2023-07-14 Fabulous Friday - Week 2

What's happening, Music Tech Teckers?

How's everything going? I'm just checking in with a little heads-up.

Email and Text Messaging Backlogs

I'm still a little backlogged in responding to emails and text messages. The reason is I recently changed from Google Contacts Cloud to Apple iCloud Contacts. Having used Google Contacts (for MANY years!) as my "single point of truth" for managing and nurturing my precious contacts, I decided to switch to an Apple-centric ecosystem and workflow. Even though we can (theoretically) integrate and connect both Google Contacts and Apple iCloud Contacts on our iPhones, this has always been problematic trying to keep everything synced. After all, Apple and Google are competitors. So Google Contacts and Apple Contacts don't always play nice together. When I was on an Android phone, of course, Google Contacts worked perfectly flawlessly. But I use an iPhone!

Updating My Student Contacts

Now that I'm 100% "ALL IN" with Apple iCloud Contacts, I have disconnected my iPhone from Google Contacts Cloud. My iPhone and all Apple devices (including 3 Macs and iPad) are working GREAT! But...a lot of my Student Contact NAMES got nuked. So, I have your PHONE NUMBERS in my Apple Contacts but NOT your NAME. This requires manually editing your names back into my iPhone. Not a problem, really. (except when some students call me now, I only see your number, not your name. So make sure also to text me your name. 408-313-9006)

BTW, for syncing all my contacts over various platforms? I'm using this AMAZING app called Make to help automate everything.

Anyway, no worries, I WILL get all caught up with outstanding emails and text messages tonight and over the weekend!

Circle

Speaking of communication channels and building creative communities, I continue to learn more about Circle. It's VERY cool! There is also a pretty steep learning curve. One of the challenges is that Circle is primarily designed for people that want to charge money for membership subscriptions. (similar to Patreon) But, for the Music Tech Community Circle channel, I'm setting it up for students to use for FREE. If you have not yet joined, you're invited. Make sure to develop your profile page with a photo, a bio, and some links to websites and social media.

Click here to Join Circle

Please let me know if you have any technical problems or suggestions for improving the Music Tech Community Circle message board! You can DM me on Circle, email support@brucetambling.com or call me at 408-313-9006

Artistic Creativity and Studio Tech

I've been installing and upgrading to an Apple Mac Studio computer. CRAZY powerful!! The installation has been a lot of work, but super fun getting the latest plugins, virtual instruments, sample libraries, etc. These tools are amazing and REALLY inspiring.

Setting Up Our Studios

It's so important to have our studio, our creative space (wherever it is) ready to...CREATE!

This process (setting up a personal studio) reminded me of what students go through in our music tech classes. Exactly what I'm doing right now. Back to basics:

Connect all the hardware
Install all the software
Test everything (with Audio Files, MIDI Files)

Basic Steps to Creating and Producing Music

Listen
- Develop a collection of amazing music that inspires you
- Get and acquire high-resolution (preferably 24-bit) WAV files of this music on your local computer SSD (Solid State Drive) or internal system drive)
- Organize these audio assets in Folders
Practice Technique
- Your DAW, your entire STUDIO, is a musical instrument
- To learn how to play and eventually MASTER a musical instrument takes PRACTICE
Learn Songs
- Study the works (recordings) of other artists, songwriters, and composers
- Try to figure out how to play this music
  - Either just one component (like guitar, bass, drums, or keyboards)
  - Or, better yet, reproduce the entire song in your DAW
Create stuff
- Make files (Audio, MIDI, DAW, etc.)
- Organize these assets in Folders on your SSD