In a small restaurant at an open mic night for teens, CJ Seymour first performed live in front of a crowd primarily comprised of parents.

About one year later, they will be appearing in front of hundreds at the Pygmalion Music Festival in downtown Champaign under their stage name, CJ Run.

CJ Run will perform at midnight this Friday at The Accord. A Friday ticket is $30, and festival passes are still available for $99.

Pygmalion will be the 18-year-old rapper’s biggest show to date. Seymour will be performing along with rising bands like Future Islands, Wolf Parade and rapper Vince Staples.

“Vince is someone I look up to a lot, as far as rappers go,” Seymour said. “The fact that I’m going to perform after him and hopefully meet him if I can finesse my way in, that’s kind of like ‘wow.’”

After releasing their nine-track EP “Listen to the Kids” on their Soundcloud, Seymour emailed several blogs to publicize their music and received a reply from Seth Fein, one of the founders of Pygmalion. Seymour earned a spot on the festival schedule after Fein saw them perform live at The Accord on Aug. 12.

“I got offstage and everyone really liked what I did,” Seymour said. “Seth talked to me and he was like ‘I’m going to email you on Monday — I’m giving you a slot at Pygmalion’ and I was like, ‘Really, me?’”

Being agender and a member of the LGBTQ community, Seymour does not match the typical image of a rapper. As an artist in these groups, it becomes very easy for them to be recognized solely by their identity, which is what they hope to avoid. They want to be known as a rapper that can represent parts of these groups, not as the “female rapper,” for example.

“I feel like there are different facets of myself that at least some people can relate to,” Seymour said. “I want to be someone that other people can see a part of themselves in.”

While Seymour primarily wants to be recognized for their musical talent, their identity plays a large part in their appeal. Many of their fans appreciate the authenticity of Seymour’s music, as their songs and the subjects of those songs are not often brought up in today’s music scene.

“When CJ goes on the stage and begins a song, you can tell that there’s more to it than just someone singing or rapping,” Sam Washington, junior in Engineering, said. “This is their voice, this is what they have to say, this is what they feel. Sure, you can read their lyrics and get a message from them or appreciate the thought that went into writing them, but hearing the emotion behind the lyrics or seeing how naturally the meaning seems to flow from CJ’s persona — that’s real.”

Seymour, sophomore in Media, began their career in music as a theater kid. From a young age, they began performing in community plays and eventually started covering songs from their favorite artists.

“It just kind of progressed from there,” Seymour said. “I moved a lot in my life and I think that the one thing that always stayed with me was music. If I listened to a song I could tell you exactly where I was, what time and place. I wanted to be able to make music like that for people so that it could be their home away from home.”

Seymour was born in Germany and grew up in the United Kingdom. There, they lived in the cities of Northampton and Croydon until moving to the United States as a teenager. Seymour cites the European music culture, particularly the hip-hop and electronic scenes, as a large influence in their musical style.

The artist also credits a large part of their music to their Nigerian heritage, having grown up listening to Highlife and Afrobeat music, genres that respectively arise from typical Ghanaian and Nigerian styles.

“My style of music is a combination of everything that I grew up listening to,” Seymour said. “It’s very honest and it’s very me.”

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