School of Rock – Day 15 – Celebration and Reflection

July 19, 2023

SUMMARY

My description of this class would be that it is a fun class where we get to practice music and instruments , specifically guitar. We also get to learn how to record and mix music.

LEADERSHIP ACTIVITY

From my final project I learned better how to make a note land directly on a beat even though I still need to work on that. My final project turned out okay but it could’ve been better.

My score: 5

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

  • I learned lots from music theory and guitar playing, my technique got better and I now know how to make beats that sound good and what not to do. I know to use repetition but not too much repetition and how to go between notes correctly.

My Score: 5

LAB (THEORY PRACTICED)

  • I was very interested in hook lab, I really liked playing with it and writing covers.

Your score: 5

PRACTICE ROOM (LESSONS)

  • I learned a lot about playing guitar and I learned some about piano and I really liked it.

Your score: 5

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

  • I was very interested in learning about songwriting.

Your score: 5

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

  • I really liked recording and mixing, I learned a lot.

Your score: 5

OUTSIDE (CREATIVITY & THE BRAIN)

  • I was very interested in the science of productivity.

Your score: 5

STAGE

  • I was very interested in playing songs and learning about how to play them.

Your score: 5

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

  • Over the past three weeks I improved very well at guitar technique.

THE COURSE’s ACTIVITY EVALUATION (OVERALL)

Content (The WHAT)

Rating: 5

I was most interested in playing guitar.

The most cool thing that I learned was about song writing and how notes and beats work.

Process (The HOW)

Rating: 5

I liked how the class was structured so that we could learn what we want. I have no problems with the structure, I wouldn’t change anything.

BONUS MATERIAL

Dr. Gebrian’s Brain-Friendly Practice Ideas

 YouTube Playlists on Practice Techniques and Brain Research

Annie Dang’s Songwriting YouTube Channel

 YouTube Resources for Songwriting and Publishing

How Years Of Gaming Affect Your Brain

https://youtube.com/watch?v=xaICKlp9kQc%3Fstart%3D634%26feature%3Doembed

Link to How Years Of Gaming Affect Your Brain

 
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School of Rock – Day 14 – Voice, Preparation, and Presentation

July 18, 2023

SUMMARY

Today I worked on my final project pretty much all day and I didn’t receive much criticism so that’s nice. We watched “Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World” at the end of the day.

LEADERSHIP ACTIVITY

Comments from class

  • Sounds nostalgic , soul, country, western
  • Made David feel happy
  • Use compressor, boost volume of melody

Leadership Project (SMART Goal Evidence)

I finished my cover of “Have yourself a merry little Christmas” today with Piano, guitar, and drums. It turned out okay but I didn’t end up doing any vocals and the beat wasn’t always right on the dot.

Soundtrap Exporting and Mixing Resources

https://youtube.com/watch?v=yq-BnrEB8Ag%3Fstart%3D1%26feature%3Doembed

PRACTICE ROOM (GUITAR LESSONS)

  • Today I practiced “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” on piano.

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=uDDeves6Crs%3Ffeature%3Doembed

LAB (THEORY PRACTICED)

The piano was lagging so it’s not very on beat… sad… but here it is. ( the computer wouldn’t let me use the actual piano, it wanted me to use the computer’s keyboard so that’s probably why it lagged)

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

STAGE

I worked on piano today.

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

I learned that you can split up piano recording in sound trap.

TODAY’s ACTIVITY EVALUATION

  • I liked watching the Rumble movie today and doing the final. Class was good today and I liked listening to everybody’s music.
 
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School of Rock – Day 13 – Collaboration and Growth – Part 3

July 17, 2023

SUMMARY

Write your daily summary last, at the end of the day here… Only one to two sentences.

LEADERSHIP ACTIVITY

Today I hope to finish my cover of “Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas”, I was hoping to do vocals but I’m too embarrassed that people will hear me.

Progress For Today

https://www.soundtrap.com/studio/QG4sIrXAQDOC07d9WV0igg/

PRACTICE ROOM (GUITAR LESSONS)

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=31k6O2nQgHg%3Ffeature%3Doembed
https://youtube.com/watch?v=rrkrvAUbU9Y%3Ffeature%3Doembed

Song Analysis Tools

LAB (THEORY PRACTICED)

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

OUTSIDE (CREATIVITY & THE BRAIN)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=CHxhjDPKfbY%3Ffeature%3Doembed

The Art of Stress-Free Productivity: David Allen at TEDxClaremontColleges

Notes

-Crisis creates serenity

-Get comfortable with paradoxes

-Starting new is going to be hard and awkward but it will get easier

-If you have messes you can’t be creative

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

  • Today I worked on my final project pretty much the whole time and I had trouble keeping time correctly.

TODAY’s ACTIVITY EVALUATION

  • I thought class was very nice today.
 
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School of Rock – Day 12 – Collaboration and Growth- Part 2

July 14, 2023

SUMMARY

I played lots of piano today and a little bit of guitar.

LEADERSHIP ACTIVITY

  • I hope to be able to play the bass piano part of wet hands perfectly today and be able to play “Have yourself a merry little Christmas” perfectly.

 Goal Page: Progress For Today

I decided that I’m doing “Have yourself a merry little Christmas” for my final project so I practiced that.

PRACTICE ROOM (GUITAR LESSONS)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=b2XXzcQhPvc%3Ffeature%3Doembed

I practiced piano almost all day today, specifically I played “Wet Hands” the Minecraft song the most.

– 5 great exercises for your practice routine!

–Continue Justin’s 117 Free Lessons YouTube Playlist

Notes

  • Start on b on the low e then c,c#,d,then index to e on next string and keep gooing up and up.
  • name the triads
  • practice looping and keeping the same time
  • Rhythm challenge, practice missing beats and keeping on tempo

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=SvTwovDq9l8%3Ffeature%3Doembed

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

OUTSIDE (CREATIVITY & THE BRAIN)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=GXy__kBVq1M%3Ffeature%3Doembed

STAGE

  • I worked on Piano so that was fun and a little bit of guitar.

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

  • I learned to play “Wet hands” from Minecraft and I had a bit of a problem reading the notes but I’m getting better.

TODAY’s ACTIVITY EVALUATION

Today’s class was good and I liked playing piano.

 
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School of Rock – Day 11 – Collaboration and Growth – Part 1

July 13, 2023

SUMMARY

I played lots of guitar and I started playing piano today too.

LEADERSHIP ACTIVITY

  • I practiced some piano and tried to make my own song again.

Goal Page: Progress For Today

I am still deciding what song to use (I know I need to hurry up) I will decide that tonight.

PRACTICE ROOM (GUITAR LESSONS)

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

 Atomic Habits

https://youtube.com/watch?v=s_ryupLmKCU%3Ffeature%3Doembed

Notes

  • Imposter syndrome is common is musicians
  • imposter syndrome is more common in high achievers
  • Bad work is a normal part of the creative process
  • Nothing you can do will ever be perfect
  • A mix is never finished, it’s just abandoned

LAB (THEORY PRACTICED)

I tried to learn notes and be able to read them on quizlet.

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=ynFNt4tgBJ0%3Ffeature%3Doembed

What Makes This Song Great? Ep.71 BOSTON (#2)

OUTSIDE (CREATIVITY & THE BRAIN)

The Marshmallow Experiment and Delayed Gratification

https://youtube.com/watch?v=TZYIJDtt3mU%3Fstart%3D1%26feature%3Doembed

 RadioLab.org – Your Future in a Marshmallow

STAGE

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

  • I learned notes and I played piano today

TODAY’s ACTIVITY EVALUATION

  • I think the content was good today, playing my instruments went well today.
 
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School of Rock – Day 10 – Community

July 12, 2023

SUMMARY

Today I played various tabs and chords and tried to learn more notes.

LEADERSHIP ACTIVITY

  • Today I practiced some songs that I might use for my final but I’m not sure what I’m gonna use yet.
  • Today I learned about notes and frets. I tried to play many songs to see which one I wanted to play, I haven’t decided but I’m thinking “Better in Time”, “What Hurts the Most” or maybe something else.

PRACTICE ROOM (GUITAR LESSONS)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=kfhTruV_7aM%3Ffeature%3Doembed

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=cBDJDZAo41c%3Ffeature%3Doembed

Music Machine Songwriting “System”

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

OUTSIDE (CREATIVITY & THE BRAIN)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=3wSbCdQMC6I%3Ffeature%3Doembed

Notes

  • Do your work at the time that you are most creative
  • Writing the song isn’t the hard part, sitting down to write is
  • Action inspires action
  • You don’t need to improve every time you make a new song

STAGE

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

  • I have had this song stuck in my head forever from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure but I can’t seem to find it so that was sad.

TODAY’s ACTIVITY EVALUATION

  • I had a fun time playing guitar and researching guitar today.
 
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School of Rock – Day 9 – Workflow

July 11, 2023

SUMMARY

I played Sweet home Alabama, December, Mama tried, and I learned to play notes on the fretboard for memorization.

LEADERSHIP ACTIVITY

PRACTICE ROOM (GUITAR LESSONS)

I practiced Sweet Home Alabama, December, and Mama tried today.

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

Music Machine Songwriting “System”

LAB (THEORY PRACTICED)

I listened to songs I like and tried to figure out what I like about them ( Dancing with our hands tied by Taylor Swift, Die for you by The Weeknd, Save your tears by The Weeknd, Without Me Halsey). By listening to these songs I think I learned that I like Synth, trap music, and Lofi-ish music. These songs had runs and echo to them, I think I like the bass being a kind of more funky noise, the trap drums sounds really good though. There is also lots of harmony in these songs.

I then listened to “What Hurts The Most” by Rascal Flatts and it is not the same so… But I think they all may have a melancholy feel to them. I know that I really like the runs with the voices though. I then listened to “If I Die Young” by The Band Perry and it also has a sad feel so I think I like minor songs. These songs all seem to have string instruments taking the place of percussion too.

I listened to Jordin Sparks’ No Air and Better in time by Leona Lewis because I believe them to be similar. No Air has some heavy Harmonizing and Runs, so does Better in Time. Since I’m trying to find a similarity between I listened to another song, What Goes Around Comes Around by Justin Timberlake. I found that I like the snare drum and whatever that clap sound is. A common theme is harmonization and runs

 Why Finding Purpose Is SO HARD Today 

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

Holistic Songwriter

Music Machine Songwriting “System”

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

STAGE

  •  MusicWill.org 
  • I played guitar and tried to write a song today but it was iffy at best.

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

  • I enjoyed playing December and listening to music today, I didn’t have any problems today which is nice.

TODAY’s ACTIVITY EVALUATION

I liked watching the video about Boston and todays class was good.

 
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School of Rock – Day 8 – Leadership Planning and Preparation

July 10, 2023

SUMMARY

I played lots of guitar today and tried to put out some music myself as well.

LEADERSHIP ACTIVITY

 bit.ly/2ZxekGt

PRACTICE ROOM (GUITAR LESSONS)

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

I watched “Running with the devil” by Van Halen and “Rosanna” by Toto videos by Rick Beato. I found it interesting that Toto relies heavily on overlaying.

LAB (THEORY PRACTICED)

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

Masterclass Article

Oblique Strategies Cards by Brian Eno

Holistic Songwriter

Music Machine Songwriting “System”

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

OUTSIDE (CREATIVITY & THE BRAIN)

STAGE

I practiced music and wrote some as well while in this room.

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

I didn’t have any problems to solve today, it was a good calm day for me.

TODAY’s ACTIVITY EVALUATION

  • The class was good today, I especially liked the movie we watched.
 
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School of Rock – Day 7 – Planning and Pathways

July 7, 2023

SUMMARY

I played less songs than normal but I think it might have been better than playing as many as I have been.

PRACTICE ROOM (GUITAR LESSONS)

Today I practiced Sweet Alabama, Mama Tried, and my new song, December by Collective Soul. I learned about Prebends.

 Powerful advice from 10 Professional Musicians you need to hear 

Notes

  • Don’t take yourself too seriously, don’t let your expectations and other peoples expectations be too high
  • It’s gonna work out
  • Lead guitar is for everybody, not just young boys
  • Don’t underestimate the pentatonic
  • Be fearless
  • Just hold on and keep doing what you’re doing, keep practicing
  • Take practice serious now
  • Don’t be afraid to make artistic music
  • Calm down musically( you don’t have to play as hard and fast as you can all the time) ,calm down emotionally, find your skillset

Start his 117 Free Lessons YouTube Playlist

 justinguitar.com.

CLASSROOM (THEORY & ANALYSIS)

Holistic Songwriting by Friedemann Findeisen

An Example: The Swift Formula – One Note Melodies

Notes

  • Implied tension is important
  • Silence is also part of music
  • One note melodies usually land on the root note
  • Coldplay rests on the 4th, 6th, and 7th in their songs

LAB (THEORY PRACTICED)

The moldy part of the series sounds the most interesting to me.

STUDIO (SONGWRITING)

If you want your chorus to sound big, don’t make it bigger, make what comes before it smaller. Don’t let every instrument always be playing at the same time.

 Do THIS with every song you write | Hit Song Architect S1E3

Explore Song Writing “Systems”

CONTROL ROOM (RECORDING & MIXING)

Soundtrap tutorial 5 – Arranging the song, Mixing and adding effects

all five videos in the playlist

OUTSIDE (CREATIVITY & THE BRAIN)

The game that can give you 10 extra years of life

Notes

  • Games work better than antidepressants
  • Post Traumatic Growth exists

Today I practiced a lot of tabs. I fixed the problem of having slow little phalanges.

Splurge Notes

-Don’t focus on quality

-goes as fast as you can

-Set a timer

-Export it as a sound file

-Do not listen back to what you’ve done for at least 3 days

-Focus on your toes then go up to your face

Sketchbook Notes

-Your opinion is unreliable at best

-Keep all of your ideas, good or bad, into your “Sketchbook”

-You don’t know what a good Idea is

-A bad idea is a good idea that you don’t know what to do with yet

Discover Notes

-Discovery is for experimentation

-We should be trying new things and be less attached to what we want out of a song

-What is the specific thing that this piece of music is about

Draft Notes

-Draft with purpose

-You’ll know you’re dome in draft when you have a simple draft with ______________(I couldn’t type fast enough before I forgot what he said

DAILY ACTIVITY EVALUATION

I think what we did today was good, I did get bored at times of playing guitar.

 
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School of Rock – Day 6 – Bass Basics

July 6, 2023

RESOURCES FOR THE CLASS

SUMMARY

Today I played my main songs that I’ve been playing and I played the chords to some other songs too.

PRACTICE ROOM

 Paper Practice Log

JamZone ultimate-guitar.com

I practiced Money, Sweet Home Alabama, Kryptonite, Baker Street, and Mama Tried.

Bass Practice Extras

 How To Add Bass Notes 

 guitar TABS for his exercise 

Bonus Bass Resource!

CLASSROOM

 How Bass Works 

Notes

  • The tonic is the most important note in a chord
  • Ground base is used in many songs but people don’t call it ground base anymore
  • Inversions sound like new chords

LAB

How to write Chromatic Notes in Hookpad 

 3 ways to use Hookpad’s MIDI drag-drop feature 

I attempted to make a baseline but my recorder wasn’t working on soundtrap but it turned out just okay.

STUDIO

Play around with playing the low E string (6th string on the top of the neck) on your guitar. Create a simple three-note-ish bassline. Get funky with it.  Try different plucking tempos to great the groove. You can even try playing Smoke on the Water

I wrote a janky base-line and I couldn’t even record it but it’s okay… because it was janky.

CONTROL ROOM

I unfortunately could not get sound trap to record my song.

OUTSIDE / IDEAS

Profile in Excellence

Profile in Excellence

 Quizlet on Bass Composition Techniques flashcards

Quizlet

One baseline that I really like is the baseline from “Let kingdom come” by Whiteheart, I like hitting replay for that baseline because it’s super good.

 How to Quickly Improve Focus – Andrew Huberman

Notes

  • People use adderall to help them pay attention these days
  • You can test your peripheral with your hand
  • If you want higher levels of cognitive mental focus, you need to be more visual
  • Focusing in a small frame visually makes you be able to focus mentally better

WHAT I LEARNED and PROBLEMS I SOLVED

Today I struggled to get my recording word on soundtrap but I did not get to fix this problem, I did attempt to fix it but I couldn’t seem to figure it out.

DAILY ACTIVITY EVALUATION

  • I liked what we did today, I had a good time and nothing was too boring, so I call that a win.

 
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