“It started off as a hobby,” Ager said of making music. “But then after a couple years of doing it, I thought, ‘Man, I could really do something like this in real life if I just continued to work on it and perfect it. And here I am now.”

From 2002 through 2006, the former guard Ager was one of the MSU basketball team’s most dynamic players, and like any student-athlete, Ager’s duties with the Spartans kept him busy.

But in between class, practices and games, Ager never abandoned his passion for music.

“That’s what I did during most of my off time,” Ager said. “I was always making music, it kept me out of trouble.”

After college, as he was working to become a professional basketball player, music still was a major part of Ager’s life.

He continued to produce beats, but never made anything official in terms of his own label or production company while continuing to pursue a professional basketball career.

However, in April of 2010, Ager began to turn his music hobby into a career when he established Moe Ager Productions LLC with the help of his college friend Dan Dugger — who now is the vice president of his company.

“Ever since I knew him, he was always making music,” Dugger, also an MSU graduate, said of Ager. “So after he graduated, I worked with him in his professional career in basketball, but then we realized we needed to materialize his skill set off the court to better prepare him for life after basketball.”

Back to school

With his production label official and his website launched, Ager began to receive more exposure, and one of the first groups to notice was his alma mater.

MSU Associate Athletics Director John Lewandowski, whom Dugger worked for while at MSU, said the athletics department had been working with a national company to produce beats for head football coach Mark Dantonio’s website — coachdantonio.com. With that plan not running as smoothly as he had hoped, Lewandowski said he and the department jumped on the chance to work with a former Spartan to make music and beats they found appropriate for the website.

And when Dugger introduced the idea to Ager, he was just as excited as those in charge at his former school.

“It’s a blessing just to get an opportunity, and of course it’s my old school so I want to do anything I can to help them,” Ager said. “Without that institution, I wouldn’t be where I am right now.

Soon, what began as producing just a few tracks for a website turned into a much larger project. Thrilled with what Ager had given the athletics department, Lewandowski came to Dugger with a new idea.

“We probably had not been more than a couple weeks into that project when I approached Dan and said ‘Hey, what do you think about Moe working on a football theme song?’” Lewandowski said. “So we threw out some ideas and what we thought were some key phrases.”

Within two and a half weeks, Lewandowski said the athletics department had received a beat from Ager with one verse rapped on top of it by another former Spartan — Sam Richardson, who graduated in 2005 with a degree in chemistry.

After hearing the first draft of the song, Lewandowski said they asked for one more verse from Richardson, who also goes by Crimson Tha Black.

Two weeks later, Lewandowski had the final cut of “Forever I’m a Spartan.”

“My staff and I were blown away,” Lewandowski said.

Forever a Spartan

Although the song was complete, the final product was not yet done.

Lewandowski said he previewed the song in early August for Dantonio and a few of the players, including junior quarterback Kirk Cousins.

“I thought it was a great idea,” Cousins said of the song. “When you have a guy like Maurice Ager, who’s a Spartan and has represented the Spartans so well while playing basketball here and beyond, it’s great to have him get involved and use his talents to further profile MSU in a positive way.”

Dantonio also approved of the song, Lewandowski said, and ideas of how to present it to the entire team were discussed.

Eventually, it was decided a music video would be made featuring Ager and Richardson, and the football team would watch it the morning of their first game Saturday against Western Michigan.

“It got me excited,” junior safety Trenton Robinson said of hearing the song before the game. “I told some of the guys, I want to get that on a CD or something so I can keep listening to it.”

“Forever I’m a Spartan” also was played prior to Saturday’s game at Spartan Stadium, and is available on iTunes.

After costs are covered for the production of the song, Lewandowski said the proceeds will be split down the middle between Ager and the MSU Spartan Fund, per Ager’s request.

“When we decided that we were going to move forward with this project, it was immediately, ‘Hey, when it comes time, we want to go 50-50 with the downloads,’” Lewandowski said. “So we’re thrilled with that.”

Although Ager said he does want to make a profit with his music, “Forever I’m a Spartan” and his other work with MSU is about more than money.

“Of course I care about the money, but at the end of the day, we’re all looking out for each other and this is a win-win situation,” Ager said. “When people see me doing those things for Michigan State, that could be even more money, and of course I’m going to look out for my school.”