When we first started talking to Joe Marson about offering songwriting advice, he was very wary. Joe rose to prominence last year as one of the finalists of the Guitar Center Singer-Songwriter Competition, where his bluesy, soul-infused performance caught people’s attention in a serious way. Since then, he’s toured constantly and released an acclaimed EP…
A few months ago, we heard that the good people over at Carnegie Hall would be celebrating their 125th anniversary this year with a very special project. The idea is to unite all of New York City around one theme — the song “Somewhere” from the timeless musical West Side Story. As big musical nerds, especially concerning 1950s hybrid musical/opera/gang-ballets,…
Soundfly is currently looking for an enthusiastic, creative videographer and/or video editor to join our Brooklyn, NY-based team, helping us craft the most interesting and engaging online music lessons on the web. Overview We create kick-ass resources for musicians — tutorials, interviews, challenges and other videos that either instruct or challenge musicians to get better.…
Managing your band well is a juggling act, like walking down a staircase with too many groceries in your arms. It’s way too easy to trip, drop everything you’re carrying, and wind up in a sodden pile on the floor. You’ve got to deal with interpersonal relationships, a competitive market, creative differences, and the general…
This coming Thursday, it’s all about the band at Black Bear Bar in Williamsburg. There will be amazing music, interesting conversation, and top-notch networking, all focusing on navigating the ins and outs of running an amazing band in today’s music landscape. We’ll have an hour of conversation on DIY band management followed by music from The Brighton Beat,…
Summer is a time for love, and with that, comes a whole new chance to woo the guy or girl of our dreams. Enter: the love song. It’s that wonderful, time-honored tradition that would-be Romeos have been using to swoop a lady-love off her feet for hundreds of years. Or in my case make her…
In order to create all the videos, resources and course assets for our popular Mainstage course, Orchestration for Strings, we worked closely with the incredible young composer, Ian Davis, who writes and arranges in the band, Landlady as well as his solo project Relatives, and has composed for such notable acts as My Brightest Diamond. Specifically for the course,…
Often times when we practice and rehearse, we just do so instinctively — we show up, play through our songs, maybe talk about them a bit, and then do it again. While any sort of practice and rehearsal is probably a good thing, no matter how you go about it, there is some interesting research…
This is part 3 of a series on how to write a musical. Start from the beginning with a brief history of musicals and explore the role of the music in telling the story. The basic question we’re looking at today is: when writing a musical, where do you begin? First of all, it’s important to know the purpose that…
