As many parents say, education is essential for a successful profession and life. If you don’t have a college degree, you can work at a job that pays poorly. It’s not a rigid rule, though; some people pursue their passions even after dropping out of school. Nick Mason and Roger Waters, two of Pink Floyd’s original members, also gave up architecture to pursue careers in music. Mason remembered those days in a 2006 interview with Tagesspiegel, stating that his original goal had been to become an architect. Nevertheless, he and the other band members made the decision to alter their professional trajectories as the band began to gain recognition. The drummer answered this when asked if his pals helped him become a rock star: “If that’s how you want to put it. I genuinely doubt that anyone else could attempt to dissuade me from talking about my schooling. My dream was to work as an architect. Though it seemed intriguing, I was certain that making music would not be a respectable method for me to support myself. However, Roger was the villain who was able to sway my opinion. The musician then replied as follows when the reporter asked him to elaborate on his point: “My parents had hoped that I would be entering the school’s top students. The truth was that I was spending a lot of time with a guy who didn’t think studying was important.
I do not want to imply that he was indolent. The two artists’ college experiences have had a lasting impact on their way of thinking, even though they did not finish their architectural degrees. It influenced their attitude to music as well. During an interview with Chris Salewicz in 1987, Waters responded as follows when questioned about the relationship between studying architecture and “The Wall”: “Perhaps my training in architecture made it easier for me to see how alienated I felt from rock ‘n’ roll audiences.” This served as “The Wall’s” initial beginning place. The autobiographical narrative that followed was sort of incidental to the main point, which was a theatrical declaration that essentially said, “Isn’t this f*cking awful?” Isn’t it awful that you’re all down there and me up here on stage? “What on earth are we all doing in this place? But in 2012, Mason received an honorary degree in architecture. The drummer’s unfinished architecture degree was completed fifty years later when Regent Street Polytechnic, which is now the University of Westminster, acknowledged his contributions to music and granted him an Honorary Doctor of Letters. The university admitted that Pink Floyd’s inventive approach to stage design and music was shaped by their training in architecture.
