Sarah Shermyen: On the Importance of a Broad Education in the Arts & Beyond
Sarah Shermyen reveals how her liberal arts education impacted her journey as a writer and singer.
You’re reading an interview in Sketch Pad’s “Artist Grad Interview Series,” which you can read more about at the bottom of this post. For other interviews in this series, click here. And click here for more on navigating college.
Are you an artist, writer, performer, or another “creative type”? Did you want to pursue a career in your art before going to college?
I am a creative, or perhaps creative adjacent—I’m finishing up a PhD in English to provide some sort of legitimacy to my track. A backup plan to writing non-academic texts.
In another life, I would have chosen singing or acting. I was good at acting but didn’t love it in the same way that I love music and writing, and I get kind of squeamish about how frequently success in acting is predicated on someone deciding you’re pretty.
Singing was a thing that I wasn’t as technically talented at as some, but I got lucky with the instrument—my voice is low and warm, and I am confident in my ability to match pitch. I’ve worked hard at learning my voice and how to trust it.
Singing is one of the few things that gets me out of my brain. But I never considered it as a career before college. Other people did for me, but I was afraid of not doing something practical. And the reality is that I didn’t think I was a good enough musician to justify that path at that point.
Why did you decide to go to college?
There was never a question about going to college. Practically as a backup, but also for loftier reasons—I chose a liberal arts college because I wanted a well-rounded education to feel I was an informed member of society.
Though I acted and played music through high school, it never occurred to me to pursue those in an official educational capacity. I thought most acting conservatories were a waste, and as I was, at that point, under representation with two major modeling agencies, it seemed like I’d be more likely to jump into a career in the performing arts from there than from school.
Plus, I was afraid of music conservatories—I knew I was not prepared for the rigor and technical knowledge required to succeed there or even to be accepted.
Did your interest in writing and singing influence your choice of major?
Yes, in the sense that English was the only degree that brought me joy, that felt arts-adjacent without being as burdened by the fear that I was gambling on a bad hand.
Did your college courses influence your writing or singing?
I avoided taking creative writing classes until my roommate, who was not an English major, took one and pushed me to do so too.
I had in my head this idea that formalized education tends to kill creativity, or maybe I was afraid to admit I didn’t know how to write creatively anymore. Within a year, I had applied and been accepted to the creative writing concentration in my college.
I had labeled myself a writer, and as such, that meant I actually needed to start writing more. It gave me structure and discipline and made me less precious, more willing to write absolute trash, to slog until I found something good. To treat writing as a practice like any other art I performed.
Did your college courses influence your pursuit of a creative career?
I took only one course (though I took it twice, a single-credit course that lasted a year) that was related to music. I’ve often referred to it as the most stressful class I’ve ever taken. It was called vocal jazz, and I used to get so nervous before and during it.
I once watched a girl have a full-on, sobbing panic attack in class. She didn’t leave, class carried on, and when the microphone was passed to her, she sang with tears streaming down her face.
I lacked the knowledge of theory that the other students seemed to have, and the thing that makes me most special as a singer—my deep voice—made it so that during class, when the key wasn’t changed from singer to singer, I was constantly having to sing over my break or switch octaves at weird points. The literal process of singing was made more difficult for me.
I do think it’s made me a better singer—perhaps a little technically, but mostly because it forced me to deal with the possibility of failure in front of an audience. I’m a looser singer for it. It meant that, when asked to sub in for a couple of tour dates for my brother’s soul band, I didn’t mind singing with only a few rehearsals under my belt, even songs not really in my range.
For writing, I wouldn’t have gotten my first publication without my professor picking a story I’d written and telling me it was ready to go out and even recommending a journal that it would be a good fit for. My writing courses gave me a sense of legitimacy when I decided to reenter writing workshops in grad school and helped me realize that writing was a skill I could rely on to make money with.
Is there anything you would do differently if you could re-do your college experience?
I regret now that I didn’t take more music classes, though the reality is that I just wanted to take more of everything. Even if I’d had to pass/fail it, I wish I had taken some theory classes or individual voice instruction.
I understand now that part of it is the network you get, the network that you need in the arts. My brother decided to get a second BA in his early 30s. After a political science degree, he’s currently finishing up a degree in Songwriting and Music Production at Berklee College. He’s honing his skills, absolutely. But more than that, he’s gaining collaborators, supporters, and connections. I don’t have those in music. I live in a music town, and I can’t find anyone to sing with because I don’t know how to navigate that world like he has.
I think I would have also made more of an effort to build out my writing cohort to get to know the other creative writing concentrates at my undergrad. I think we were a competitive bunch, and the scarcity mindset was really prevalent—that only a few of us were going to get to the top. I wish that I had been able to look past that and realize that writing isn’t that solitary.
Do you have any advice for writers, singers, or other creatives who are currently enrolled in or headed to college?
I don’t think there’s any definite right way to do the arts. I’m pretty sure that there are certain disciplines that benefit from formal schooling more than others. What I know about creative writing and publishing, beyond the actual craft of it, I learned as an intern and from other writing friends once I got to graduate school.
I wouldn’t change much about how I did college (beyond never having enrolled in that chemistry class my freshman year and swapping music theory for the music history course I took). But that might be because I am greedy but not particular about the education I consume.
I am a great believer that no art education should be too insularly focused. My writing is better for my knowledge of musical rhythm, from studying how to read images. My singing is better for my experience as an actor and tapping into the emotion in a word. And studying history, novels, and the abundance of outer space widens the humanity, the experiences I might draw on in any of my disciplines to find that one real thing that connects me to my audience.
About Sarah
Sarah Shermyen received her BA in English from Barnard College and is a Ph.D. candidate in English at the University of Georgia, where she also serves as a Graduate Editor at The Georgia Review. She specializes in American literature, how we define and create regional identity, and the problems of beauty. She has work forthcoming in Studies in American Humor and The Georgia Review and publishes a Substack devoted to her research and conversations in American culture.
Subscribe to her Substack to stay up-to-date on new posts. Or follow on Instagram @sshermyen.
About the Artist Grad Interview Series
Hey, there! I’m Sarah Graves, a writer, English professor, and mom to a creative kid. I’m interviewing writers, artists, musicians, performers, and other creative types who have college and graduate degrees because going through college when you have nontraditional career goals comes with unique challenges. My hope is that seeing how others with creative interests have navigated college and grad school helps you in pursuing your own dream. There are many ways to approach art, college, and career. But however you go about it, the most important thing is to make your art. Because the world needs your art (and so do you)!
If you’re a creative type with advice to share about navigating college, hit reply to this email or message me at sarah@sarahgravesphd.com. I’d love to feature you in an interview!