The near-blinding lights on stage fill the otherwise pitch black stage as junior Simon Young makes his entrance with his guitar in hand. His hands shake in nervousness, but he stays headstrong and determined to play his best. He steps on stage and puts his fingers to the strings, and the outside world disappears. All that matters is in six chords.
Simon Young writes and plays music for local businesses and restaurants. He has been writing for six years and performing for two. He mainly plays acoustic guitar, but he knows how to play the drums as well.
“I started [writing music] when I was about ten years old,” Young said. “I started listening to Ed Sheeran and some of the acoustic artists that my dad inspired me to listen to. They kind of made me want to be able to paint that mental image that they were able to.”
Young started playing publically when he was fourteen, prompting people to reach out to hire him for gigs. Though he only knew how to play a few songs, he managed to draw the attention of various officials that helped start his career.
“I was playing at a wine swirl that was in downtown Tyler,” Young said. “I knew five songs and played for four hours straight. I played for that whole time only knowing five songs and just moving from place to place, so I wasn’t playing the same thing for the same people. It was actually a lot of fun and, that night, I got seven bookings and really got my name out there. It was a great experience. It was like the highlight of my career.”
Branching out from his solo career, Young has been working with his new band, Chaos and Creation, since the beginning of February. As of March, the band has played two shows around East Texas and has already received a lot of positive feedback.
“I did not think anything would ever come from it,” Young said. “I feel like this opportunity has a lot of potential, and I am super excited to see where the band takes me. They are a great group of guys.”
His career has not been without its challenges, however. As a musician, Young has faced adversity in balancing his school work and passion for music at the same time. Oftentimes, he had to give up time he would spend playing music to focus on school.
“A lot of the time your not able to book a certain show or you’re not getting along with certain people,” Young said. “Things as far as school or something like that is getting in the way and you can’t play shows for two months. At one point I had to take a six month break because I had school, I had a lot of family stuff going on, and so there’s definitely a lot of obstacles when it comes to something like this.”
Young listens to various types of music, but his own work is typically acoustic. His taste in music stretches from hip hop to punk rock, and draws inspiration from his own playlist in the music he produces. His passion also extends to doing covers of songs in acoustic style.
“I branch out into anything I can,” Young said. “My goal is to take anything that is not acoustic and put it into acoustics. I’ll take anything from 90’s rap to Ed Sheeran’s acoustic stuff and then go to Queen, putting that into acoustic guitar.”
Though he has faced many challenges, Young’s passion for music has not wavered, and he still seeks to write and compose music as a career after high school.
“It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been doing it for, you will always find challenges,” Young Said. “As far as songwriting goes you will go through time periods where you cannot write any lyrics, you can’t do anything like that. You’re just at a songwriter’s block and nothing comes out.”
