As the school day ends, ESOL and SUCCESS teacher, Micah Hadley, packs up to leave and makes his way home. Many people do not know how he spends his time outside of school. 

Hadley has a passion for playing guitar that started when he was a junior in high school. 

“In IB, there is an extracurricular component called CAS (creativity, action and service),” Hadley said. “I was going to just dip my toes in the water a little bit and play guitar.” 

Dipping his toes in the water was just the start of Hadley’s musical endeavor. Soon, Hadley was fully submerged in the art of music. 

“The last two years of high school I was really bad at doing homework because all I wanted to do was to get good enough at playing the guitar to play shows or join a band,” Hadley said. “It pretty quickly became something that I integrated into my life.”

IB helped Hadley discover his passion for playing the guitar. 

“Ultimately, IB was the big component,” Hadley said. “It gave me the format I needed to try playing an instrument, when I felt like that was another world. All my friends had been in band class or orchestra since they were little. Since I didn’t do that, I did not think I was prepared for that. At the time, everything was school unless it was a sport I was doing. Having to take an extracurricular class for IB was a door into other parts of myself that school gave me the structure to start at. It helped me realize that I can forge my own path.”

Learning guitar was not fully taught to him.

“I took guitar class, but it is very much self taught,” Hadley said. 

Playing an instrument did not end when Hadley graduated high school. He continued on throughout college and even learned how to use his voice properly. 

“I took a vocal class during undergrad because I wanted to learn more about how to sing as an instrument and not destroy my voice,” Hadley said. “When I was in high school, the White Stripes and the Black Eyed Peas were a really big deal. I would shout-sing to try and get my voice to breakup and get more gravely, but I was destroying it. I wanted to learn technique.”

Throughout college Hadley had been writing music.

“I used to play music every single day when I would get home from classes in college,” Hadley said. “Sometimes it was problematic because I was putting off a lot of work, so I could just keep working on pieces I was writing.”

Hadley has been in many bands since he first started playing. 

“The first band I joined was in my senior year of high school,” Hadley said. “I wanted to do our school’s so called talent show. I was then in a band in college. Soon after I was in another band in college. I have been in some sorta bands, since then. I also toured with a band in Arizona.”

Hadley joined a band to express the genera of music he enjoys.

“In high school, I really liked listening to 1960s and 1940s blues,” Hadley said. “I want to perform that for people who appreciated it. Now, I play many different genres. It has been a mix lately. I am more into new wave rock.”

Hadley has any musical influences. They include SZA, D’Angelo, Alex G, Light Asylum, and many more. 

Music is a way for people to be creative and let their emotions flow. 

“I use music as a way to let people know that I am putting on a new persona because I am on the stage,” Hadley said. 

The band Hadley is currently in, is in the process of making shows a regular. 

“Every Monday we have a band practice,” Hadley said. “One of our bandmates is a lawyer so his schedule is kind of crazy. Because this is a newer version of the band, we played a show this last summer but we had a lineup change. Now, we are trying to gel as a newer group. We are going to try and play open mic at The Camel and play a stripped down version of some songs.”

Since the new year recently rang in, Hadley has made a new years resolution for himself. 

“Part of my new years resolution is to go back to playing a little bit of music everyday,” Hadley said. “I practice everyday.”

In college, Hadley would rather play the guitar than do homework. Now that he is a teacher, he has a better balance. 

“Now, I feel that I have a better balance,” Hadley said. “Being a teacher helps with that because you need to unwind and not bring too much of your job home with you.”

Hadley will continue to play guitar with his band at open mics as the year continues on.