PHOENIX — It's where you'll find some of the hottest harmonies here in the Valley and some of the boldest beats -- and it's not a club, not a recording studio either - instead, it's all in a classroom.
Some of the students aren't even old enough to get their driver's licenses, but they're not letting age, or anything else, stand in their way.
"This is where we get down," said Dion Gordon, a Goodyear teacher at Valor Preparatory Academy.
Mr. Gordon's Digital Music Studio class at the Goodyear school has been hitting the high notes with students for quite some time!
"We do the 21st-century skills collaboration and communication and just the creativity part: we just want to get to that right side of the brain, not just be a critical thinking, frontal lobe, but go into other areas of the brain and really expand and be creative."
"If I listen to that one vocal that just hits - it's just...yum!" explained Maxx De la Cruz. "It gets you excited. It makes you forget about everything else."
De la Cruz is already producing his own beats and is doing it with a program called, "Music Studio." He and his classmates are able to mix their own music and rev up their own rhythms, just like the top DJs and producers would do, except they're doing it right here in this classroom.
"Whenever I finish making a song, I feel relieved - like, oh yeah, I just made it and it sounds good. It's a happy feeling," said De la Cruz.
Many of the students say they have big plans after graduating, hoping to take the music industry by storm. But for now, impressing their classmates, and Mom and Dad, is good enough!
"They see the artist," explained Damian Brooks, a junior. "They see someone who has potential. And making good stuff. Every time I show them, they're like 'oh my goodness this is so good.'"
"Being a teacher, I wasn't very expressive until 11th grade, so I just believe trying to pull out their voices and let them know that what they say and what they do means something," explained Mr. Gordon.
