Music is an essential and inescapable part of pop culture, so it’s important, at least for younger generations, to keep up with new names, genres, and trends that are becoming popular and could possibly determine the future of music. The BSM student body was recently surveyed about who their favorite young artists are and what their favorite genres of music are to figure out what these trends may be.

Pop, rap, and alternative rock were voted as the most popular genres among students, with 68.8% of students voting pop, 42.9% voting rap, and 31.2% voting alternative rock. Some other notable genres that are relatively popular among students are indie pop, electronic, country, R&B, and art pop.

Along with their favorite genres, students listed their favorite young artists. For pop music and all its subgenres, students mentioned artists like Taylor Swift, Harry Styles, Tate McRae, Billie Eilish, Clairo, Olivia Rodrigo, and Lorde. Next, the most popular rappers among students are Tyler the Creator, Kendrick Lamar, Lil Baby, Playboi Carti, Megan the Stallion, and Yung Gravy. And finally, a few of the indie/alternative young rock artists students like are Girl in Red, Beabadoobee, Mitski, Black Midi, Måneskin, and Hayley Williams.

Along with their favorite current artists, students listed young artists whose careers they feel have a lot of potential and are worth paying attention to. These artists are Billie Eilish, Olivia Rodrigo, The Kid LAROI, Katie Gregson-Macleod, Steve Lacy, Måneskin, Parijita Bastola, Yeat, Midwxst, Remi Wolf, Omar Apollo, and Don Toliver.

These young artists with lots of potential that students listed are extremely diverse in genre, as they range from alt-pop, emo rap, hip hop, singer-songwriter, R&B, neo soul, funk, glam rock, soul, rap, pop, and trap.

Because of this genre diversity, it’s difficult to determine what exactly the future of music may look like. However, at least according to students at BSM, the future of music could be full of new and exciting artists, either popular or alternative, with an interesting fusion of genres.