This week, our spotlight is shining on an artist that was born to be a musician. Warner Music Nashville recording artist, Troy Cartwright is one to look out for. Growing up in Dallas, Texas, he recalls always loving music. “I’ve always been into music. I always joke that writing songs is the only thing that nobody told me to do.”

At just twelve years old, Cartwright started playing guitar and writing songs.”Once I could play, I just kind of stopped practicing, and just started writing songs,” shared Cartwright. “I always sort of had a knack for that part of it.” Despite loving music, interestingly he tried to avoid the country genre at first because it was his older sister’s favorite.

“When I was kid, it was just sort of whatever was popular at the time like Simple Plan and New Found Glory and stuff like that […] There was some singer-songwriter stuff that I fell in love with like Pete Yorn.”

Cartwright loved music so much that he took a leap of faith. He headed to Boston for college to pursue a degree in music business. Little did he know, this move would soon change the trajectory of his life.

The Turning Point:

In college, Cartwright rediscovered country music, after missing home and its familiarity. Artists like Eric Church and Chris Stapleton became his “North Star” later in life, as an artist.”I started missing home and that kind of was the start of it to country music and now it’s my career.”

During his junior year of college, Cartwright participated in an internship that became a major turning point for him. “I realized that was not the path that I wanted to go down,” shared the singer about the business-oriented job. “I realized through that process like ‘hey if you’re going to be an artist’ you just got to go for it.”

Upon graduating college, Cartwright headed back to Dallas to pursue his career as an artist.“ I was able to pretty quickly string together enough shows to pay the bills. […] That was kind of my start in country music, just playing the honky tonks and the bars that would have me.”

Eventually, Cartwright caught the ear of a publisher in Nashville.“I had a publisher here in Nashville say ‘hey why don’t you come write some songs here.’,” adding later, “After I came to Nashville for the first time and got to co-write, I was going to move to Nashville no matter what, I just had to figure out how to get there.”

Today:

Now, Cartwright is living his dream, as a signed recording artist. Most recently, the singer-songwriter released his debut major-label EP, Halfway To Houston. The five tracks all portray the rock influence from the singer’s childhood mixed with his love for the storytelling that country music does best.

“Most of these songs were written during the pandemic,” begins Cartwright. “I had a lot of time to think about what I really, really wanted to say as an artist.” Later, the singer shared, “I kind of had it in two buckets. It was what’s the real stuff that I want to say and then what’s the rock n roll part I want to get out.”

His songs “Hammer” and “Halfway To Houston” bring out the rock side of the collection, while “Break Every Heart In Texas” is one of the most emotive songs on the project. According to Cartwright, “It’s a song that I’ve always loved and I love the story and the picture that it paints about this guy watching the love of his life basically marry someone else. I think it’s a pretty powerful emotion.”

This is only the beginning for Cartwright. Fans can expect more music coming in 2022, as well as a tour with LANCO coming even sooner. Stay tuned and make sure to keep the singer on your radar!

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