At eight years old, Chance Peña bought his first guitar and soon started playing at bars around his hometown of Tyler, Texas. At 15 years old, Peña competed on season 9 of “The Voice,” starting his solo career. He has since charted on three Billboard charts (Hot Alternative Songs, Hot Rock Songs, and Hot Rock & Alternative Songs) and amassed over 294 million global streams on single “i am not who i was” released in 2023. The artist sat down with The Daily Texan before his Friday afternoon ACL set to talk about his Texas roots and his ethereal music.
The Daily Texan: You were born and raised in Tyler, Texas. How have your Texas roots impacted your music?
Chance Peña: Storytelling wise, the music that comes out of Texas is very story-centric … the people I grew up around, my family, my friends and the stories you hear around town, I think it just imbues something in you. (I am) proud to call Texas my home, and it’s the only place where I feel true peace. When I finally get home to Tyler after the end of a tour, it’s just like, “okay, I can breathe now. I can settle down (and) be me.”
DT: What’s it like playing one of the biggest music festivals in your home state?
CP: We’ve been all over the country at this point. We just got done with a five-week run, and then we’re going to Europe next week for four weeks. It’s nice to be here, because it’s familiar. All my band guys came to my house in Tyler the other day. We got to hang out, eat good and do all the things. … It’s cool to be like, “here’s my home.”
DT: A lot of the imagery you use in your lyrics involves nature, what about those natural elements resonate with you? How does that help you express yourself through the lyrics?
CP: I started going to national parks a lot when I was 20. I found being out in nature like that makes me zoom out. It’s hard to think about your responsibilities when you’re in the middle of the desert or the mountains, you have no cell service and everything that might weigh you down is 100 miles away. It’s inspiring to be out there, and music is another place where I feel that. Being in nature and writing songs go hand in hand to me. I find myself being called back to my experiences in nature when I’m sitting down to write something.
DT: As a singer/songwriter and producer, how does each part of music-making allow you to express different parts of your creativity?
CP: Songwriting you can kind of do anywhere. … It’s definitely more of a free-flow than producing. You can sit down however long you want, wherever you are and just write whatever comes to mind. When I was younger, I would write and produce at the same time on my laptop. Now I like to write the songs and then think about how I want to record them. What kind of space do I want them to live in? What kind of instruments do I want to be on the album? … Songwriting is a blank canvas, and producing is taking the outline of the song and (thinking about) what colors (you are) going to put on the picture.
DT: You competed on “The Voice” at 15 years old. How did that opportunity impact your career in music?
CP: It made me realize that a career in music is attainable, because before that, I was playing in bars and stuff in Tyler. Before “The Voice,” I don’t think I knew (that) this is what I wanted to do with my life. I knew I loved doing it. After “The Voice” I was like, “this is what I want.” I chased it, and then here I am, almost 10 years later.
