Chris Bangos
Known for his fascination with technology and international musical inspirations, Chris Bangos is a Music Technology student who combines his past culture with a new age sound. During his younger years growing up around a Greek community in Southern California, this led to experiencing what music was like on the other side of the world as well his love for classic rock. It wasn’t until middle school where he was given the opportunity to discover the world of sound.
In his middle school years, he was handed some sticks and eventually became the schools only drumset player, giving him his chance to play live with the orchestra and guitar ensembles. As he was entering high school, he asked his father, who was a drummer in a Greek band, a question that he often remembers asking: “What if I also picked up the guitar?”. His dad of course encouraged it. During the summer of 2017, Chris saved up enough money from working at his dad’s pizza shop to buy his first guitar, a red Fender Stratocaster with a fender mustang amp. With his new appreciation for heavy guitar riffs from Van Halen, led zeppelin and Def Leppard, he aspired to rock out the rest of his life. Alongside the guitar, he also grew fond of learning the piano, the punch of a bass, and the greek influence of the Bouzouki. With these instruments always on his mind, he knew the next step was learning how to produce and write music in the modern world.
When it came to the 2020 Corona Virus pandemic, Chris utilized this time to improve and learn. Using his seriously underpowered laptop, he experimented with trial run of FL Studio, cheap headphones, and a Focusrite Solo interface. Barely understanding how to use virtual instruments, he tried producing his own music, which at the time was hip hop-based guitar tracks. Throughout the pandemic, he would build computer systems, learn audio hardware, and continue to strengthen his musical ability. This led to his decision to choose what he wanted to pursue in college. He knew he loved music, but also was conflicted in his fascination with computer science. He had to make a decision and chose the perfect combination in a new program called Music Technology at Belmont University.
As a freshman he would learn how little he knew about the future of this career and was eager to start. Throughout the years, he would get involved in scoring short films and playing live solo shows. Learning from Carl Rydlund, Chris would drift towards scoring for media, creating thematic music for various visual concepts while learning software synthesizers and how to mix and orchestrate more high-quality music. He would then get involved in scoring student films and sound designing for Belmont Musical Theater, broadening his music technology background. During the summers in between school, he would play live shows incorporating his music tech skills during his acoustic nights. Now as a senior, he has had credits in indie films alongside warner bros, arranged for the jazz band at Belmont, and sound designing for musical theater and indie games. Look forward to his upcoming Greek band in Nashville and scores for indie films.