Professional Musician Following His Dream

Video posted February 28, 2018 in Arts & Entertainment by Alex Lake. Updated: May 3, 2018

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Hailing from the Philadelphia area, Eric Henkels, age 29 has chosen a rather non-conventional career path — playing and performing music.

Throughout his life, Henkels was always surrounded by music. Growing up with parents who were musicians got Henkels started at a young age, learning to play the piano when he was just three years old. As Henkels grew older he learned to play the saxophone and guitar by the time he was in high school. Henkels says he always knew he wanted to play music, but gave in to society’s pressure to go to college and “get a real job” as he graduated high school.

After studying Broadcast Journalism for some time, followed by a job doing play-by-play for a short while, Henkels finally decided to follow his dream to play music for a living. After about ten years in the music industry Henkels has been a part a many bands including Total Whiteout and Go-Go Gadjet.

Now Henkels devotes much of his time to a dueling piano act with his friend and business partner, Pat Smith, called “Piano Fight Club.” Henkels and Smith travel the East Coast playing all kinds of songs on piano. "We don't play just traditional piano songs--we put our own spin on the dueling pianos act. We play hip-hop, pop, rap, and R&B on our keys," says Henkels. In addition to Piano Fight Club, Henkels does part-time freelancing doing various things such as filling in for bands, and recording music.

Henkels favorite music to play and perform is a genre called "Arena Rock" which is a softer yet strident pop-rock trype of music. Examples of arena-rock bands are Journey, The Beatles, and Henkels' personal favorite: Coldplay.  Henkels says his dream is to sell out venues like Philadelphia’s The Fillmore and The Electric Factory, playing arena-rock anthems. Using his exceptional energy, he hopes to bring crowds of people together to escape the pressures of life and enjoy the music.

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music , musician , performer