Here in North America, as I’m sure is the case around the world as well, we’ve been experiencing a pretty abnormally warm winter so far. I tend to look forward to using the colder nights of January and February as an excuse to spend more time bundled up in my studio making music—and this year that just hasn’t been as exciting.
Thankfully however, our student community here at Soundfly has been working through the winter to create some blazing hot fire to light my fireplace. So let’s listen to some of the recent tracks to come out of Soundfly mentorship sessions in our thirteenth edition of the Student Spotlight series. Enjoy!
Here’s the full playlist. Scroll down to hear a little more about each track and what each student set out to accomplish with the help of their Soundfly Mentors during their session.
“Track 1F”
Student-Artist: Heidar Sigurdsson
Course: Headliners Club
Mentor: Joseph Capalbo
Focus: Polish up his orchestral music; figure out how to follow either the “artist” route or the “writing for sync” route.
Joseph: Heidar quickly sharpened his songwriting and production quality by learning where to find the sounds he was imagining, how to apply them, and the direction that he can take his music in his session. I am excited to see where he takes his compositions in the future!
“A New Life”
Student-Artist: Roman Tomanov
Course: The Creative Power of Advanced Harmony
Mentor: Sırma Munyar
Focus: Build more interesting chord progressions and understand the relationship between chords and melody, and to write melodies that he could sing along to and memorize easily.
Sırma: When I heard Roman’s final project, I was blown away, not just as his mentor, but as a musician, period. I wish I had written this tune—that’s how much I love it! But even beyond that, I’m consistently impressed by Roman’s work in general, because he’s fearless when it comes to stepping outside his comfort zone. In fact, I think that’s what he likes the most about making music. Studying harmony extensively is just a small piece of the puzzle to him; he dabbles in every genre he can think of until he discovers the little details he enjoys, which he then puts into his work.
“Souls Divided”
Student-Artist: Jasper Morris
Course: Headliners Club
Mentor: Brooks Palin
Focus: Progress the production level of his tracks, and learn and apply new production techniques to his future works.
Brooks: Even though Jasper has just begun his production journey, I can tell that he is an insanely fast learner. His dedication to production is infectious and will serve him very well in the future!
“Umm-Yeah”
Student-Artist: Grant Luv
Course: The Art of Hip-Hop Production
Mentor: Ryan Lindberg
Focus: Finish an instrumental hip-hop track.
Ryan: It was awesome working with Grant. He was really enthusiastic about the material we were covering and it showed in his music. His style of instrumental hip-hop is one of my favorite types of music, so it was really cool getting to see his style grow over the course of our session.
“Crossing the Cursed Forest”
Student-Artist: Dan Beg
Course: Unlocking the Emotional Power of Chords
Mentor: Joseph Capalbo
Focus: Create more interesting chord progressions.
Joseph: Throughout Dan’s session in the Unlocking the Emotional Power of Chords course, he became much more proficient in songwriting and learning his way around the DAW. He now can write more interesting progressions and understand how to translate that in the production process.
“Canvas of Me”
Student-Artist: Joel Yeo
Course: Songwriting for Producers
Mentor: Sırma Munyar
Focus: Develop better arranging and songwriting skills.
Sırma: Being a music teacher himself, Joel had a very solid musical background. He understood what it took to write a memorable melody, and never struggled to pick the chords to go with it. At the beginning of our session, he had fragments of ideas, some of which were truly special that just needed to be developed. So, it’s such a wonderful surprise to hear a demo like this at the end, unmistakably fleshed out. Not many people grasp basic music production strategies this quickly, I’m very impressed!
Ready to reach your musical goals?
Our one-on-one mentorship program is built on our belief that accountability and guidance can have a huge impact on students reaching their goals and developing their musical identities.
Soundfly’s community of mentors will help you set the right goals, pave the right path toward success, and stick to schedules and routines that you develop together, so you improve every step of the way.
Tell us what you’re working on, and we’ll find the right mentor or course for you!
