The music industry is something rarely thought of as a probable career. Senior Bert Zhang is one student who is on his way to majoring in music composition. He will be attending the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign this coming fall.

“When I was five my mom signed me up for piano lessons and I took them until eighth grade,” Zhang said. “In sixth grade I joined band, percussion and in seventh I also joined choir. In high school I stayed in band and did choir my freshman and senior year.”

Zhang has been studying music for most of his life and by continuing his focus on piano and participating band, he was able to find that he had a true talent for music.

“I figured out how to make [the piano] do what I wanted to do and eventually from that my mom told me to write down what I was playing because she had thought that I was playing from sheet music,” Zhang said. “When I told her I wasn’t she told me to write it down and from there I decided that I wanted to do something I like as a career. If I could get to a point where I had a reputation and could just free lance, I could basically have my own life.”

For Zhang, music has always been a big part of his life and he hopes to continue his music studies in college and pursuing it as a career. However, life after college seems far off and Zhang is unsure of what will happen. But he is certain that he wants to be involved in music. According to Zhang, not only his love of music has helped him come to where he is now, but his past music teachers have influenced him greatly.

“I’ve been really lucky to have a lot of great music teachers, especially in Katy ISD,” Zhang said. “I’ve never had a music teacher that wasn’t really good. They not only taught me music but they taught me how to become a better person, which has helped me a lot.”