Musician uses local venues, MSU to achieve career goals

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Although the Beatles and Michael Jackson are legends in his book, MSU music performance junior Adrian Sanchez credits the beginning of his musical aspirations to ‘N Sync.

“My brother and his friends were trying to do this performance to ‘Bye, Bye, Bye,’ and that was it,” Sanchez said. “I started getting into dancing through that whole boy band thing.”

Sanchez, a budding vocalist and guitarist, has since moved on from his boy band craze and into Lansing-area performance venues, flexing his vocal muscles and gaining fans as he goes.

Sanchez teamed up with fellow music performance freshman Connor Ralph at the East Lansing Farmer’s Market last Sunday.

“Adrian is just a fun-loving dude,” Ralph said. “I’ve never even seen him get angry, and he has a great voice — it blends really well with mine.”

Sanchez attributes his talents in part to an artistic family, which he said has supported him from the beginning.

“My older brother is into painting, … my oldest brother and my dad (are) big into welding and decorating, and my mom makes wedding dresses,” said Sanchez. “I grew up with a family really comfortable with me doing art and music.”

Associate professor Richard Fracker has been Sanchez’s voice instructor for a year and a half, working with him in private lessons as well as in the studio with other students.

“He’s a terrific young man,” Fracker said. “I’ve always been interested in his voice, but Adrian has the human being component too — the audience can always sense his sincerity.”

Although Fracker works with many talented students, he said he is impressed by Sanchez’s abilities and passion for music.

“He would rate extremely high on the charts as far as innate ability,” Fracker said. “He’s exceeded everything I thought about his potential talent.”

Sanchez said he was excited to show off his original music at the farmer’s market and is looking forward to more opportunities to come through both the College of Music and local performances.

Sanchez, along with Ralph, plans on taking advantage of open mic nights at the MSU Union and Lansing bars. He also will be going international in the near future, with plans to join fellow MSU music students in a trip to Beijing in October.

“We perform with singers there in an exchange program that’s a week or so long,” said Sanchez. “Then we have singers from China come here, and do the same thing. It’s a really awesome opportunity and I’m really fortunate to be a part of it.”

Although Sanchez acknowledges some instability in the music industry, he believes he’s doing what he was meant to do.

“My freshman year, I realized that I’m here to entertain,” Sanchez said. “When I figured that out, every day just seemed to be going in the right direction. I just trust that I’ll be happy and I know I’ll be on stage.”

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