Conversations with Savannah King

Today we’d like to introduce you to Savannah King.

Hi Savannah, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’m 21, the oldest of four girls, and I’m a transfer student at Belmont University. I’m from a port city on the Gulf Coast, Mobile, Alabama, and ever since I was really young I’ve had a deep love for music. I grew up listening to a super wide range of stuff in the car with my dad; everything from Queen to french rap to Fleet Foxes to Kanye. I started singing when I was around 4 or 5 and that eventually turned into my taking voice lessons which I ended up doing all the way through high school. I picked up the guitar at 12 and have been playing ever since, and I play a little piano. I stayed in my hometown for my first two years of college pursuing a degree in Psychology and Criminal Justice, and then the infamous Covid-19 lockdown happened. As awful as Covid was, it allowed me a lot of time for self-reflection, evaluation of where I was in my life, and personal growth. I’ve always been passionate about mental health, but Covid reignited that passion when I was able to see the world as a whole in a very vulnerable place struggling mentally.

During this time I came to the realization that there was a significant absence of one of the most important things in my life, and that was music. So I started inquiring about degrees involving both Psychology and Music at my old university, but they had nothing available. I found out about Music Therapy through some research of my own and decided that somehow I was going to figure out a way to do that with my life (helping people with music–are you kidding me? That’s the best thing ever). I had looked into going to Belmont in high school and ultimately ended up attending my hometown college, but I revisited the idea of Belmont when I realized I wanted to do Music Therapy. I saw that they were having virtual auditions and I reached back out to my old voice teacher. We got back into the swing of things and trained for about three months for the Belmont auditions. As nerve-racking as that was I told myself that if I got in, that would be amazing, and if I didn’t that would be okay too. It wasn’t a smooth road getting here by any means whatsoever, but I’m talking to you today, so we made it! I’ve now done a year at Belmont, and I quite literally could not ask for a better school, experience, education, group of friends, or city. I’m absolutely in love with Nashville and everything it has given me so far, and I hope to give just as much, if not more, back.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
The road here has definitely not been smooth, whether that be struggling with my own mental health, finances, relationships, grades, etc. But such is life, you know? I expect to put up a fight for the things that mean a lot to me, the things that I care about and am passionate about, and this was and is one of those things. My grandmother always tells me “this too shall pass” and she’s 100% right. It’s all about perspective. I’m just making it through one day at a time.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I’m a Music Therapy major with a concentration in Commercial Voice at Belmont. Usually, when I tell people that they think that I do music for commercials, like advertisements, which is funny. For anyone who doesn’t know, any type of commercial music study focuses on genres outside of studying classically. I’m proud of myself for getting to where I am today. I had help along the way and I am so deeply grateful for that. But I think I’m most proud of my little sisters back at home. They’re all so drastically different and each have so much to offer individually and are so creative and talented in their own ways. Watching them grow up has been the coolest thing. I really hope I can be some sort of example for them, not in terms of them living up to what I do or following in my footsteps, but showing them that they aren’t confined to one place or way of thinking—that they can pursue their talents and gifts for a living and be fulfilled in that.

So maybe we end on discussing what matters most to you and why?
I don’t think there’s one specific thing that matters most to me—I think what matters to me the most is figuring out the ways I can utilize this life I was given, like… how can I impact the people I meet along the way? How can I make a difference each day that I’m here-even in tiny ways-especially with music? How can I make people from all different walks of life feel like they belong? People fascinate me and I like to think that our differences can bring us together.