We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Son Chau. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Son below.

Son, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you tell us a bit about who your hero is and the influence they’ve had on you?

I started playing guitar when I was 14, and I can remember the moment that it clicked in my head that that’s what I wanted to do with my life. I was watch MTV in my room when the music video for “Into the Night” by Carlos Santana came on and I remember feeling so euphoric as I’m listening to the song; suffice to say I was obsessed with that song for a good while, anytime it comes on TV I would immediately drop everything and go listen to it. That spurred my interest for guitars and eventually made me want to make folks feel the way that I felt the first time I heard that song, hence my pursuit in a music career began. So I would say that Carlos Santana is the first of many heroes that inspired me throughout my journey as a musician.

As the years went on and my interests changes, there were many other musicians that influenced me at different points in life. Paul Gilbert for his technical prowess and precision with the guitar, Mateus Asato for his smooth melodic playing and now Cory Wong and Victor Wooten for their skills on their instruments but also mainly for their approach and attitude towards music.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I started out playing guitar but eventually started dabbling in music productions on the side and now I’ve produced and recorded a number of local artists in the DFW area such as Jacob Serrano, Xyzsa Love, Ava Jacobs and more. As mentioned before I also play guitar as a hired gun for multiple projects and solo acts, and I teach music lessons during my time off of performances and studio sessions.

I’m definitely proud of the fact that I really do enjoy creating and performing music, so studio work and shows seldom feel like work to me, and as a music instructor I am very passionate about sharing everything I learned over the years because I never had the opportunity to attend a music/fine art academy.

What else should we know about how you took your side hustle and scaled it up into what it is today?

My career as a musician definitely started out as mainly a hobby in high school that evolved into a true life interest when I graduated. Meeting my best friend of many years (who is currently a music therapist) after high school prompted me to seriously consider and ultimately decided to go to college for music, for it was something that we both were very much interested in. However at this point music was still very much uncharted territory for me, I knew what I wanted to achieve but not necessarily how to achieve it. Through him and a few mutual friends, I was recommended to provide music lessons at a small mom & pop music shop in Grand Prairie where I spent the last 10 or so years providing music lessons. It was through there that I met Jacob Serrano, a local artist who is also currently teaching music at the same establishment. The path to my dream opened up when Jacob decided to work with me on performing and writing music, as he was brought up in a very musical family/environment and was provided many resources to propel himself forward as a musician.
Ever since then, music was less of a shot in the dark and became more of a well-defined endeavor for me.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

I would say personally for me, the most rewarding aspect of creating music is to see folks really being inspired or emotionally impacted by my songs or production work. As a teacher is being able to see my students succeed and/or learn to love and understand music in a meaningful way.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/killmonomusic/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/killmonomusic/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/SonChauGuitar
• Tiktok: tiktok.com/@killmonomusic?lang=en
• Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/2yhGhqLjXBGeRUGAiBug7E?si=mX0bc1WqTTKq1P1NDbkVbg&nd=1&dlsi=ef063dc52c124e6a

Image Credits
Anamaria Perez Tom Salazar Susie Theisen