Simón Gomez, music theater/composition freshman, wrote a song that will be performed by a Broadway star.
The song is called “Home’s Not a Place to Forget” and is set to be performed sometime this month at Missouri State University.
Gomez wrote the song for a Project 21 concert in November as a tribute to his grandmother, who’d recently died from Alzheimer’s disease.
“The song is about a broken relationship between a mother and daughter, where the daughter returns to her childhood home to care for her ailing, senile mother,” Gomez said. “It’s a song about love and loss that is really special to me.”
Madeline Powell, music theater and vocal performance freshman, performed the song in the Project 21 concert and uploaded a recording to her Facebook. Callie Altepeter, Missouri State University freshman, reached out to Gomez and asked to sing the song with her teacher after seeing the video.
“Her teacher happened to be Broadway actress Lisa Brescia, which was super exciting to find out,” Gomez said.
Gomez has been writing formally for the last year. His first full-length song premiered in October at his first Project 21 concert. He is currently working on putting music to two sonnets written by Lizzie Snellings, a music theater senior. Gomez wrote it for harp, piano and voice and plans to perform the song at the upcoming Project 21 concert at 8 p.m. March 23 in the medium rehearsal hall in the Wanda L. Bass Music Center.
“I think my friends inspire me to write music,” he said. “OCU is a place full of incredibly talented people, and seeing all that talent makes me want to write music for those people. I want to see what they can bring to my art with theirs.”
Jacob Arnold, music theater freshman, is one of the students who has sung one of Gomez’s pieces.
“His music is very real,” Arnold said. “It’s not synthetic, not something he needs to force. It just comes to him. The first time I read the song I cried, and no matter who you are, you can really connect with his music.”
Gomez said he hopes to keep writing music in the future, both vocal and instrumental.
“That’s why I love this school so much,” he said. “I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunities I get to do everything I love–sing, act, dance, perform, write music, and more.”
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