well i'll use my personal experience, maybe it'll help. i was going to school for sound design in savannah, had good grades but even though i was studying sound for video games & film, I always was doing music on the side (production & engineering). it got to a point where I wasn't going to Sound class because I was doing shows or in another studio producing. i dropped out for 2 quarters, went to Atlanta and got an internship @ a major label studio doing music engineering. learned everything that they weren't teaching me in school, made great contacts and got a year of real experience working in a studio. started picking up school again while working @ the studio, and I just graduated with a full time job offer doing Sound Design with a film company, 9 -5. So i still can get off work and go to another studio and do my own music. But you have to grind and really think about every decision you make