#something slightly unrelated: i’ve been forced to listen to pop lately

[twig-gy]

vivivivivi is such an inspiration for me. i don’t really know how to use any other music programs, they’re all so confusing and hard to start with, so i only use beepbox. and like. the power. how can you convey such emotion in a few instruments? such complicated feelings, the synths layering onto each other, i can hear the way they use the volume of a note to add different effects and it’s just. like.

in my head conveys such specific things, like. the way that ‘the beginning of the end’ seems like a normal song except for the ways it conveys this unease in just little note choices. the way some of the songs create such agonizing dread that it feels like my experiences exactly (like when i’m Resisting The Horrors). the way that flies swarming my skull uses growing, overpowering noise that feels like you’re having a panic attack, and the next track (the penultimate one, pretend im not breathing) releases it with guitar, strummed in such a hesitant way that makes me think it’s someone who’s hands are still shaking, trying to let yourself feel something that isn’t a bad emotion, contrasting to the rest of the album it’s just like.

their music is so good how!!!! if i was trying to convince someone that you can make good art without paying thousands of dollars for The Best Things, this is what i’d show them. even listening a little to vivivivivi’s songs you can clearly hear the skill they’ve built with pandora’sbox. something i keep admiring and wanting to put in my own music is the way they know how to control the mood, the emotion. to be able to convey the exact feel or setting, to paint a picture in someone’s mind using just the 8bit instruments you’ve got. to bring your viewer through the exact course you want them to chart, it’s like…. just amazing.

another person who makes good instrumental music is AZALI. they don’t make the same kind of music where you FEEL an emotion, nor do they use the same software bc they have fl studio. but it’s still so great how they can make a setting, and just. the music. is so good

this is why i love music : well, a part, because i also just love music for music’s sake. but one of the reasons is i love how i can clearly hear the artist’s skill. i can pick through each layer of music like, the drums are doing this, i can hear a melody there, i can hear how they’re using the instrumental to accentuate their point. like something i always loved about the mind electric (chonny jash cover, not all 3 i’m talking about the cover called the mind electric right now) is how the drums are so erratic and basically the main instrument, and you can hear the drums emphasize the lyrics. i love octave changes, i love how sometimes people make the instruments go quiet so you need to listen to the lyrics, i love how sometimes they can well. not do that and make the instrumental even more powerful.

#i just #love music so much aaaaaaaa #i could never live without it it’s so fucking amazing #what people can do. #something slightly unrelated: i’ve been forced to listen to pop lately #and also against my will #i kinda like it? it just doesn’t hold the same skill though #pop just feels so formulaic. i know that’s the point but like #and this is definitely biased of me #when i listen to pop i don’t feel any intent there #any thoughts #besides of just like ‘lemme make a somg so i can get it on the charts! #‘ #like. soundtrap #right? #it’s a music thing. it gives you these really basic loops #and i could make songs with them. and they sounded good. but it didn’t feel right bc i couldn’t control anything #it sounded so painfully basic. not personal at all #i feel bad for anyone who doesn’t know how powerful music can be or hasn’t explored it. there’s a whole world out there #don’t ignore it. #especially for basic fucking pop loops #yeah i’m a biased person what are you gonna do? tell on me? idc i can be biased about this

[belencusi]

When Teaching Teaches You: Thoughts On Teaching Kids Piano

Sometimes I could feel it in the moment, a pure happiness. Sometimes I felt only the frustration of driving around bustling Brooklyn between lessons, often arriving late, often being greeted with parking tickets, often stressed out thinking about my other jobs and deadlines. But always I was reminded of how much I loved it. How much it inspired me. How much it satisfied me. How much joy it brought me at the end of the day.

Teaching piano to kids has brought me some of my greatest challenges and some of my greatest joys. Walking into a first lesson with a “young five-year-old” (he was definitely four) as his mother bore witness on the couch next to us (she was kind and laid back- love you Hannah - but very much right there, which initially was...awkward) - I had no idea where to begin in reigning in his attention, let alone introducing musical concepts to him. But what started as several weeks of cluelessness and frustration eventually turned into one of my favorite lessons of the week, as Dino and I began to know each other and speak a common language. He was precocious and learned quickly, and the twinkle in his eye as he looked up at me for guidance and approval melted my entire being into a hopeless puddle of lovedazed mush.

I adored Dino, like I did the rest of my students. They taught me so much about love, and about myself. I found a deep joy in learning to hear and see them, and meet them where they were at. Our lessons were as much about me teaching them music as they were about them teaching me how to listen - how to guide them as they taught themselves. I’m passionate about teaching because I believe it’s one of the building blocks of society, along with family. How we raise our kids at home and how we educate them in schools and elsewhere make up the fabric of a generation - and for that we want kids who are encouraged to think for themselves, to love and feel fully, to respect each other and themselves, and to have a thirst for knowledge. I believe in teaching how to think, how to explore, how to create, rather than what.

So I based my piano lessons on this principle. I met my students where they were at. I listened to them. I acknowledged them. I respected them. I encouraged them. I tried my best to strike a balance between their own instincts and my teaching agenda. I don’t think I’ve figured out the ultimate recipe. In fact I probably let them have their way more often than I should have, but I always preferred a more relaxed, fun approach than something rigid and forced. I was inspired by what I thought had been missing in my own lessons growing up. I was classically trained and taught to read music like a pro - but was never exposed to jazz music, improvisation techniques or other styles that as an adult I wish I had more experience with. So with my students (most of whom used the same books I learned with, talk about nostalgia) I made sure not to limit myself to the classically-inclined, by-the-book curriculum that is so common among teachers. I added improv warm-ups and games for us to explore pop and other styles of music. I encouraged them to choose their favorite songs they wanted to play, regardless of genre. For one student I even made up an entire “galaxy” of keys and chords to explain music harmony, with the intention of teaching him to write his own music. I wanted so badly to teach them to love their own ideas, to develop an itch for uninhibited exploration.

I had so much fun at our lessons...!! Probably more than the kids themselves. In an effort to make them feel comfortable I would get goofy as goofy comes, only to find them to be the more composed and serious ones. (At about age eight this strange thing happens where they become like mini adults and suddenly your attempts to relate with them on a kid level are met with an air of polite disdain. They are now “cool.”) They’d look at me funny. Flat-faced and slightly amused. Haha! They couldn’t fool me. (They were adorable.) I wanted to encourage laughter, fun, exploration, mistakes. I welcomed mistakes. I welcomed questions. I welcomed them.

I’ve currently had to step away from teaching to focus on other work obligations, and to do so has been much harder than I thought it would be. I always say my end goal is not to teach. I have aspirations to be a performing artist, an actress, an entrepreneur, all jobs that inevitably require sacrifice and a willingness to drop other commitments at a moment’s notice for what could - or could not - be a life-changing opportunity. For that, I’ve developed a thick skin. And yet, when I think of my students, the moments of laughter and discovery and purity, the simplicity, the satisfaction I felt when I’d come up with a crazy idea on the spot to explain the circle of the 5ths, and how it somehow worked and the kid somehow got it (or so they said...) - I think of those things and I feel paper thin. I miss those moments. I miss their cheeky laughs. I miss their excitement to show me what they practiced (completely unrelated to what they were supposed to practice, of course). I miss them.

I can’t say enough about the wonders of teaching. As my career progresses and morphs and does what it does I don’t think I’ll be able to stay away - only explore different ways to be able to inspire in others, especially kids, the magic of music, and creating, and exploring, and laughing. The magic of life.

To my students in Brooklyn (and their loving parents)...thank you!!

#teaching #piano lessons