New Year, New Start

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Sometimes, the only way to actually “finish” a project is to be faced with a deadline.  I know I’m not the only one who has a huge backlog of Pro Tools and Ableton Live sessions waiting to be completed “some day.”

This year I’ve decided to do something about it.  I’m planning to participate in two different groups that aim to help composers stay motivated:  Disquiet Junto and Weekly Beats.  They both have the same goal, which is to inspire participants to complete one new composition for each week of 2014!

Disquiet Junto is the brainchild of Marc Weidenbaum, aka Disquiet.  Junto is a Spanish word meaning “a club for mutual improvement.”  Here’s how it works:  each Thursday a new Junto project is announced. The project gives general guidelines or restrictions that act as a spring board for a new composition.  Participants are expected to upload their completed tracks to the group by the following Monday.  Here’s my track for the first project of 2014:

Please record the sound of an ice cube rattling in a glass, and make something of it.

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/127810860″ params=”color=000000&auto_play=false&show_artwork=true” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

While Disquiet Junto seems to lend itself to more experimental work, Weekly Beats is a popular group for electronic music producers (or even songwriters) looking for the same kind of motivation.

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There aren’t any guidelines for each week’s project, the task is simply to produce a new track every week. I’m planning to use this as an outlet for combining my experimental tendencies with more typical EDM beats. Here’s my first track for Weekly Beats:

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/128108119″ params=”color=000000&auto_play=false&show_artwork=true” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

I’m curious to see if I’ll be able to keep up with the weekly projects for both groups. Here’s to a productive 2014!