Recording Software is Changing Music Lessons
Today was a big day for one of my students
I showed him the amazing free recording studio on his laptop. GarageBand comes standard with most Apple computers. It is designed to be intuitive and simple to use, but fully capable of creating high quality, professional recordings. This is my student’s first step toward writing his own music.
Our lesson lasted 45 minutes, and we spent about 35 of those minutes digging into the basics - creating a project file, building a little drum track, recording and editing MIDI instruments, and just getting familiar with the software. It was time well spent even though barely ten minutes of our lesson was about actually playing bass. His assignment for the week was to create four short drum and keyboard chord progressions. For each one he’ll write a bass line.
Up until now, he hasn’t had a way to write, listen to and play along to his own music. He hasn’t been given the option. Until now he has been learning other people’s songs. It might not have occurred to him that it was something he could learn and practice.
having tools To create music is so important.
Intrinsic motivation is what keeps people playing music long into old age and there are few things more intrinsic than expressing yourself through the creation of music. GarageBand makes it so easy to get started.
Eventually my student will buy a device called an audio interface that allows him to record bass and guitar at near studio quality straight into his software. For another $100 he can buy a microphone that plugs into the audio interface to record anything else from voice to guitar to hand claps. GarageBand is not just a useful practice tool, its the most accessible first step into studio musicianship.
Helping people learn to write music and navigate recording software is an absolute honor for me. It is a sacred moment when a student shifts from “what music can I learn” to “what music can I create?”
Think about any of your favorite bands or artists. 99% of them make a living playing their own music. Music students sometimes have this notion that you have to get really good at your instrument and your scales and then creativity will suddenly just start happening. Nope. Creativity starts hand-in-hand with learning an instrument. Its something you practice deliberately and master over time, just like everything else. GarageBand gives you a playground to practice being creative.
you can start making music with just a computer
I once had a couple contact me about lessons. They were DJs and interested in producing electronic music. They didn’t play instruments and they hadn’t really written music before. When they asked me if it was possible to do lessons this way I said “hell yeah! Lets do it.”
Over the course of six months, we worked on music theory, composition, engineering, mixing, even a little music history - all without learning an instrument. Recording software like GarageBand made it possible to visualize chord progressions, melodies, and bass lines.
The cool thing about it, though, is that they ARE learning an instrument. Recording software language tends to visualize musical information on a piano keyboard. Not only do you get used to manipulating notes on the screen, but you can also buy little piano keyboard called a MIDI controller that interfaces seamlessly with GarageBand and other recording software. This allows you to trigger and play all kinds of sounds - drums, bass, organ, piano, synthesizers, and all kinds of other virtual instruments.
They will continue to get better at piano not as a goal, but as a side effect. Instead of the motivation being “learn and instrument, then write music” it becomes “learn to write music, then understand what you need to practice to get better at writing.” This type of motivation seems to be more sustainable over time and tends to feed back on itself.
Having permission to create is crucial
Some of you might object to this idea of not learning an instrument before you write music, like skipping the meal and going straight to dessert. Especially for kids, you might think “hey, I’m getting my kid guitar lessons so they don’t have more screen time and now instead of playing guitar, they are playing on the computer.”
Here’s the thing though. When you learn to create music, you learn to interact in a way that is distinctly different from memorizing and performing. You take ownership. You start problem solving and engaging in ways that you never would have. Instead of seeing a song and playing a song, you start to look deep into what the song is made of, how the parts interact, how it could be done differently.
Our school system is about linear learning. Grade 1, Grade 2, Grade 3. First learn the alphabet, then learn grammar, then learn linguistics. Step 1, Step 2, Step 3.
Musical learning does not need to be linear. My philosophy is “everything helps with everything.” As long as you’re interacting with music in a mindful, thoughtful way, you’ll be learning some important aspects of music. Questions will come up. Patterns will reveal themselves.
If you’re inspired to learn every solo Jimi Hendrix ever played, thats going to be massively beneficial. If you want to learn all the chords in the key of G and write folk songs and chord progressions for a year, thats massively beneficial. If you stop playing guitar for a few months and produce electronic beats on your laptop, thats absolutely going to give you a different perspective on guitar when you start playing it more often. If you stop playing for a few months and study music theory, thats going to affect your musical attitudes.
If your gateway into making music starts with a laptop, that is a hell of a lot better than not getting into music at all. Whatever aspect of music keeps you up at night is a good thing to explore for a while.
Your brain becomes your musical instrument
Imagine how much differently you would look at a car if you designed and built one yourself from scratch! Imagine the contours of the rear bumper. Imagine drawing the shape of the front headlights and trying to mold them just the way you want.
You suddenly start having opinions about things you didn’t even notice before. The thickness of the steering wheel, how soft the seats are. Where is an intuitive place to put the switch for the dome lights? Does the body shape reduce drag? Are the doorhandles too stiff?
Abstract ideas would become and tangible, measurable things. You would certainly never look at a car the same way.
Learning to write and record music is like designing a car. Everything you play gets scrutinized in a different way. The more you write, the more you learn about your own strengths and weaknesses. What to practice becomes more obvious and more self-motivating. And its fun!