Meet Xavier Muzik

Today we’d like to introduce you to Xavier Muzik.

Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
I am a composer, but I wasn’t raised in a particularly musical household. Most of my time was devoted to athletics. At some point in my life, I’ve played football, soccer, basketball. I also ran track and wrestled. I came into music through the middle school band (I played the tuba), and this was the first time I dared explore an avenue that wasn’t tied to athletics. There’s an infamous story in my family about the time that my parents tried to have me take piano lessons as a young child, but I threw a fit and refused to have any of it. I’ve since come around and have recognized the error in my ways. I think I needed to discover music on my own accord to develop the passion I have for it now, but I digress.

Mind you, up to this point I had been living in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I was born there and I lived there until I was 16, which was about 9 years ago. It was in New Mexico that I discovered the crush that would eventually bloom into a full-on infatuation for music and the arts. In my first two years of high school (in New Mexico), I explored this blossoming love affair with music through piano classes that the school offered, while simultaneously experimenting with creating my own works. But my options were limited. It became apparent that in order to give music the shot it deserved, I needed to move. When I was 16, that door was opened for me.

My parents are both from Los Angeles and were eager to move back. Unfortunately, the move had to be executed in stages. My mother would move out here first, while my dad, who was one of the Deputy Chief of the Fire Department in Albuquerque, would commute for a couple of years until he was eligible to retire at which point he would make the move permanently. I could choose to either move out with my mom or stay back with my dad. Though the decision was heartbreaking for me, I decided to move out to Los Angeles for the promise of opportunity and education. My interest in music was more than a fleeting moment of experimentation.

I was drawn to music because of its capacity for expression. For various reasons, I have always been a rather muted person when it comes to the public expression of my feelings and emotions, but music gave me permission to be unabashedly me, and I loved that.

I continued to learn and refine my craft threw music theory and choir classes in high school here in Los Angeles. Eventually, I was accepted to CalArts where I studied music composition. After I graduated, I developed another love: politics, or more accurately, campaigning and movement building. It turns out that the same thing that drew me to music, the opportunity to fully and completely express myself, also drew me to politics. I’ve come to define this as a result of a deep-seated conviction I never knew I always had: the right of every person to self-sovereignty and self-expression. Now I define expression very broadly to include things that don’t immediately pertain to the arts such as voting and participating in our society/democracy. I define self-sovereignty to include many things from economic mobility and security to the right everyone has to feel safe and accepted in their own skin. I wanted to do everything I could to secure those rights for everyone, especially those who have traditionally been silenced.

My dive into politics took time that would otherwise be used for music, but I don’t mind. Ultimately, our art is the pursuit of the most genuine manifestation of our experiences and our earnest attempt to process those experiences. I would be doing myself a disservice had I decided to live my life in any way or fashion that wasn’t an extension of my most genuine self, and I honestly believe my music would have suffered.

My love for music and politics stems from the same seed for me. Moving forward, I hope to combine the two in my life more fruitfully.

Please tell us about your music.
I am a composer, which means that I write music. My genre of choice is a concert, or otherwise known as classical, music. I primarily focus on acoustic music with more or less traditional ensembles. Think woodwind and string quartets. Music is how I express myself, and that’s something that I always try to keep in mind as I create. It’s more important to me that the music I create is genuine than it is that people enjoy it. I think like most people when I create I have something in particular in mind that I want to communicate, and I do hope that comes across in the final product, but I am not entirely sure whether or not people receive that particular something is all that important. Sometimes, people walk away from my music with an entirely different take than what I had intended, and that’s ok. What some feeling or experience my sound like to me may not be the same for everyone. But ultimately though that process, I learn more about my perceptions of my experiences and how that relates to the society in which I live.

What do you think about the conditions for artists today? Has life become easier or harder for artists in recent years? What can cities like ours do to encourage and help art and artists thrive?
That’s a complicated question. I think the nature of the artist is to create, and an artist is gonna art no matter what. That being said, external conditions can have an outsized impact on the artist’s ability to create. For me, the biggest hurdle I’ve encountered here in Los Angeles is the cost of living and funding. I’ve had to take on odd jobs and such just to pay rent, which isn’t always a guarantee. Granted the reasons for this are systemic and much too complicated and nuanced to get into here, I think were these situations properly addressed, Los Angeles would be an even better city for artists than it already is, and it is a great city for artists.

How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
The easiest way to see and hear my work is through my website: www.xaviermuzik.com. The best way to support my work is to commission performances of my work and/or new works entirely, in addition to checking out said performances.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.xaviermuzik.com
• Email: muzik@xaviermuzik.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/xaviermuzik
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ecqsen

Image Credit:
Thomas Rooney

Suggest a story: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.