Not many people would choose to leave their job and their home and live out of a car to pursue a dream, but that’s the stuff that acoustic singer-songwriter Sean Coray is made of. “I just quit my job right on the spot. I gave up my apartment, everything… I have so much less, but I’m a lot happier,” he says. And that dedicated resolve has led to the release of his first EP, Drifter.

Less than a decade ago, at age 18, Coray was the lead singer of a group called The Apollos. “I was the baby. Everybody had families. We had different priorities,” Coray explains. With goals that went beyond playing gigs with friends as a hobby, he ventured out on his own.

Influenced by the likes of contemporary singer-songwriters like John Mayer and Gavin DeGraw—as well as legends like Herbie Hancock and the late Ray Charles—Coray turned out to be a natural, and in 2008, he taught himself how to play the guitar. A friend, bass player Linston Triplet, helped him make the transition from a “typical” singer to a musician, telling Coray, “Start writing songs. Get your name out there as a singer-songwriter.”

With vocals that vacillate between a gritty rumble and a smoothed-out falsetto, Coray is starting to see some success, having opened for iconic singer/songwriter and guitarist Marshall Crenshaw last year. The two also played together at last year’s St. Louis Microfest, an event where Coray made a repeat performance this spring.

Coray’s sound has been described as jazzy acoustic soul, but the artist would like to be regarded as limitless. “I don’t see myself as a soul artist or an R&B artist or a jazz artist. I just see myself as music,” he says. “I wish people would let music be music.”

Coray, a self-proclaimed “starving artist,” shares the lofty hopes of many who are trying to make it and live off of their art, and ispatiently awaiting his breakthrough. “It doesn’t always come when you want it, and sometimes it’s gonna be a long, hard road,” he says. “I’ve come close a couple of times, where the doors cracked. And then you get there, and it’s like the doors shut back closed.”

The humble singer is also grateful, however, for the freedom to live his life on his own terms: “There’s nothing better than just being able to wake up every single day and do what you love doing and pushing forward.”