At the Kingswood Oxford Middle School, most students display their musical talents during band, orchestra, choir concerts, and the occasional assembly. However, many students can’t perform their preferred style of music with the same frequency and attention as those in organized musical groups can.
One of these musicians is eighth-grader Jack Gold. Although Jack plays the clarinet in the Concert Band and the jazz guitar in the Jazz Band, his true passion is playing rock and metal on his guitar.
His love for the guitar started in first grade when he received his cousin’s old Fender Squier navy blue electric guitar. Ever since that day, Jack has endlessly practiced his craft as a guitarist and can now recreate fast and complicated rifts from AC/DC and Metallica with ease.
Ever since his elementary school days, Jack has loved rock and metal. “What I like about rock and metal is that it is fast and aggressive so when I’m not feeling it or just need something to do, it fixes me basically,” Jack said. “ [It’s] super aggressive and it’s just fun to play, cause it’s fast.”
Another musician is seventh-grader Owen Caligiuri. Owen sings with the choir; however, he is known for rapping on his SoundCloud account he named BigScooch.
Owen created BigScooch after his friends dared him to record a song. What started as lower quality music with an extremely basic recording software has now turned into longer, stronger, and more entertaining tracks.
Before being deleted, “trAck-A (disstrAck)”, a song Owen recorded with two other friends, had almost 500 plays. For the most part, Owen enjoyed the overwhelmingly positive reaction he got from friends and classmates. “I was really happy. I knew it was going to get a lot [of attention], because it was a diss track. It was kind of a joke I really wasn’t trying to be rude, and in the beginning I even made a disclaimer,” Owen said.
Although many non-traditional musicians do not get as much recognition as they deserve, Jack Gold and Owen Caligiuri have excelled in their fields of music. Students can find Owen’s music when searching BigScooch in SoundCloud. Jack Gold will soon put his music on his Instagram account.“I’m always looking for a new guitar, so if you have one lying around, please give it to me,” he said.
