My Unofficial run through the Songwriter's Challenge , what we all won doing this!
Hello Steemit!
Today I want to share with you my experience on the amazing contest that has been the Songwriter's Challenge hosted by my brother @meno and @luzcypher ! I know there is still one week to go but I might miss it since I'll be visiting my hometown of Guayaquil , in Ecuador and I don't know if I will be able to participate but oh well .. I'll be visiting family and just taking a little break from work in general... I need it! hahaha
So, I ''disqualified'' myself from this contest at the very beggining , being @meno my real brother I thought it wouldn't be fair for anyone competing for the price , but I thought I would try and do the 8 week run , just as a personal challenge to write songs at a speeded up pace . I somehow made it through 7 weeks , and I actually liked a couple of the raw songs that came out , some of them didn't really touch me .. but I won't tell which ones! hahaha
I want to share with you what I actually WON from doing this , aside from making some SBD along the way , which I am really grateful to all those who supported the songs throughout the 7 weeks , not just for me , but for everyone , musicians making money from their actual original music is so hard nowadays so seeing this happening is just amazing!
I'm an actual professional musician , but my main income comes from teaching and producing , then doing sessions playing for other artists and anything else I can do on the side to pay the bills , it is a hard profession , but I can't see myself doing anything else... so I just try to give it my best effort.
I stopped composing music for years and last year I finally decided I was going to put out an album. I've been taking arranging and composition lessons since then and as I was working and putting together my music I really wondered ''How the hell am I going to make this happen?'' . I do have a studio but doing a complete album is a really big project , from composing the music ( which I think I have done now thanks to this contest! ) , arranging it and all the logistics and I was getting discouraged... after seeing the huge amount of musicians that are arriving to the platform , all the cool songs and great talent I am getting motivated again , I think we can actually have a music community strong enough to put out some great quality and professional music out there , and actually make some profit out of it!.
This contest is about to be over next week and knowing my brother @meno I know he must be already brainstorming and thinking of what to do next. I really think this type of contests that encourage art and creativity should not stop. After I read one of his articles saying that maybe to kick it up a notch producers and session musicians could be added to a possible next music contest. This would result in actual professionally recorded and mixed songs at some point. I got a kick out of it and decided to make a little experiment , just to see how could that work out !
So , I grabbed one of my own Open Mic Entries and decided to do some pre-production over it , arrange it , layer parts , etc. I play a couple instruments, so I decided to put something together.
And as a little fun experiment and exercise I arranged a section of it , so to have an idea of what we could be possibly putting out here:
I'm no drummer , and my piano and bass playing are quite basic.. also I'm no sound engineer , so there are a lot of point that could be done better but this is just a sample of what we could actually be putting out if these songs were done in teams!
I have met some amazing musicians and producers on this platform and many musicians nowadays have their own recording setup , so there is definitely potential for a lot of collaborations , this would definitely make this grow a lot bigger !
Just my opinion :)
.png)
That's so cool this contest pushed you to create. Deadlines are a great inspiration.
Thanks @luzcypher! Indeed , some little and healthy pressure can help you just ''run that extra mile'' and of course the inspiration I find from everyone else here , also pushing themselves to create . Some really nice songs have been created just for this contest , that's no small thing!
Yea man, glad that's what you got out of this. I feel similarly.
I like the way you're thinking, eventually leading to a contest where it goes 1 month or 2 and each week you show the progress on your way to a fully produced track.
Week 1 could be: rough sketch (kind of what we show in the current challenge)
Week 2 getting a rough template recorded somehow/pre pro
week 3 starting the actual track
Week4 various insts laid down
Week 5 vocals
Week 8 over dubs
Week 7 mix
Week 8 final master
just spit ballin'
Thanks @jaybird! Actually the layout you propose is not bad at all ! maybe with some sort of pre-selection going from the rough sketches to the actual pre-productions so it doesn't end up with having to produce 100 songs , but who knows , maybe if we have enough teams we could actually be able to pull that one off! Thanks for commenting!
This is a rather excellent account of your experience, Pechiche! So glad you got so much out of it - but my brother, you put into it so much more - so much more - than you took out.
You've given me and everyone else who's participated and listened-in an abundance of inspiration, which is priceless!
This final account of the maiden Songwriters Challenge is simply "icing on the cake!" Thank you, brother Pechiche!
Perhaps instead of disqualifying yourself in the next challenge - you can be one of the judges instead! :-)
Thank you very much @passion-ground , brother ! Thanks for your words .I really think this contest (and the open mic) is one of those situations where everyone wins , that's why I have been putting quite a bit of energy into it!
Thanks for the support and letting me know that I've brought some inspiration to the songwriter community , it means a lot ! But I have to say this holds true in both sides , I get inspired as much from the music I find here.
I'd love to put in more energy in more ways than just participating with songs ( which is no small thing at all ! It is what holds this together) , whatever ability I could use to help this grow , I'll do it gladly ! That is not for me to decide though :P . Cheers brother!
this is great dude. I was thinking how cool it would be to see some of the songs from this challenge properly produced.... then we could make videos! and albums! and get people together for recording sessions and stuff! It could be so awesome!:D
Thank you very much @basilmarples! , certainly what you say is possible , there is enough human talent and original material around here ! So , this could be happening more sooner than later ! definitely I'd love to hear/work on your tracks! cheers!
awesome! We'll all have to get together on a thread and discuss what could be next.... I'd absolutely LOVE you to have a crack at one of my tracks sometime! That would be so exciting :D :D
Dude, man – just got a chance to come back to this post to listen to your production version of “Reflejos.”
Wow! You did a great job laying down all the individual tracks, man! I love all of the percussion work along the piano and bass too! The seeming simplicity of all those tracks makes your lead vocal really pop front and center quite nicely, right where it belongs.
Your harmonies are wonderful as well! Very nice dynamics overall, and you did a real fine job mixing down this raw demo clip! It’s beautiful, brother – great work!
Again @passion-ground , thanks for your nice words and for coming back to hear this little demo :) .
I'm glad you liked the little pre-production , it is what I can do from my studio here in Buenos Aires with my set-up . The percussion layering is a little nod to the uruguayan candombe as I've been listening a lot of that lately , the rest is just a very Pop approach , just reinforcing the melody with some elements and keep it clear and effective :) , with the main melody up front .
Harmonies , well.. I'm a huge Toto Fan ...and of course The Beatles! So .. that's that! hahahaha . Cheers my brother!
This post has been voted on from MSP3K courtesy of @Meno from the Minnow Support Project ( @minnowsupport ).
Bots Information:
Join the P.A.L. Discord | Check out MSPSteem | Listen to MSP-Waves
This post has been resteemed from MSP3K courtesy of @Meno from the Minnow Support Project ( @minnowsupport ).
Bots Information:
Join the P.A.L. Discord | Check out MSPSteem | Listen to MSP-Waves