Rising Stars: Meet Schy West of Ohio

Today we’d like to introduce you to Schy West.

Hi Schy, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Honestly, it started with curiosity. I always felt a pull toward music, and not even to make it at first. I just wanted to know how it was made. Why does one song hit you a certain way? Why does a certain sound make you feel something you can’t explain? Music always did that for me. It inspired me, motivated me, and got me through things.

High school was a confusing time for me. My parents split, and on top of that I was going back and forth with a girlfriend, breaking up and getting back together, then talking to other girls, trying to figure out relationships at such a young age. I was always in my feelings and struggling to stay emotionally stable with everything going on. I’m not really someone who talks to people about what I’m going through, so I kept a lot of it inside. Senior year, when I’d finish my homework and get bored in class, I started writing. That was the first time I realized I could let out what I was feeling.

After graduating, I took a gap year before college and worked at a hardware store. That year changed everything. My brothers and I pooled our money and invested in a pair of Yamaha HS8 monitors and an audio interface. Once that gear was set up, I stopped JUST writing and started really going for it. I taught myself how to work FL Studio, how to record myself, how to use effects, how to make a song sound the way it felt in my head. Learning the engineering side answered all those questions I had growing up about how music comes to be.

Today I’m a recording artist and sound engineer out of Columbus, Ohio, and music is how I express myself. It’s where I can talk about my problems, my struggles, and my mishaps in a way I never could just venting to someone. I vent to my mic. When I’m making music, I feel alive. My goal is simple: to do for other people what the art does for me. If my music helps someone feel understood, or gets them through something, then I’m doing what I’m supposed to be doing.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
A smooth road??? Not at all. One of the biggest struggles early on was not having the skill or the knowledge to do exactly what I heard in my head. I’d have an idea for a song, but I didn’t know how to record it right, mix it right, or get the sound I wanted. Everything I know, I had to teach myself, and that meant a lot of trial and error and a lot of tracks that didn’t come out the way I wanted.

The mental side has been even harder. It’s easy to look at other people’s success and start thinking you’re not good enough. I’ve dealt with a lot of self-doubt, the same stuff I think every artist goes through. Not believing in yourself, feeling like you’ll never make it, like you’ll never be that one in a million. Getting the gear and the tools I needed took time too, and it wasn’t always easy.

But the real challenge is just continuing to show up. Waking up every single day and making the music anyway, even when no one is listening or caring about what you’re putting out. That’s the part nobody sees. I keep going because this is what I truly love and what I’m passionate about, and I know that every song I make gets me a little closer to where I want to be… Not just in my music career but with my mental health as well.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I’m a recording artist and sound engineer, so I handle my music from start to finish. I write it, record it, mix it, and engineer it myself. Being self-taught on both sides of the glass is a big part of who I am as an artist, because nothing gets lost between the idea in my head and the final track.

I feel I make music for the late nights and the moments when you’re stuck in your head. My lyrics come from real things I’ve been through: relationships, family, religion, self-doubt, and trying to stay steady when everything around me isn’t. I don’t really talk about my feelings out loud, so my songs are where all of that goes. If you want to know me, listen to the music and read the lyrics. It’s all in there.

What I’m most proud of is my 120 songs that I’ve put out on my platform since starting in 2018.

What sets me apart is that my music is honest. I’m not trying to fit a trend or sound like anyone else. I’m making music that feels the way I feel, and because I engineer my own work, every detail of the sound is intentional. My goal is for someone to hear one of my songs and feel understood, the same way the artists I grew up on made me feel.

Can you talk to us a bit about the role of luck?
I think luck plays a part in everyone’s story, but I do love to say blessed instead.

Although, the luckiest thing in my life is the people around me. I have a family that supports me, and friends who are really more like family. They push me, they believe in me, and they see the vision. They listen to my music, they show up, and they do anything they can to help, because they know this is my true passion and what I feel is my calling. Not everybody has that, and I never take it for granted.

My brothers are a big part of that. When we pooled our money for those Yamaha HS8s and that audio interface, it gave me something I never could have gotten on my own at the time. Even the timing of my gap year was lucky. If I had gone straight to college, I might never have had the time to sit with that gear and really learn it.

On the other side, some of what felt like bad luck ended up shaping me. Going through my parents’ divorce and all the ups and downs in high school, women, and the gap year was hard, but it gave me something real to write about and pushed me toward music as a way to deal with it. I wouldn’t wish those times back, but I wouldn’t be the artist I am without them.

At the end of the day, I don’t wait on luck. Nobody handed me the skills. I had to sit there and figure out FL Studio, recording, and mixing on my own. Luck might open a door, but the work is what gets you through it, and having people in my corner is what keeps me going.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://SchyWest.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/schywest?cplk=MW5obWt2Ymt4aGowaA%3D%3D&utm_source=qr
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@schywest?si=E2a3tJ5gDpe8MFem
• Other: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/schy-west/1369007281