​As we rapidly approach the holiday season, I wanted to plug a little music resource that I’ve been working on! If you're interested in grabbing one of these by the end of the post, I'll post the links to them down there.

​As a composer who’s fond of pencil and paper, one of my most common recurring expenses is composition notebooks. I find it super useful to be able to jot down, plan, and workshop ideas anytime through the convenience of a paper notebook. Somehow the act of sketching on physical paper allows me to process and generate ideas more efficiently. However, I’ve never been able to find a notebook that does exactly what I’d like it to do. Most options offer lined paper for notes and manuscript paper for music, but that’s about it. I often find myself drawing in additional features every time when I need to put something on a timeline or brainstorm long term plans.

It was in my searching for a good notebook that the idea to make my own hit me. What if I could make a custom sketchbook that would offer everything I needed right from the start? A composition notebook for composers made by a composer? Well, I did it! It’s available now in hard and soft cover via amazon and on my website store as a digital download (for those who prefer a digital format!). 
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If you're interested in learning a little more about it, I’ll give a detailed breakdown of the features I added to the standard notebook model below. The more I worked on it, the more I realized there is so much missing from the books we all settle for!
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Something that always frustrated me about the average notebook was that I wasn’t able to quickly return to the notes I’d taken for a particular project as needed. I ended up flipping through page by page, trying to remember approximately when and in what order I had written things down in. A huge waste of time. My solution to this is a small index page at the start of each section.

With all the pages already numbered and placed into a grid, the user simply has to write in a small title to be able to rapidly return to the work or notes from whatever project they'd like. A big time saver, and a great way to keep things organized.

​Following the first Index Page is a section consisting of just regular lined note paper. Again, the pages are all numbered to help with easy organization. I spaced the lines closer together than can be often found in notebooks like this, giving the user a greater area for note taking while still maintaining a convenient small size. Each page features 27 lines and carries over to the following page allowing for them to be used individually or as a larger two page set.
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​For the staff paper, I also opted for increased concentration of staves per page rather than the large and obtrusive set up I’ve often found in other notebooks. Each page features 11 lines of staff, again carrying on to the following page which allows you to write per page or across two for a single idea. This is particularly useful when writing for multiple parts as you can increase the number of instruments shown vertically by using the two page option without reducing the length of space you have to write.

​Following the typical note and staff paper, I’ve added a section of timelines to help facilitate the planning of piece structures or project due dates. I find I can’t write music without a sense of direction or trajectory, and creating timelines has always been my chosen way to always give me a path forward. Anytime I feel I’m not sure what should happen next, or I feel stuck on a specific spot in a project, I refer to my timeline to give me the answer. I highly recommend this to anyone who is looking for solutions to this! The timelines are very basic, and can be altered to suit whatever need the user may have for it. The similar theme of using the notebook on a single page or two page basis continues, and you can easily connect different timelines to extend the range of a particular project.
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​While we all have access to calendars on our phones and computers, I find it helpful to use a paper calendar when working out tentative plans. This can allow you to plan far into the future, which is super important when juggling commissions and other responsibilities. By planning far ahead, you can better account for the time you’ll need for each project well in advance. It’s important to be able to limit and manage your projects so you don’t take on too much at once. The calendar pages of the sketchbook are the perfect place to plan out your long term projects for the year to come.
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If you’re so inclined, you can pick up a physical copy of this sketchbook at the following link: amzn.to/46tDB3i

Or if you’d prefer a digital version, it's available here: Composition Sketchbook

Please let me know what you think of it, if you’d like to see any changes, or if you want other kinds of notebooks made custom for specific instruments/artists. I’d love to hear your thoughts. Until next time, thank you for reading, and happy jamming!

It seems that my posts on recording and studio tips have been of some use to a few of you, so I figured I'd expand on that info by touching a little on how you can put that wonderful studio to use to make some money! My current favorite method is to be a remote studio musician.

I first realized this was an untapped potential gig income stream during the pandemic. My musician friends, being the brilliant resilient folks they are, persisted in their desire to make music even as shutdowns began. This resulted in many situations where we needed to figure out how to get our music to one another without being in person. The solution created was to record our parts in our individual homes and then send it to each other to be mixed together. There were initial technical issues, and we braced for the quality of the music to be sacrificed as a result of the distance. However, we were surprised to find this was not the case!

(This was one of my favorite COVID projects!) The cello you hear on this was recorded remotely in a basement while battling with a particularly outspoken water heater.

The result was a much higher quality than anticipated, especially for how cobbled together my setup was. I was even able to spend more time on the track without having to worry about studio time or a commute of any kind. It was an incredibly low stress and easy process. As soon as I finished, my brain lit up with the possibilities. Not only could I now work for any current clients remotely, but I could begin working with people around the world, and write and record my own music too!

This is a recording I did for a composer from Hong Kong, Hon Ning Cheung in the same basement during the height of the pandemic.

A track I remotely co-wrote and recorded on with JeongJeong (Brett Mooney), a close friend and fellow bedroom producer.

Okay, okay, enough with the examples... How do you do it? Well, once you have a microphone and a place to record (explored in my previous blogs), this is actually the part that is more simple:

When you're starting out, it may be difficult to get a hold of clients, I'm right there with you. Your best bet is to get in touch with other artists like you. Find potential clients for your services as a musician and send them an email or a message, build up a portfolio of recordings and previous work examples that you can reference potential clients towards, and set up a central hub where you can house all this, it could be a website (which I recommend) but it could also be a social media page of some kind. It's simply important to be visible and to be able to prove your value to a potential customer.

For example, if you're a vocalist, I would get in touch with composers, people who appear to not have access to vocal talent, and let them know you're there. Wind players can do the same, or even find work on songs of more popular genres. As a cellist, I tend to get in touch with singer songwriters, and other independent artists who might not have the flexibility to work with musicians in person but still would love to bring their music to the next level with live instruments. I've also had a lot of experience working with composers to premiere and record their works virtually. As a composer, I try and get in touch with ensembles and orchestras. There is demand, but a lot of people won't think of you as a solution until you present yourself as one.

It's unlikely that people will stumble across you randomly, so you'll need to be proactive about getting in communication with artists and simply letting them know that you're an option if they're looking for access to professionals with your skill set. This often involves tons of cold emails/messages and tons of non responses. However, the responses you will get will surprise you! Reach out to those people whose music you love, what do you have to lose? The worst thing that can happen is you get no response, the best thing is that you could work with some really incredible people, and make some money while you're at it. By offering remote services, you're showing them an easily accessible avenue to the skills you can provide. Even if they don't end up responding or being interested, they are at least now aware of you.

I may go into detail about how to go about these cold emails and messages in a future post, but for now, if this kind of work piques your interest at all, I highly recommend exploring it! I'm always available to answer any questions too, so never hesitate to reach out. Until next time, thank you for reading, and happy jamming!