Community Challenge 78 | Write something in A Minor

Where to Start • Lesson Archive • Recommended Lesson Plan

Hi Everyone,
I'm getting back into Community Challenges! If you're not familiar with the idea, let me expain:

Imagine learning a new language without ever speaking or writing your own thoughts - only speaking travel phrases. Imagine you've only memorized the sounds of those phrases and don't even know what word each sound corresponds to. Imagine how much better you'd be able to communicate if you understood grammar and syntax and just general linguistic concepts in the language you're learning. Imagine if your teacher pushed you to speak your own ideas in that language instead of just travel phrases. Wouldn't you be much better at speaking that language? Some might argue that you're not really speaking the language unless you can articulate your own thoughts and ideas.

A LOT of people learn music by memorizing sounds and shapes on the guitar. Some people even learn a bit of theory, But if you never write your own music, it's a little like sticking to the travel phrases without practicing coming up with your own ideas. The best musicians (especially in the pop/rock/indie/songwriting world) tend to be really good at coming up with their own ideas - whether writing a full song, a bassline, a lead line, and interesting chord progression. That takes a knowledge of music theory AND practice taking that knowledge and making something new with it.

Community Challenges are designed to be a place to practice writing music. Yes, PRACTICE writing music. I don't need your best, I don't need you to pour out your heart and soul, though if you do thats totally cool too! I just need you to try to write something.

If you've never written anything before, watch the video - I walk you through the basics of how to start writing something.

I don't care if it's a voice memo you spent five minutes on or a full band Pro Tools session you spent 5 hours on - whatever you come up with, post it to the Community Challenge 78 thread on the community forum.

HAVE FUN!

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