After reaching the end of my senior project experience six weeks after it began, things look different on the other side than I might have expected. For starters, I think the work that Dominic and I did over the past few months answers our original question, to a certain degree. Did we master songwriting in the past 2 months? Nope. And do I think I can do better? Yeah, I do but it’s besides the point – knowing how I can do better in the future has come from working on this senior project, and that in itself makes it more than worth it. I may not have put forth my best work now, but I learned what I want that best work to be, and I have more tools now that’ll make it easier to get there.

 

Despite all that, I am still proud of the work we created for this project. For starters, we met the goal that we put forth of completing three songs, so that’s great! Besides that, did we become better at storytelling through music? I think so – When I was making these songs with Dominic, the added element of a future audience definitely changed the way I worked a bit. Suddenly, there were stakes to what I was doing (to a certain degree). I wasn’t just going to be making the songs for no one but myself, so every part I added was a bit more purposeful than before. I really tried to see the instruments as being parts of a whole that always needed to reinforce that whole, throughout the entire song. It’s sort of like a three paragraph essay in a way – every body paragraph exists to further prove the thesis; for our songs, every instrument had to exist to move along the emotion / groove of the song in a logical way.

 

I may be making what Dominic and I did sound like a breeze to do – parts of the process moved along faster for sure, but there were challenges for us. For me, cutting vocals was where I struggled the most. I ended up treating them like any other instrument on the track – I put them behind a sufficient amount of effects and try to blend them into the songs. That’s definitely me being self conscious. I’m still in a place where I need to improve my vocals capabilities, and until then I’ll find interesting ways to mix them into tracks, but it’s a goal that I want to reach in the near future.

 

Before senior project started, I thought it was going to be a (relative) breeze to complete, but I ended up running into challenges (vocals) and testing my skills enough that I came out of it with improvement in certain areas under my belt, and a clear list of aspects I can improve regarding my songwriting moving forward. Due to quarantine, Dominic and I only got a taste of an everyday life in music, but it was enough to intrigue me to pursue it further in the future, whatever shape that may take.

 

Gus