How Imagine Dragons Writes Such Memorable Melodies
Imagine Dragons’ “Demons” plays with our sense of memory about how the melody is supposed to play out each time. How does this work?
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Examining Mental Health in the Music Industry: 5 Steps to Taking Care of Yourself
+ 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. There is absolutely nothing in this world more important than your mental health. In this industry, especially, so many of us are hard-wired to take care of…
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The Sound of Fear
Common idioms such as “seeing is believing” give our eyes the central role in our engagement with the world. But there is little doubt that listening plays a critical part in how we navigate and understand our environment. Historically, our ears, not eyes, revealed what lay beyond the light of the campfire. And importantly, our…
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When You’re a Piano in a Forte World
By Liam Singer Live rock music and noisy bars go together like beer and… more beer! The sounds of a drum kit, electric guitar, and amplified vocals are all designed to cut through the noise of clinking glasses and drunken conversations. These are not “dinner party” instruments. Audiences in these spaces don’t always like hearing…
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This Psychologist Wants You to Stop Wasting Your Practice Time
+ 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. “Practice makes perfect” is a classic cliché — it contains elements of the truth but misses the whole story by a long shot. As musicians, we’ve all experienced times when we…
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Improvisation and the Brain
We recently found this fantastic piece on how musical improvisation affects the brain on Vicky Williamson’s blog Music Psychology and she graciously allowed us to post it here. Vicky teaches and researches on the relationship between music and the brain at The University of Sheffield. Check out more of her writing here. Hello Dear Reader, It is…
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Sam Smith, Brian Williams, and the Science of a Song Getting Stuck in Your Head
I have always been fascinated by songs that sound alike. I love the kind of artists’ mindmeld that happens when multiple songs released around the same time converge in similar sound. I love when musicians pay homage to their favorite influences. I love trying to pick out samples in songs. And I love the gossipy…
