Carmel High School senior Sophia Stephens has had hearing issues her entire life.
In seventh grade, she failed a school test and learned she had a cholesteatoma, an abnormal collection of skin cells deep in the ear. She had surgery to remove it, but she remains deaf in her right ear.
That hasn’t stopped her from singing and writing songs.
Stephens, 17, has been writing songs since first grade, but got serious when she was in eighth grade. She has written approximately 300 songs.
Some of the songs are pop and some are more of the indie genre.
“It’s hard to put a name on my style because I write so many different songs because I like experimenting with different things,” she said.
Her favorite songs to write are rock, but those aren’t the ones on her EP (extended play) recording that she released in June called “Remnantal,” featuring four songs.
“My dad got in touch with some producers, and the producers helped to take some of the instrumental pieces we already had and combine it with my voice to put it on these websites,” she said.
The producers were from London, Portugal and Nashville, Tenn.
Stephens said her brother, Jack, wrote the piano piece for her song “Familiar” when he was 10, and it kept evolving. Stephens wrote the guitar part for “Never Spoke.” Jack, 14, wrote the piano part for “Submerge” when he was 10, too, and it’s still developing.
Stephens has been refining her songwriting throughout high school.
“I just wanted to really focus on getting stuff out there and sort of developing my brand before I go to college,” she said.
Stephens performs in the Blue and Gold choir. She has performed a few gigs at farmers markets and restaurants in Zionsville.
“I’m hopeful that I’ll have more gigs in the future because it’s really fun, and there’s a lot of good opportunities in Carmel, especially to go perform,” she said.
Stephens enjoys the choir because she gets to meet more musicians and other songwriters.
“It’s also good to help develop my singing,” she said. “I started out at Carmel being a soprano and focusing on my high register, and last year because of choir I’ve gone into an alto range and developed more of my lower vocals, which is where I sing on most of my EP. It just helps me develop my vocal cords, I guess, and focus on different elements of singing.”
Stephens, who carries a 4.2 grade point average, is a member of the National Honor Society, is an ambassador for the Hamilton County Bicentennial and is co-president of the Singer/Songwriter Club. She takes lessons from voice coach Blair Clark.
Stephens said songwriting is therapeutic as far as writing out her thoughts.
Stephens started singing in fifth grade when she got the lead in her school musical, “Beauty and the Beast,” in Cincinnati. She didn’t know she could sing well before that because she didn’t have any training.
Stephens plans to at least minor in music while earning some type of business degree.
“I want to do something with music in the future,” she said. “Even if it’s just like playing at bars and stuff like that, just to be able to keep doing it.”
Stephens is designing a setlist with more cover songs, but mostly has been performing her original songs.
She has several albums she wants to release in the future with different themes with songs she has already developed.
Stephens has social media accounts on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. Her music is on Spotify among other sites.
