By Arianna DerManulian ’14 | Staff Writer

With a strong passion for music and performing, four 2011 graduates were accepted into the Berklee College of Music in Boston in the hopes of recording their first album consisting of four to six original songs.

Josias Yglesias, Walter Bridgforth, Scott Posada and Haley Grant began playing together their senior year at South and are continuing making music with their band Sias.

“We all started playing our instruments around 8^th grade,” said lead vocalist and guitarist Yglesias. “But during our senior year of high school, we decided to start our own band and throughout the past three years we have been developing our own style and genre of music.”

Each person has their own unique addition to the band, Yglesias said. Bridgforth had gotten accepted into Berklee right after his senior year of high school as a drummer which led to the decision of Posada, Yglesias and Grant transferred to the school in the hopes of pursing their music career together.

“We all have different majors,” said Yglesias. “For example, Scott’s doing electronic production and design and I’m doing the music business so when we all come together to practice, we all incorporate what we’ve learned throughout the week to improve ourselves.”

Bridgforth said the music itself explains their growth chronologically. He said the diversity they have acquired transformed them from an average high school band into a band with individuals who shine in their own right as well.

“Having the high school band follow your footsteps into somewhere as prestigious as Berklee is an opportunity for us to grow as musicians as a whole,” said Bridgforth. “Most bands take breaks during summer months if they’re not all living in the same area or substitute players until they meet again. We have the luxury of learning and then applying what we learn to our music year round which is awesome.”

Back in high school, Yglesias said they had been to two recording studios in Detroit, but unfortunately lacked sound quality with their work.

“I think back then (in high school) we didn’t take the whole thing too seriously,” said Yglesias. “But when we started our freshman year of college, we had been working really hard on everything and since being students at Berklee, we have become much more experienced with our work and what we are able to do with it.”

After composing nearly 50 songs, Yglesias said their genre of music is very different yet interesting.

“There’s a mix between electronic, jazz and pop,” said Yglesais. “There’s a bunch of different instruments added throughout the piece so there’ll be an electronic beat incorporated with real drums, so it’s very different but really cool sounding.”

Being the only fallback to their success, recording one song is nearly $1,000, Yglesias said.

“When we all go back home, we’re going to try and raise money through fundraising and kickstarter.com, which is a website designed to support those in the music and arts industry,” said Yglesias. “We also play at two bars: Telly’s Bar and Grill and Blue Pointe Restaurant to try and get our music out there and spark an interest in people.”

Everything is very new and stressful to the band, Yglesais said. Especially raising money and getting people to recognize them.

Yglesais’ brother, Jacob Yglesais ’13 said that he and his family are very strong supporters for their band and have even created a website called www.siasmusic.net to help support them and raise money.

“We are just trying to get our name out,” said Yglesias. “We’re literally everywhere, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, you name it, we’re there. But aside from money, everything is basically all coming together since we have our songs down perfectly and then from there we only need to record them and then promote our music.”

Since being students at Berklee, Yglesias said they have been given so many great opportunities to pursue their music career.

Bridgforth said he enjoys recording and taking pride in the professionalism it entails. He said time is money and the longer a band takes to get everything just right means the bill will grow exponentially. Fortunately, he said the band doesn’t have that problem because they are trained how to be professional.

“A lot of artists such as John Mayer, PSY and Imagine Dragons had all gone to Berklee and they made it out into the big world,” said Yglesias. “Our name is going to be out there because a lot of people make it from here (Berklee), and with such great support from our friends and family we’ll definitely be recognized soon.”