Welcome back to Soundfly’s weekly interview series, Incorrect Music, curated by guitarist, singer, and composer Lora-Faye Åshuvud (of the band Arthur Moon). In this series, we present intimate conversations with artists who are striving to push the boundaries of their process and craft. Nick Millevoi has been following the Dutch duo Dead Neanderthals ever since the first…
In November 2016, Peter Pillitteri, an aspiring composer and one of the students in Ian Davis’ popular Orchestration for Strings course, emailed us out of the blue to tell us this incredible story: “‘Round Midnight is a 1986 film by Bertrand Tavernier about a fictitious jazzman, Dale Turner, who was played by the great jazz saxophonist, Dexter Gordon.…
Here’s our Top Five track submissions from our June monthly challenge to create a sample-based beat out of a ridiculous recorded family argument.
A new documentary follows the production of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds’ 16th studio album, Skeleton Tree, and the fallout from Cave’s personal tragedy.
In this edition of Student Spotlight, we catch up with budding media sync composer and sound designer, Nick Shopa.
The Creative Process is Soundfly’s community-driven live Q&A series on Crowdcast. Enjoy this edition with Nick Schofield (on Best Fern).
A professional songwriter meditates on the relevance of Nick Cave’s philosophy on creativity, and his own struggles with procrastination and creativity.
Welcome back to Soundfly’s weekly interview series, Incorrect Music, curated by guitarist, singer, and composer Lora-Faye Åshuvud (of the band Arthur Moon). In this series, we present intimate conversations with artists who are striving to push the boundaries of their process and craft. Nick Photinos’ debut solo album, Petits Artéfacts is a playful, masterfully performed collection of…
That 12-string guitar is a difficult thing to tune! All those high-tension thin strings can be really difficult to deal with, especially the high G string, so this instrument doesn’t necessarily readily encourage alternate tunings. It is a lot of work, but if you take the time to explore the options for alternate tunings on a 12-string, it can…
After becoming a hit as the “‘Benny Hill’ Theme,” “Yakety Sax” experienced a renaissance turning dramatic web videos into funny ones.
Singer, songwriter, pianist, inspiration, Aretha Franklin, known to many as the Queen of Soul, passed away Thursday. She was 76 years old. In the last 24 hours, as we assume will continue for days, weeks, perhaps years, many artists and people of all walks of life have been sharing stories of how Franklin’s music and…
Who’s the first composer you think of when you think of film scoring? They probably started in pop music, and that says something!
It’s getting a little ridiculous now. Too much great, new music is coming out every single week, and it’s tough to keep up. And since we here at Soundfly HQ can be found, most weeks, grooving out to the new, freshly composed, produced, and mixed sounds of our talented students alongside all the commercially released…
At Soundfly, we’re really excited about our new model of mentor-driven learning. Yes, we have a ton of fun making high-quality videos and content, but having a human being there working alongside you to answer questions, offer feedback, and push you in the direction you want to go can make all the difference! “Personalized learning”…
Using all four of your senses is a tool to unlocking a ton of below the surface lyric ideas. Sensory stories help connect on a deeper level.
+ Welcome to Soundfly! We help curious musicians meet their goals with creative online courses. Whatever you want to learn, whenever you need to learn it. Subscribe now to start learning on the ’Fly. A few weeks ago, I was on tour with Chris Forsyth & the Solar Motel Band in support of the band Heron Oblivion. When I learned that…
I’m a lifetime Philadelphian and proud of it. It’s an interesting place to grow up and be a musician. Philly is a big East Coast city that can feel like a small town of connected, but decidedly distinct neighborhoods and music scenes. The city is full of some of the oldest stuff in the country and…
Compared to most instruments, the modern guitar is a relatively new instrument. While classical instruments like piano, brass, and woodwinds all have hundreds of years of pedagogy behind them, the language of guitar music and how we learn to play is new and constantly changing. Today, we can find chords to any song on the internet…
It’s unlikely you’ll find any rip-roaring country instrumentals making waves in these modern times. But in the 1950s and ’60s, fast-picking country guitar players were all over television and influenced guitarists of all genres. Though rooted in blues, jazz, and swing, country guitar is mysteriously singular in many of its techniques and approaches. It’s difficult to…
Taking music lessons requires dedication and commitment to practicing and meeting your teacher half-way, here are some tips to lightening the load!
Last summer, I took a road trip to the Grand Canyon with some friends. After some time passing the aux cable from phone to phone, we ended up on Aerosmith’s 1993 7x platinum, 20-million-selling, mega-hit record, Get a Grip. This was one of the albums that seemed to follow us everywhere we went in the mid-’90s. All…
+ Bridge the worlds of theory, improvisation, and jazzy hip-hop, and improve your piano chops with Grammy-winner Kiefer in his course, Kiefer: Keys, Chords, & Beats. For the musicians of the many houses of improvised music out there, the Art Ensemble of Chicago is one of the most influential bands of the 20th century. Yet for…
+ Welcome to Soundfly! We help curious musicians meet their goals with creative online courses. Whatever you want to learn, whenever you need to learn it. Subscribe now to start learning on the ’Fly. A few years ago, I had one of the most powerful live music experiences of my life when I went to see Stevie Wonder on his Songs in…
+ Improve your songwriting with Soundfly! Explore our range of courses on emotional chord progressions, basic songwriting technique, songwriting for producers, and many more. Subscribe for unlimited access here. Ben Ratliff’s Every Song Ever: Twenty Ways to Listen in an Age of Musical Plenty is my favorite book I’ve read in the past year. In each chapter, Ratliff details a…
+ Learning about synthesis? Soundfly’s got a definitive new online course called Advanced Synths and Patch Design For Producers! Preview for free and subscribe for access. While the electronic-leaning composer Sarah Davachi’s latest album, All My Circles Run, marks a break from her previous releases in that it is sourced solely by acoustic instruments, she says that her…
