For the Live event I teamed up with Owen, Timon, Michela & Timea. As a team we had to organize a live event, for this we decided to host Behind the Beat: a workshop about music production. In this workshop we talked about the history of music production and gave a tutorial of how to work with the Digital Art Workstation (DAW) FL Studio

Task Division

We decided split the work up to make use of everyone's qualities. Timon, Owen and I are all music producers, so we would take care of the content of the workshop. Michela and Timea were responsible for the marketing and they would take pictures during the workshop.

We decided that besides the basic tutorial of FL Studio, we also wanted to teach everyone a bit about the evolution of music production. Owen took this task upon him and he was able to tell a nice and coherent story about how music was captured for the first time, to how music production is now possible from something as simple as your laptop or phone.

After this short lecture it was time for the tutorial in FL Studio, this was my task. I tried to quickly go through the basics of how the program works, however this was a challenge because it is hard to simplify the instructions. In the end I did manage to convey most of the information, so everyone was able to start working with FL Studio.

Professional Skill

Giving the workshop helped me work on my professional presenting skills. Normally I am not a good public speaker, but talking about something that I am passionate about really helped. At first I did get the feedback that I was going a bit to fast at times, so I had to slow down a bit. This made sure that everyone could follow it better. In the end everyone was mostly able to follow the tutorial, I think this means that I have done a decent job with my demonstration.

Theoretical Skill

We didn't use a lot of theories for the creation of the workshop, we did use some elements of the control aspects (Time, Information, organization, facilities, script). For the time we had decided to meet up on the 9th of December to put together all the parts we individually created for the workshop. After this we had a meeting on the 11th about 1 hour before we had our event, this gave us time to quickly do a trail run and to set everything up. For the information we had decided to create a group on Whatsapp for our internal communications, for the external communications we created a poster and used Microsoft Teams. For the organization we had divided the team roles: promotion and photography was for Michela and Timea, Owen and Timon would mostly present and I would give a live demonstration. We also made a list of what facilities we needed, we made sure to book a classroom in advance where there was enough room for everyone who had signed up. We also made sure that we could use the big screen and we brought studio monitors (speakers) for during the live demonstration. Furthermore we had created a script of how the event should go down, Owen would start with his lecture, then I would do my live demonstration and thereafter Timon would explain the assignment of the contest. After the contest we would have Owen conclude the workshop and we would give a price to the winner of the contest.

Investigative Skill

I have been a music producer for over 8 years now, this means I already have a lot of expertise in the field of music production. To create my demonstration for the workshop I did have to do some research, al was it not in the way I had expected. Most of the time when I am creating music I am working on auto pilot, meaning that I just automatically do everything without having to think about it. To create a good demonstration I really had to pick apart my whole workflow and investigate how I normally would create a song. I did this by starting to work on a beat for the demonstration and by taking notes at every little step of the way, doing this created a step by step guide that I used for my demonstration.

Societal Skill

With this workshop we aimed to inspire people to start producing as well, or at least to let them try it out to see if they would have any interest. Most people found out that they were not that interested or that they didn't really have a knack for it. We did have 1 student come in who wasn't from our education, who really seemed to be really interested and also seemed to have a some talent in the music production. I think that we inspired him with our workshop to start with music production, so it is pretty nice knowing we made some impact on somebody.

Conclusion

In conclusion, by organizing and hosting the workshop was a valuable learning experience. It helped us develop our professional skills in event organization and public speaking and also gave us the opportunity to share our passion for music production with others. By using a mix of theory and practice, we were able to provide a interactive experience for the participants. Although not everyone found a passion for music production, it was rewarding to see the positive impact on those who did.

Visiting 2 Live Events

I have also visited 2 live events hosted by fellow students. For this I went to a Wine tasting and I visited the end of year celebration.

Wine Tasting

I think the wine tasting was the most fun live event of the two events I've visited. I got to try 5 different wines, a chardonnay, a pinot grigio, a rose, a malbec and a merlot. I don't really like wine, but I did think the chardonnay and pinot grigio were somewhat enjoyable. We also got to try different foods with the wines, like grapes, ham or krab. These foods paired well with the wines and complimented the flavours. I did like the setting of the tasting as well, it felt cosy and and the atmosphere was good as well. The presentation was also well thought out, we got a introduction to the wine, then we got to taste is and then we would have to think about what flavours we thought were in the wine. I myself wasn't really good at this, but some of the other attendees were really able to pick apart the wine. After we explained what we tasted we got to know where the wine was from and what we should have been able to taste. Overall I really enjoyed the event and I've learned a bit more about wine, however I still don't really like the taste.

End of Year Celebration

I also joined the end of year celebration, I went together with Roos, Miranda, Anouk, Jens and Patrick. Unfortunately there were not many other students there. We did have some drinks there and we talked to some of the fellow students who did show up, however because of the low attendance the atmosphere was a bit weird. The organization had really put up a good event, they had arranged a bar and some DJ to come and play as well. Overall I think the effort they had put in was great, it was just a shame that not many people showed up.