By Kalena Reynolds | Staff Writer
Students by day and DJs by night, Louis Brogan and Anirudh Nair have found their calling by managing music careers while balancing full course loads in hopes of one day making it big.
Atlanta senior Louis Brogan said he began exploring music last summer, ultimately inspiring his interest in DJing. He then started learning from YouTube videos of his favorite artists.
“I worked for the Atlanta Braves in the summer, so I worked really weird hours,” Brogan said. “I worked from 7 p.m. to 1 a.m., so during the day, I would wake up, watch YouTube and figure it out.”
While Brogan picked up the skill relatively fast, his inspiration came from his love of house and EDM artists.
“It’s something that just kind of grabbed my attention,” Brogan said. “I’d say probably around last year is when I really started listening to house music and EDM, which is what really got me into it. So I’d also say it’s a hobby too, because I try to go to a lot of concerts. I listen to a lot of music that is similar to what I do.”
After Brogan did his first set at 5IVE Night Club, he began doing weekly sets at both Scruffy Murphy’s and 5IVE Night Club. Brogan said the weekly sets are less nerve-wracking, but the larger ones are more high-stakes.
“I don’t get nervous when I play most times, like weekly at bars, but when it’s a big event and people are kind of staring at you and they’re more there for you, the atmosphere is like, ‘Oh God,'” Brogan said.
Cypress junior Anirudh Nair began his DJing journey in April 2023 after seeing an increasing number of DJ TikToks on his feed.
“I was like, ‘Well, this doesn’t seem too hard,'” Nair said. “So then I just ended up buying a board and started learning by first watching those transitions on TikTok along with just some basic YouTube videos.”
Nair said he spent last summer in Waco taking classes at Baylor and honing his skills as a DJ in his free time.
“Instead of watching YouTube videos, I kind of just started messing around on my board every day,” Nair said. “I would start watching DJ sets on YouTube because I love house music and EDM. Then, the better I got at it, I realized this is what I really want to do with my life.”
Aside from DJing, Nair has also begun producing his own music to further his experience as a DJ and benefit his career.
“It was around July when I was like, ‘OK, if I want to be a famous EDM DJ, I have to start producing my own remixes and my own songs,'” Nair said. “That’s kind of when I started my production journey, which honestly helped me as a DJ, and then being a DJ helps me with producing too.”
For Nair, the production and practicing process is his escape from his lengthy course load of 18 hours, but it would only be possible with extreme time management skills.
“During the week is when I get my work done,” Nair said. “In the morning and in the afternoon, go to class, come back, get my stuff done and study in the evening or night. Then, during my study breaks, whenever I’m not hanging out with my friends or not working out or something, my study breaks are essentially producing new songs or new remixes — because, in a way, that’s something else I’m doing that’s still productive, and it’s still my goal and my dream that I’m working for.”
