We recently connected with Batu Ozkaner and have shared our conversation below.

Batu, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

Starting a career is taking a risk. You don’t know if you’ll end up being good at it, you don’t know if you love it or hate it, and you don’t know if you’ll make a living out of it. I’ve been through this all, and I don’t regret even a bit the day I started making music. Since I was a little kid, I put this one idea in my head that I was going to make the best music in the history of mankind and to this day, as a student at Berklee College Of Music, I still strive to make that happen because the biggest investment a person can make is to take risks and never stop pursuing.

Batu, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My father was the one that actually made me start playing music. When I was seven years old, he would take me to piano lessons every weekend and that kind of became my primary instrument. Then about a year later, we found out Mimar Sinan fine arts university- a very prestigious music school in Turkiye was making entrance exams. With the help of my dad I quickly joined and got accepted to pursue guitar as my primary instrument.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

Making music rewards you with the biggest weapon in the world. Influence. There is no other force in the world that can make people move, laugh, cry, angry, and make them feel other complex emotions all at once. As an artist, you have the power to do all of this and be the voice of millions of people who listen to your music. This kind of power is dangerous and could be used to make the world a better place, but it is used by people who wants to control mass audiences. These people constantly make music and trends on social media that don’t matter, making people dumber and dumber every single day. I think it’s time to change this.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

There is only one way society can support artists. Listening to the ones who do matter. Listening to artists who genuinely tries their best to put on good music. Listening to artists that makes you wanna get up, work on yourself and be better than who you were yesterday because if everyone encourages every single person in their lives to better themselves everyday, this will not only create a thriving creative ecosystem, but create a successful society.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/imbatuoz/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/batu-oz-5aa3b0281/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0A3HNIBKbePIFEPlTmT9Cw