Personal Statement Essay

Noel Lopez

3/25/2022

According to Google, “Making music is a universal human trait that goes back to at least

35,000 years ago.” Music is something that I've grown to love to the point I want to make a

career out of it. Music has been a major part of my life for the past four years and has grown on

me slowly but surely. This essay will be about my “musical journey” so far.

For my 15th birthday my parents bought me an acoustic guitar as a surprise. I had been

picking up guitar and piano in a music class I had at school for the past year, but I was more fond

of the piano than the guitar. When I opened my gift I was not very happy. Now, looking back on

it, it was probably the best day of my life. I had thought to myself how I had wanted a piano

instead, and how mad I was.

The first four months I let the guitar collect dust in a corner of my room. Barely picking it

up to strum a string, I never even bothered to learn a chord until I heard a song on guitar that I

thought sounded cool. I took the time to try and learn the riff and actually started to get some

enjoyment out of the instrument. I just started getting more fascinated with it and then started to

learn some chords. After about a year, I had almost all the open chords memorized. I never took

lessons, nor do I plan to if I needed to learn something. I always just looked it up on YouTube,

but I do think that I would be a much better guitarist if I did get lessons.

In the summer months of 2020, all I dedicated myself to was playing the guitar. I was

getting better quickly and I had just got an electric guitar that same summer. I started to learn

more advanced chords and scales. Later that year, I went on a two and a half week trip to Hawaii.

When I went to Hawaii they had a music shop next door to the resort we stayed at. My friend and
I spent a majority of our time there. The owner of the shop was a middle aged man named

Samuel Banano, he has his own ukulele company and custom makes his own. I bought one “on

the cheaper side” for $500. I fell in love with the instrument and picked it up quicker because I

have experience with a similar instrument.

Nowadays I'm starting to learn music theory and playing rhythm guitar in the church

band. Music changed me in many ways over the past 2 years, so much so that it has changed the

kind of music I listen to. Guitar has changed the way I listen to music as well, making it easier to

hear the instruments more clearly. I am excited to see where music takes me in the future and

how much it impacts my life. Learning instruments has changed me for the better and I hope to

go to college to become a music teacher.