Latest / The Other 22 Hours / Rob Moose on the feast-or-famine mindset, songs as love letters, and remaining child-like.

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Rob Moose on the feast-or-famine mindset, songs as love letters, and remaining child-like. · The Other 22 Hours

• 0:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: It just kind of got confusing after that to be like, what do I actually want to do?
• 0:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I don't want to do things like Paul's tour.
• 0:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: That felt so out of touch with reality.
• 0:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I felt like the hotel was making more money to me.
• 0:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Just like the resources we're going to places where it's like, I was like, can I stay at the remada and keep some more at that, you know?
• 0:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
• 0:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: But you also would need sushi on the plane going to the next city after the show.
• 0:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, it's not why I started doing this.
• 0:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: We often define artists by their output, their records, books, movies, and the times they're on stage.
• 0:35
  [SPEAKER_04]: But the art is made in the quiet, the struggle, and the mundane, the hours that no one sees.
• 0:41
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm McKinna Ann.
• 0:42
  [SPEAKER_03]: And I'm Aaron Kray for Hayes.
• 0:44
  [SPEAKER_03]: This is the other 22 hours.
• 0:46
  [SPEAKER_03]: An exploration of the creative life lived in between.
• 1:03
  [SPEAKER_03]: Today we're featuring our first conversation with a freelance side musician who, if you don't recognize his name, you surely recognize his work in his playing.
• 1:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: We are talking with Rob Moose, who is a violinist and stringer-ranger, who,
• 1:21
  [SPEAKER_03]: basically any indie rock or pop record that you have heard in the last 15 years that is not only his arrangements but his playing as well.
• 1:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: I've been to have to read this off a list just to name a few of the people that he has written strings and recorded for.
• 1:36
  [SPEAKER_03]: We have Paul Simon Bruce Horne's Bee Bee Bridgers Taylor Swift, Blake Mills, the national that December's Interpol Saint Vincent,
• 1:46
  [SPEAKER_03]: Sufi on Steven's perfum genius does as well as contributing arrangements to massive classical artists such as Joshua Bell and Renee Fleming and touring with most of the people that I've just named his resume is extensive.
• 2:02
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and this was a really calming conversation, I would say.
• 2:05
  [SPEAKER_04]: We talked about peaking in the tour industry when you reach the top of the top, what happens as well as the power of morning pages and routines, and that it really all comes down to the people and relationships.
• 2:20
  [SPEAKER_03]: With that, please enjoy our conversation with Rob Moose.
• 2:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: We like to start every conversation with a how are you doing and that's a how are you really doing question not a small talk question and where are you physically and creatively cool I am in a not small talkway doing really well because my family is we're on orchids island which is one of the salmon islands up kind of just below Vancouver we're here for a couple of weeks for our son spring break and this is a place that I like pine for all year long.
• 2:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: I've kind of accepted that we're, you know, we're not going to live your full time, we're not even able to be anywhere near like 50 50 with where we spend our time but something about this place just gives me a lot of peace and a lot of inspiration and like hope and so to actually physically be here we've had here maybe four or five days ago that just the effect is kicking in as it always does have been coming here for 17 years and it just remains very powerful for me such an incredible contrast to city life and so yeah, really enjoying that so far.
• 3:21
  [SPEAKER_03]: Amazing.
• 3:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: I just assumed that you were in Los Angeles.
• 3:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: Every, yeah, no matter what I do in my life, everybody assumes I live there and I've never lived there and I will not live there.
• 3:30
  [SPEAKER_04]: I don't know, throw a chance, I don't know, but... Do you still live in New York?
• 3:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 3:34
  [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, I definitely thought you lived in Elano.
• 3:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's like this weird thing.
• 3:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know.
• 3:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, a lot of the work I do was with the wonderful people out there.
• 3:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I go there sometimes, but I've been in New York for 26 years.
• 3:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 3:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then this place kind of entered our universe more permanently in 2019.
• 3:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: So we're able to go back and forth when time allows.
• 3:54
  [SPEAKER_03]: How are you from originally?
• 3:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: I grew up mostly in Connecticut throughout the Northeast, but most of the time was there and then I moved to New York for college.
• 4:01
  [SPEAKER_04]: What college did you go to?
• 4:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: I went to Manhattan School Music to study violin and then I went to Columbia for an MA in American Studies for a year, but I started touring about six months into that and after carrying books around on a European tour when I was 22 for...
• 4:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: For like seven of the nine weeks, I remember, I think it was on my birthday, we were in Spain.
• 4:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just looked at these books I was about to put back in my backpack for the hundredth time to never ever like read and finish this paper.
• 4:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just left them for the housekeeper.
• 4:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: Amazing.
• 4:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: And dropped out of the program and it was sort of intended to be like, not sure what's next for me.
• 4:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: I should like broaden my horizons after being at a conservatory and the things that I had dreamed of doing were starting to happen.
• 4:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I just like go and I've never looked back.
• 4:44
  [SPEAKER_03]: Wow.
• 4:44
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, amazing.
• 4:46
  [SPEAKER_03]: Those dreams at that time being a conservatory.
• 4:48
  [SPEAKER_03]: So we met in jazz school, we went to the new school.
• 4:50
  [SPEAKER_03]: But I had a lot of friends that went to Manhattan School.
• 4:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: I went to Interlock and Arts Academy.
• 4:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: So I had a lot of friends that went to more classical route.
• 4:56
  [SPEAKER_03]: I was like, I'm convinced that I got into Interlock and only because drum set was my main thing and they had like a jazz ensemble.
• 5:01
  [SPEAKER_03]: They're like, oh, we need a drum set player.
• 5:03
  [SPEAKER_03]: They can also kind of play Marimba.
• 5:06
  [SPEAKER_03]: But it seemed like the people that were there that classical music was their thing.
• 5:11
  [SPEAKER_03]: It was like blinders on.
• 5:12
  [SPEAKER_03]: You saw them the first weekend of school and then they disappeared into a practice room until like the last weekend of school and you're like, who are you?
• 5:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right.
• 5:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: Merged again.
• 5:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: Right.
• 5:20
  [SPEAKER_03]: What were your hopes and dreams at that point in time?
• 5:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: Was it to kind of go in our castle router or was it to do more what you're doing in writer arrangements and play in a more kind of pop sense?
• 5:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think my dream was exactly what I'm doing because I don't know that what I'm doing existed totally, or I didn't, I wasn't aware of an example of it, but I think I always kind of grew up equally interested in classical music and rock music, or non-class music, that was just such a fan of like grunge music in the 90s.
• 5:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't play guitar, I guess I got a guitar when I was 16, and I started violin when I was six, but I was always like in orchestra kind of plucking and trying to figure out this Nirvana song, and moving to New York was amazing because I started to see examples of people playing instruments that looked like mine in environments where rock bands would play, and I didn't know that that existed before.
• 6:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think around that school time, my dream was to, I love the idea of being able to travel and perform, and I think I just wanted to play in an environment
• 6:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: really alive where the audience participated in a way and I got to see some groups during my school years and right after that we're integrating orchestral instruments and that really got my wheels turning and that ended up being the path that I followed.
• 6:28
  [SPEAKER_03]: Coming from last music where the creativity at least in my experience and observation, the creativity kind of lies in the interpretation and the expression that you put into somebody else's writing.
• 6:39
  [SPEAKER_03]: Were you always interested
• 6:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: I started to really get interested in that around college.
• 6:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: There was a great jazz program at my school, and I some of the kids who lived in my dorm were jazz-basis and saxophone players.
• 6:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think I always felt a little bit like an outsider in classical music, I kind of don't know why.
• 6:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I gravitated toward people who were doing something a little bit different, and it was just probably just new for me to be around people who could play cramatically like that, you know, and like have more freely.
• 7:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so,
• 7:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't realize that I could pursue that stuff on the violin, violence seemed very defined to me by like the masters in the classics and by technique and teachers and rules.
• 7:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: My first instrument was actually piano, so I would sometimes go to piano, try to learn.
• 7:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: In a sentimental mood or something like that, and then guitar also...
• 7:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: To give me a number of years to kind of circle back to my main instrument, the instrument that I had the most skills on and be able to recognize that I could do different things with it.
• 7:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I feel like that college and post college period of time was gathering skills that I could like later deploy in a more thoughtful way.
• 7:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, like because those types of new sort of try to expand and times when you're really home and I feel like it was important for me to go through that gathering stage and then later in my 20s and 30s, I really zeroed in on like
• 7:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: string arranging and recording as the thing that I felt like I had a really unique voice in.
• 7:57
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I'm curious because you have a according to the internet.
• 8:00
  [SPEAKER_04]: You've toured on some pretty massive tours and what is your relationship or how did it evolve into wanting to focus more on composing and being in the studio and being home versus the live touring career path?
• 8:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think I just peeked with touring like I don't really know how I could do better than like being on the Bunnyvert tour where it went from this kind of cult project to something or what Grammys and we played S&L and stuff like that and then later being a part of Paul Simon's farewell tour and being on a plane, you know, and stuff like that just it just kind of got confusing after that to be like, what do I charge like what like what do I do?
• 8:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: What do I actually want to do like I don't want to do things like Paul's tour not like I don't want to work with him But that's how it's still out of touch with reality, and I felt like the hotel was making more money than me, you know Like just like the resources we're going to places where it's like I was like, can I stay at the remada and keep some more of that, you know?
• 8:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah
• 8:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: But you also would like eat sushi on the plane going to the next city after the show.
• 9:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: It was interesting.
• 9:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: My wife loved that tour because the hotels were so nice.
• 9:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I was just like, this is not why I started doing this.
• 9:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I think it was somewhat that.
• 9:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: And also just, you know, those creative urges to kind of push past what you know.
• 9:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: And touring with bands, I got to see how records were made early on.
• 9:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: I would get to plan a record as big as a violinist, playing somebody else's arrangement or playing my own.
• 9:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I sort of just noticed that there was a complexity, maybe a intimidation around bringing in orchestral players, compared to hiring a bassist or guitarist to come in and play us on.
• 9:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: There was this whole process ahead to happen.
• 9:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: It took a lot of time, resources, the artists themselves who really knew their music and knew their stuff.
• 9:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe didn't feel empowered to really communicate interface in that way.
• 9:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: As a member of the group who also spoke to its other language, I just felt like there's got to be a more efficient way to do this.
• 9:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I want these elements to be on as many recordings as possible.
• 9:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I love the way this sounds here, so maybe I can kind of facilitate, so just kind of blindly made myself available as somebody who could try to come up with the ideas and come in and record them.
• 10:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, just hopefully have it be something that people could do for more songs more often.
• 10:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think those things kind of came together and showed me the possibility of focusing on that.
• 10:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: More, probably took until like 2018, 2019 from, say, like 2012 to where it was really like, oh, most of my work is now over here.
• 10:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: So it was sort of a gentle phasing out, I suppose.
• 10:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I'm really happy because that means that I get to work on new stuff like every day.
• 10:33
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I mean, one of the things that comes up a lot in these conversations that I'm just personally very interested in is the kind of the different buckets of like career aspirations and achievement and creative fulfillment and aspirations and achievement and
• 10:48
  [SPEAKER_04]: how that evolves in our minds as we age as well.
• 10:52
  [SPEAKER_04]: Like I just still vividly remember like being in my early 20s and like seeing somebody like quit a seemingly successful band and not being able to fathom because I hadn't yet really lived the life of a professional musician.
• 11:05
  [SPEAKER_04]: I hadn't ever gone on tour.
• 11:07
  [SPEAKER_04]: I couldn't fathom why they would leave.
• 11:09
  [SPEAKER_04]: a successful tour and didn't understand in my body like what it means to tour and also there's so many other factors than just the music who you're with, who you're not with, because of it, all those different things.
• 11:22
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so especially when you think of
• 11:25
  [SPEAKER_04]: The big dream is, oh, to be flying on a jet and have all of your things taking care of and get to play music.
• 11:30
  [SPEAKER_04]: Like, why would anybody not want that?
• 11:33
  [SPEAKER_04]: Can you speak a little to living those heights?
• 11:37
  [SPEAKER_04]: Like you said, peaking and grappling with, oh wait, these are nice, but this isn't why I started playing violin to begin with, and how do I reconcile all of the different scenarios and environments and commercial career creative?
• 11:51
  [SPEAKER_04]: Aligning.
• 11:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, totally.
• 11:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think, you know, even just having briefly touched on the kind of college and post college experience and what I was attracted to in non-costal music that those performing environments that energy that interchange with the audience.
• 12:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: When you start to get to venues of a certain size, you don't really feel that anymore in the same way.
• 12:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, they have the power to overwhelm you more in certain moments.
• 12:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: But you're like looking out, you see nothing.
• 12:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's cool, the first couple times you play in arena or something, and not to say it's not cool.
• 12:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I think that there's sort of a sweet spot of venue size where obviously you're in a large community, you can be really moved by applause or by cheering or by sheer volume or people singing along or things like that.
• 12:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: But you don't feel like you can't see anyone and you don't know how it's going or like,
• 12:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Some of the two might just be over time getting until like using any years and stuff, and that's already another step removed from just hearing, I get why people do it for audio reasons, and for sonic reasons, but I always struggled with that.
• 12:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think something was just the environment, and it getting so big that it almost felt like you were just performing by yourself for some taping or something.
• 12:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like what was that?
• 12:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: What was the difference?
• 13:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: Also think,
• 13:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe some of the differences if you're playing a catalog that's mostly of songs from a long time ago.
• 13:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean the first time I got to be on stage with Paul Simon, I was weeping.
• 13:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: We opened the show with America and it's like how many times did I hear that on a mix tape when I was 12, you know, like this guy is right there.
• 13:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like he knows my name.
• 13:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like I'm playing.
• 13:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm here.
• 13:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't want to be cynical and lose that, but I also feel like when you're at Madison Square Garden or something, he will often say, like, oh, I'm doing this a little bit of a showbiz, but here, you know, there is a sort of a layer around it that it's different than when you're playing for.
• 13:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, maybe one of my favorite venues to play would be like the Bowery Ballroom.
• 13:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's size.
• 13:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: Or if you're playing, you know, 2003,000, like,
• 13:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: being in those environments where you really feel like you're making a human connection.
• 13:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: And maybe it's ironic to say that I feel that with recording because most of the time when I'm working, no one is there, but I feel like I'm doing something.
• 13:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: And my expression that I'm able to tap into and flesh out is then going to be able to reach people across a really wide variety of like ages, experiences, locations, and for the rest of time.
• 14:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think I love being able to really go deep on something and just see what I can kind of excavate and contribute.
• 14:08
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I that residents with me really deeply.
• 14:11
  [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I started touring all the time.
• 14:13
  [SPEAKER_03]: Like I couldn't be on the road enough.
• 14:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: And then, you know, I was playing on records and recording a little bit and, you know, constantly kind of like threatening to like stop touring and say no, but then a call would come in and be like, yeah, great cool would be music.
• 14:26
  [SPEAKER_03]: I love or people I love or whatever.
• 14:27
  [SPEAKER_03]: And
• 14:27
  [SPEAKER_03]: I remember finding those one year where I did the math and I was gone like 270 days.
• 14:32
  [SPEAKER_03]: Wow.
• 14:33
  [SPEAKER_03]: Which is too much.
• 14:34
  [SPEAKER_03]: Bruns are my first instruments.
• 14:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: So it was a lot of like being on tour with one band and flying for like every week day of a year.
• 14:39
  [SPEAKER_03]: Oh yeah, like learning songs for another gig in the van with one people and then flying from one tour to the other and sending multiple kids and places and like my ego loved it.
• 14:47
  [SPEAKER_03]: But I was I would venture to say like as unfulfilled as I'd ever been.
• 14:51
  [SPEAKER_03]: I creatively still.
• 14:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: And it's always been like you said like that permanence of making a record.
• 14:57
  [SPEAKER_03]: as beautiful an art form as live music is in that it exists right then in there in that moment.
• 15:02
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
• 15:02
  [SPEAKER_03]: And it's an interaction between the audience and the performers.
• 15:05
  [SPEAKER_03]: A good band in a bad audience.
• 15:07
  [SPEAKER_03]: It's still kind of a bad show.
• 15:09
  [SPEAKER_03]: A bad band in a good audience.
• 15:10
  [SPEAKER_03]: It's got to be like a good audience in a good band and then it can be magic and it feels like levitating and it's right then in there in the moment.
• 15:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
• 15:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: But then the permanence of making a record, I've always related to carving a sculpture and something that will outlive us and outlive the creators and that's always been like a really romantic idea to me.
• 15:28
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
• 15:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: Use of my creativity.
• 15:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I know you guys are parents too and it's like now that I have a nearly six year old, it just being able to work kind of really flexible schedule.
• 15:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, it works both ways like sometimes I'll be like, oh, I have to stop because they need me to pick him up at school.
• 15:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: He's sick.
• 15:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: I got it.
• 15:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I never think about what I'm leaving behind in those moments.
• 15:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's like my priorities are so clear, but also then it could be like, I didn't finish it song.
• 15:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: I really want to go back after he goes to bed and get in and do a few more hours like just the fact that it's possible to get into the zone at different times than that.
• 15:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: I struggle with it because I am trying to create like a really dependable routine for myself and I'm trying to really prioritize sleep and also be very present as a parent and finding that sweet spot of like, I'm getting enough done.
• 16:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm a little bit uncomfortable because I'm not getting more done, but also like, not probably means that my life isn't balanced.
• 16:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I'm just constantly like reflecting on and tweaking that stuff.
• 16:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I feel like the studio situation is a lot more supportive of the life that I've chosen to lead as a member of my family.
• 16:27
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I love that.
• 16:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: Hey, just a quick pause from this conversation.
• 16:31
  [SPEAKER_03]: The other 22 hours is an independent production built entirely on the idea that he's quiet on his conversations matter.
• 16:38
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• 16:40
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• 16:44
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• 16:49
  [SPEAKER_03]: It's a small action that we say massive difference for us.
• 16:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thanks for being here.
• 16:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: Let's get back to our conversation.
• 16:57
  [SPEAKER_04]: you told me before that also you like systems and creating these things what are some of the resources you find helpful when you're trying to refine your systems or look at like what are the ways I can take care of myself mentally emotionally creatively also prioritize parenting as you know that has been for us such a shift of when you come up also being like career is number one
• 17:21
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I was like, wait, even in my heart, career is not number one anymore, but I feel like I'm supposed to still be thinking career is number one, but it's just it's not like so I'm curious what you have found for help and support and education in that.
• 17:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, and that only is curing.
• 17:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: Number one, but like I'm not number one, like I am my lowest dad, you know, it's just it's so cool.
• 17:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: I feel that amount of like empathy and like the larger perspective that I have now just from watching this guy grow up from second line.
• 17:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's just awesome to kind of become the audience member.
• 17:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think also, you know, with what I do too.
• 17:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I feel like it's taught me a lot about how to just interact with all kinds of people, not just within my family, but a lot of what I do, I think goes back to having red and tried to kind of fall along the artist's way, and maybe 2018, one winter, and the thing that really stuck with me from that book was doing the morning pages.
• 18:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I've moved around where I do that.
• 18:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: used to be something that I felt like was really important to do, like, right when I wake up.
• 18:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: But now, oftentimes, I have somebody else waking me up, and I, I don't have to dip the plan to get out before I think he's going to wake up, like, that time doesn't exist.
• 18:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: So it's kind of shifted for me to be like, when I arrived to my studio, I try to, in spite of the temptation to jump right into work.
• 18:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: I try to take 10, 15 minutes or so to do just a free right to kind of like externalize all the stuff that's, would otherwise be sort of
• 18:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I've tried to couple that with this sort of weekly planner book that I have because I'll notice that when I'm doing the free right about whatever I'll be like, oh, I need to buy that cable and what I don't want to do is like go to my phone never because then I will get so far away from where I ever intended to be so I'm trying to create these like analog systems around me to log things and
• 19:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes it's a little annoying because you're like, I wrote it down in the letter to studio.
• 19:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: What was that thing I wrote down?
• 19:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I have like many different calendars and I just really enjoy the act of writing and I feel like hopefully it also allegedly have prints that information in your brain more.
• 19:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, just kind of externalizing the ideas and really mapping out what the time could be, like aspiring to like this incredible five or six hours that I might have and then the hardest part for me is carving out a little time at the end.
• 19:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: It could be like five or ten minutes.
• 19:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: to just be like, what did I do?
• 19:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: What worked, what didn't, what do I need to do next?
• 19:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: Because I will always go right up until like a second and then just be like late coming home.
• 19:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's just my brain type where it's just, I get into this flow thing and it's really hard for me to, I'm like a five-year-old in that way.
• 19:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's how it's hard for me to switch gears and so.
• 19:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 19:51
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
• 19:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I noticed that.
• 19:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: Same thing with me.
• 19:54
  [SPEAKER_03]: I'll go like right up to the last second and it's a blessing going to curse Bernard studio, which is 30 feet behind our house, which is incredible, especially for like going back to work after our kids go to sleep.
• 20:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, come right out.
• 20:06
  [SPEAKER_03]: You know, it's a physical space that shifts my, you know, the Pavlovian response of like, oh, this is my creative space I'm here.
• 20:13
  [SPEAKER_03]: But when I work like right up to it and then I have to go inside and on the other side of that door right there is like two kids and dinner and all of that like there's no like built in buffer to like shift years.
• 20:23
  [SPEAKER_04]: He'll come in and be like, I have to go to the bathroom and I'm like, look, you have one in the studio.
• 20:29
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm like, why don't you build in your quote-unquote commute time before you come into the house?
• 20:36
  [SPEAKER_04]: It's like, use the restroom out there.
• 20:37
  [SPEAKER_04]: Take five minutes and chill out before you come in because this is happening and for you to come in and the kids are like, daddies here and then you be like, I need to go recent.
• 20:47
  [SPEAKER_04]: No, it doesn't.
• 20:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, they've been waiting for you.
• 20:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: I totally struggle with that.
• 20:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: In New York, I have like a 12 minute like ride commute from studio to home.
• 20:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think that time is all very kind of active unpacking of debriefing and stuff.
• 21:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: But here, it's the similar thing where the studio is like 80 feet away.
• 21:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't wish it was a little farther away, both for the setup and for the unlined.
• 21:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, it's really hard to study.
• 21:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: footgears in that way and it's really hard to pull away from the work in time to do it.
• 21:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: I hope over time to just be able to accept that if I don't finish something today, I just have to wait till tomorrow if I really want to sleep and see my wife and like, I want to get more accepting about falling short but like being more sustainable.
• 21:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: Because that's the thing is I think I've always run the risk of not noticing burnout until I get to a point where I'm like, whoa, what was that thing?
• 21:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just said that's not me, that's not how I want to feel, you know, I need to get out of here for a day, which also connects to like the freelancer mentality of feast or famine and like,
• 21:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: I play on like hundreds of songs a year, but I still am convinced like Andy Song might be the last song every a hired for, you know, like, because how do I know, like these crazy shifts in technology, like musical trends, whatever.
• 21:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's been very steady for me, but I still don't know how to truly believe that it's not going away.
• 22:01
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, and I'm so glad to kind of brought that up because you are our first side person as a guest.
• 22:07
  [SPEAKER_03]: Everybody else that we've had is an artist is a writer, a front person, an actor, a photographer like Max.
• 22:14
  [SPEAKER_03]: Like saying that they have the means to create their own work or monetize their own work without anybody else's input.
• 22:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: you know, whereas like yourself or me, we're relying on other artists to then have work.
• 22:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: I can assume given your resume and everything you've done that creates this kind of inertia, but like it doesn't start like that on day one.
• 22:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: How do you navigate that?
• 22:37
  [SPEAKER_03]: To me, it was really frustrating to like, I want to work.
• 22:40
  [SPEAKER_03]: I want to do this.
• 22:41
  [SPEAKER_03]: I want to have all this, but like waiting for the phone to ring or like having just at a time like generating work.
• 22:46
  [SPEAKER_03]: How did you navigate that?
• 22:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's like an ongoing process.
• 22:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: I would never want to come across as someone who's angling for something or being disingenuous about what a relationship is.
• 22:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: I feel like early in my career, I was really careful about people that I worked for.
• 23:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't trying to become their best friend.
• 23:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I would notice that stuff and be like, oh, I just feel for certain people, like Justin from Boni Verre, like, you know, and I've heard other interviews, you guys have done more people talk about the kind of payroll or the teams that have to be maintained in order to do tours on a certain level.
• 23:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: How do you know if you're in that position, who's your friend and who's just like you're paying them 120,000 dollars a year or something, so, you can be both, but yeah, I guess I've just been kind of wary about that.
• 23:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think that networking is my greatest skill or whatever, but I guess because I branched outward from touring.
• 23:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: I had somewhat of community already and
• 23:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's interesting like we're all looking for people to work with who obviously do a great job, over to liver, or on time, reliable, and stuff, but also people that we just enjoy communicating with or being around and when I get the opportunity to hire string players for a concert or recording or something, I know that there are like 700 amazing violinists in my burrow, if not more.
• 23:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm just like, who do I want to spend four hours with being genuine in those relationships and being really interested in people and staying in touch, not really with an ulterior motive, but just like cultivating community is probably about all you can do.
• 24:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then word of mouth, I've been so lucky.
• 24:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, this must reach a funny very record is like the fourth one I've worked on.
• 24:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I was like incredible to get to work on music with somebody over 15 years over four projects.
• 24:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: I've been lucky that it's like a band brought me into a recording situation, maybe that producer that is working with another artist and hell, had a bit of experience with me and it just kind of, it's very organic, like, I have a manager, I had a manager once before as well.
• 24:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think new work ever comes from somebody besides you.
• 24:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's not like he's cold calling people on being like, you gotta get Rob on this major label record.
• 24:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's he knows the person to talk to when
• 24:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: Somebody reaches out to me and he may have a relationship with him that goes back to decades or something, but it really does have to come from you somehow.
• 24:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I feel like coming up with a way to approach at that field is true and comfortable.
• 24:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's been important to me and has been a long process of refining.
• 24:58
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, that process of refining, I think, of...
• 25:01
  [SPEAKER_04]: Aaron just turned 40.
• 25:02
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm turning 40 in a couple of months.
• 25:05
  [SPEAKER_04]: I really like this age.
• 25:06
  [SPEAKER_04]: Within also the musical community, I feel like I witnessed and so many friends and peers and colleagues around our age.
• 25:15
  [SPEAKER_04]: This kind of like acceptance or comfort of like, yes, knowing that every job could be the last job.
• 25:22
  [SPEAKER_04]: But it's just like the frenetic energy of trying to like,
• 25:27
  [SPEAKER_04]: get things or do things or achieve or be seen.
• 25:31
  [SPEAKER_04]: It feels like it is calming in the certain age demographic that I've experienced.
• 25:38
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm curious, like if you can speak to that, I just like, I think of my 20s in New York, even when I worked at Nunsets Records, I could visibly see when somebody would talk to me and I'd be like, oh, I'm a musician.
• 25:51
  [SPEAKER_04]: And they'd be like, oh, that's cute.
• 25:52
  [SPEAKER_04]: You're like, changing the musician.
• 25:54
  [SPEAKER_04]: And then when I would say, I work at Nunsets,
• 25:56
  [SPEAKER_04]: It was like something switched, all of a sudden I was like an asset.
• 26:01
  [SPEAKER_04]: I was at a young age to be fielding people's maneuvering and I could feel it at like parties and so much so that I even like went to the VP of Nonsedge at one point.
• 26:11
  [SPEAKER_04]: Like someone kept pounding me about getting their record to them and they were like so sweet and empathetic and trying to explain how to navigate this.
• 26:19
  [SPEAKER_04]: And that has shifted in being self conscious of MI coming off that way in different scenarios.
• 26:24
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I just really have felt that energy leave me like, and also it's not even from like achievement or success.
• 26:33
  [SPEAKER_04]: Like I personally have not achieved levels of success that you have or that I hope I would buy now.
• 26:41
  [SPEAKER_04]: But I feel so much calmer because my perspective on what that means is
• 26:48
  [SPEAKER_04]: it's not the end all goal of life anymore and it's also not on an expiration date and it's also not what informs whether I'm worthy of attention or connection with people but I didn't truly know that when I was younger so I'm curious if you can speak to that.
• 27:07
  [SPEAKER_04]: find tuning of that.
• 27:08
  [SPEAKER_04]: And especially when you were getting some of your early like bigger gigs, was there any of that heightened anxiety of like, how do I act?
• 27:17
  [SPEAKER_04]: How do I make sure that this keeps going?
• 27:19
  [SPEAKER_04]: Where do I fit in with all of these people?
• 27:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I mean, with a performing stuff it used to be so stressful to me, just you might get asked to do three things on one day and that's something that's easier with reporting as like I can say yes to a bunch of stuff and just figure out where it goes.
• 27:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, like learning those rhythms of like this tour is laid out here and then like how to like catch another wave, somewhere else.
• 27:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't miss that.
• 27:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, I also think something that I noticed on the little older than you guys but last year was sort of my 20 year mark of like being out of school and doing stuff touring recording whatever and that landmark really hit me in a way that I didn't expect and it may be really want to like scrapbook and because I've just some time
• 27:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: It was not really comprehensively, but I've kept a lot of those, like, festival laminates and different tickets, the things I've been to, and I used to have such a sharp memory for dates, and that would, like, tell you, like, the last 77 concert that I played where I was.
• 28:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: And now it's hard for me to remember, like, where I was in my birthday four years ago, but...
• 28:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I spent some time over the last winter break out here going through this stuff and trying to organize it.
• 28:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: And what I want to do is just kind of paste it into a book and just write one page about whatever I remember, which might be totally inaccurate, you know.
• 28:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: But the reason I bring that up is that that amount of time, those experiences that have accrued, they are a part of me.
• 28:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's not just what I'm doing today and what I'm doing next month, that constitutes me.
• 28:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's like this incredible composite of all this stuff.
• 28:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think knowing that I've had all these experiences just makes me feel
• 28:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: like there's less pressure on now and the future that perhaps indicator of what will happen and that's a you know a little bit of a relief but it's also realizing that I've participated in so many things in that I guess in a way like if I never got to do anything again there's still this rich history that I've carved out for myself so I feel like between that and having a family and putting my focus into other places it's really enriched my perspective and taking away some of that pressure
• 29:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: And everything I thought of too that came up with beer remarks was I remember when I got my first really lucrative gig or whatever.
• 29:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: I realized that it was an opportunity that it gave me an opportunity to do some things for free because like, hmm, things were taken care of for me.
• 29:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I'm not this amazing person or anything.
• 29:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I just, there was stuff I wanted to do where it was like, I always felt this.
• 29:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I'd rather be doing that than not doing that.
• 29:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: But maybe I have a conflict, or maybe I worry about setting a precedent if I agree to that fee, what's that kind of mean for me falling forward?
• 29:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: And sometimes just being like, I wanna do this, I wanna take nothing.
• 29:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, and there may be there was one or two years where I could do that sometimes.
• 29:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then those years stopped and have rejoined occasionally.
• 29:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: But
• 29:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: I try to look out for moments like that where I just like I want to be a part of something I want to make for contribution.
• 29:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: I really am a fan of something.
• 29:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't want it to be weird.
• 29:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: I should just offer my services.
• 30:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
• 30:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I hope to always remember that too and find balance in that way and not always be focused on the bottom line.
• 30:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: Just be more childlike about it.
• 30:10
  [SPEAKER_04]: I love that.
• 30:11
  [SPEAKER_03]: That's really beautiful.
• 30:11
  [SPEAKER_04]: I mean we have these conversations all the time because Aaron's a producer so he's hiring people all the time and then I make my records and either through Aaron or on my own are hiring people and it's a thing to learn how to negotiate and talk about money especially when the thing about music is like so many people are friends also and then we're a mixing business with social and like budgets.
• 30:36
  [SPEAKER_04]: are difficult.
• 30:38
  [SPEAKER_04]: And in some places, many people are not getting what they deserve to be paid, not because they don't deserve it, but because the industry is difficult.
• 30:47
  [SPEAKER_04]: So navigating that stuff is challenging.
• 30:50
  [SPEAKER_04]: And when people are in positions to do that, I've certainly been on the receiving end of it.
• 30:56
  [SPEAKER_04]: And it's not just like, oh, that really saves my bank account.
• 31:03
  [SPEAKER_04]: Oh it's like nurturing a relationship.
• 31:06
  [SPEAKER_04]: It builds my confidence.
• 31:07
  [SPEAKER_04]: I've received that from people of like, oh, they believe in what I'm doing and I have the means to do this and also I hold that with a lot of reverence and then want to be really respectful of their time and their work and same with when I've been able to sing on people stuff and I'm like, it's okay.
• 31:24
  [SPEAKER_04]: I don't have to get paid.
• 31:26
  [SPEAKER_04]: It's a beautiful exchange and something we've never talked about that on here.
• 31:29
  [SPEAKER_04]: of just money is so tricky.
• 31:32
  [SPEAKER_04]: We always say, especially coming from music conservatories.
• 31:35
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm like, how come there wasn't a class on finances and taxes?
• 31:40
  [SPEAKER_04]: Like every music conservatory needs some financial literacy, freelancing, budgetary 101 education, and I don't think they have them.
• 31:52
  [SPEAKER_04]: We certainly didn't.
• 31:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think the school that I went to and schools like that that are really focused on orchestral and solo players is stuff like that.
• 31:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: They would probably consider that type of occupation like beneath what they're aspiring for their students to achieve.
• 32:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: But, come on, I mean, let's be realistic.
• 32:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's so few opportunities for...
• 32:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: orchestras obviously have been struggling for a long time and continue to, but we talked about dreams that one has when they're like, you know, in the early 20s or in school and stuff, I feel like my dream for my future future self, because hopefully I'll never stop doing this, I love what I get to do every day.
• 32:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: My dream would be like if I'm 70 and I'm like financially set more than set, say I get somebody shows me over the course of a year, 50 songs, like I could pick my favorite five or six or eight or something, do them for nothing,
• 32:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: but be like, I'm going to do how I think it goes.
• 32:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's going to be no back and forth.
• 32:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's going to be no notes.
• 32:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like not because I don't want to include you, but because I'm at a playthrough, I just want to offer the way I hear it.
• 32:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: And you can do whatever you want with it.
• 32:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then otherwise, just be trying to work collaboratively with people on projects that I would have equity in and do things that I want to do, not stop.
• 32:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: But just be like, the back is fourth is the hardest part.
• 33:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I have to re-screw on my head about that every couple of weeks.
• 33:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I have a very good batting average, I feel like too, but it's just every single one of those string arrangements and recordings that I make is like a love letter to the song and the person.
• 33:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it's really hard to have people fiddling with it, you know.
• 33:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: Especially, you know, it's like people come out at what different levels of experience, different enthusiasm, different ways of communicating just simply.
• 33:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: You could tell me the same thing two different ways and it could hit me so differently.
• 33:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's another thing that people aren't taught.
• 33:31
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm also always dreaming up like musician boot camp for like how to prepare for this life, essentially with these conversations are a lot of, but I'm always like, there's no human resources for the music industry and also social training, like social emotional training would be so helpful for so many of us, especially when a lot of us start out like living in vans together and sharing beds and like just
• 33:55
  [SPEAKER_04]: it's such a weird lifestyle that you learn through trial and error and again that's why I really like this age because I feel like so many people are growing up and I'm now the age of the oldest person that I first toured with.
• 34:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like my first tours, the first one I did was just a trio.
• 34:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was 22, one of the other musicians was 43 and I think about her all the time
• 34:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: I must have been, so, I mean, I'm still a little annoying, but, wow, that was just a fall, like, it, me, you know, like, yeah.
• 34:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I was really trained, musically, certainly, but I was really trained in all of the Ancillary things that connect and make a touring experience work over a number of years, and I'm so grateful, and I really look at it like a second school, and it's, I didn't know that was happening to me, but I can see it now, and every time I run into that person, I'm like, I'm so sorry, I just have no idea what you're talking about.
• 34:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: You're still at such a high level.
• 34:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I want to grab on one thing that you were saying before we wrap up here.
• 34:56
  [SPEAKER_03]: And that was you're talking about every arrangement that you do as a love letter to the artist.
• 35:01
  [SPEAKER_03]: I could go on for an hour on just that on like your role as a stringer Ranger is so unique in the record process.
• 35:07
  [SPEAKER_03]: Because like you're writing a composition on the back of a composition that's already there.
• 35:13
  [SPEAKER_03]: it's in your name as the arranger but you're serving this artist and you're serving this song with some that is deeply personal and what you are doing as a string arrangement makes a massive impact on a recording and the feel of it and the shape, the dynamic, the emotion, the perception like you wield immense power with what you put on there.
• 35:32
  [SPEAKER_03]: With the list of people that you've worked with I can imagine that there's probably a little bit of imposter syndrome or how did I get
• 35:41
  [SPEAKER_03]: Not anymore, but how do you step up to somebody like say a Paul Simon with the confidence of like this is what I'm hearing this is what this song needs to both you know Paul Simon is the artist and then the level of producers that he works with and just be like I'm showing up in myself and this is what I'm bringing this is what the song needs how do you get there?
• 36:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think by focusing on your first instinct, and for me going to audio as soon as possible, not remaining in a stage of documenting in a formal way, if I can get away with it, I just want to kind of be like a person singing along to the song, having a response.
• 36:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, like, oh, that was interesting.
• 36:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: I like what that did.
• 36:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: and just go into the kind of unknown and like be playing in the sandbox and then and give myself the permission to just go for a while and see what I've collected and also maybe to sleep on it before presenting it.
• 36:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think jumping into actions so quickly that you don't have time to judge your idea because other people will do that for you.
• 36:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: You still have time to obviously refine and it could be that the very first thing you do goes away and everything that built on top of that is what's interesting But yeah, I just think it's my job to kind of fall in love with the song and sometimes I play on stuff that if I didn't have to play on it I wouldn't and sometimes I play on songs that are
• 36:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: as intimidating because I love them so much.
• 36:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm so impressed by them and they come to me in a state where I want to be on this song because when I listen to it later, I want to know that I had something to do with it, but like, this is so good, you know?
• 37:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think that sometimes the hardest is the song that's sort of right in the middle where I'm like,
• 37:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is pretty good, but I don't know that I can lift this into better than it is, but I think through repetition and just kind of humility and like following my voice, I get to a place where the song just kind of stick to me and I find my way in.
• 37:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't like look at the song overall and say, I'm gonna come in here and I'm gonna come out there.
• 37:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just start somewhere.
• 37:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think that just helps me because then I'm in the conversation, I'm in the sound and I'll often just mute all of me really quickly and be like, do I miss myself?
• 37:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Because I, the worst thing to me is when you're there too much and you're just like wallpaper and you're not really making an impact like I've always really focused on exits and registered changes and stuff But I do that a lot like is it adding something so I don't know if there's 17 responses?
• 37:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, do you notice that you carry that same approach and playfulness and openness into revisions?
• 38:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: Probably not.
• 38:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I think I can have a strong emotional response to a level of notes that might get because I guess I just hope before I hear from somebody, it is perfect that is done.
• 38:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: And what I want is just for somebody to receive it and cry and then get excited and play with it and do sonic things to it.
• 38:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: And
• 38:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: But inevitably, if there's some stuff where that needs to change, I get over it and oftentimes I'm like, thank you for making this better.
• 38:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes I'm like, I don't think you're making this better to myself, but I will do this for you.
• 38:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then I think after a time or two, I sometimes have to just say, I feel like we're in a great place that this may be some of those ideas would be better suited to another instrument because it's going to get start to get kind of muddy here, like if I keep conversing in the same lanes.
• 38:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I would say that I'm not nearly as a dignified and high level about receiving the feedback, but that I come around and I always do it.
• 38:50
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
• 38:51
  [SPEAKER_04]: I have one more question before we do our last question.
• 38:54
  [SPEAKER_04]: Sure.
• 38:54
  [SPEAKER_04]: We've talked a little bit about how becoming a father and having a family has changed your approach to your schedule and stuff, but I'm curious how fatherhood has if you are aware or feel it has changed your actual composing.
• 39:09
  [SPEAKER_04]: in your actual creative work.
• 39:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it sparked me a lot because of the way that a day typically rolls out for us in which as the morning person, I'm with Milo from when he wakes up for the first stretch of the day.
• 39:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: If it's a day with no school or something, I will get into his universe with him.
• 39:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm on the ground with him.
• 39:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: We're doing things almost like we're siblings.
• 39:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm just so drawn to his immediacy and his creativity and his ability to spin out new games for himself.
• 39:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's so inspiring, but at the same time, I'm having to wait to do my work, which is hard for me because before he was in our lives, I would get up and I'd be recording by like eight and a morning.
• 39:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: I would like love the idea of a long runway, where you feel like anything is possible within a day.
• 39:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: So there is this kind of longing that's created through this play with him.
• 39:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: So that by the time I get to my work space, I am like
• 39:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: ready to go.
• 39:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I feel like I've been able to match my previous productivity when I used to have 12 hour possibility of a day, say, with like the five, six, seven hours I get now, because I am just so hungry to do it.
• 40:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think being able to sort of study and follow him and be in the moment like that and then get to apply it to what I do after having to wait a little bit too long has been a really good formula for me.
• 40:21
  [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, I love that.
• 40:22
  [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't really thought about that.
• 40:23
  [SPEAKER_04]: Longing that builds up when you can't get to the creative work.
• 40:28
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm in getting my master's in depth psychology of creativity, which is a Jungian psychology like studying the unconscious mind and that.
• 40:37
  [SPEAKER_04]: Creativity is this channel to bring our unconscious mind more on level with our conscious mind, where we've lived in a society that's elevated our conscious mind to our detriment.
• 40:48
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I wrote one of my papers about creativity in the stolen moments where I wrote a song with Henry was like eight months old, I think at the time, with an eight month old, like crawling on me the whole time and pulling on me and hitting my guitar and what kind of preparation and life
• 41:04
  [SPEAKER_04]: training has to come before that to be able to have yeah so you can tap in with all these distractions and also hold on to these ideas when you're like oh my god this song I can feel it it's here but yeah I have to go pick up my daughter from school so those kind of processes are obviously so interesting to me now this is gonna be when I'm gonna go deep on of like the longing
• 41:29
  [SPEAKER_04]: when you're also doing something that's really fulfilling and filled with love and inspiring and takes a lot of creative and takes a lot of creative.
• 41:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's not like you're, you know, cleaning out your storage unit.
• 41:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's stuff you want to do but it also you see the creativity at play in a young person and then it kind of reminds you of that you have this outlet for that too and it's like he's not quite at the age where I can like bring him into the studio with any regularity and we're going to be able to focus and make something for
• 41:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, we do do fun stuff like that sometimes, but yeah, just there's so much of the kind of like you see the mirror effect and so he's just really inspired me and I think about him with what I'm making and like hopefully the legacy that I'm constructing and like and some of that sort of scrapbooking and like wanting to just be able to say like here's all the stuff I did it you could look it up at your leisure, but like here's a list.
• 42:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think I really thought about that stuff before him.
• 42:18
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, imagining what our work will feel like to our children when they're older.
• 42:24
  [SPEAKER_04]: I feel like we can kind of gloss over it because it's our work.
• 42:28
  [SPEAKER_04]: But yeah, but it's going to, like, I think of how I treasure just recordings of my grandfather playing piano and like our kids are going to get so much more access to all of these things that we make.
• 42:41
  [SPEAKER_04]: That's so good or worse.
• 42:42
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
• 42:43
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, but that's really, that's really beautiful.
• 42:47
  [SPEAKER_03]: Well, as Michaela mentioned, we have a final question that we like to end everything with, and it's basically like the advice question more.
• 42:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: Oh yeah, I remember this idea prepared.
• 42:56
  [SPEAKER_03]: No, if you ever doesn't, that's the best part.
• 42:59
  [SPEAKER_03]: First, you know, you type of intuition, first idea, best idea.
• 43:02
  [SPEAKER_03]: There's some facility in it that you can choose your own adventure between something that you wish you knew at 22.
• 43:10
  [SPEAKER_03]: You know, first launching into this as your creativity as a career or conversely some nugget of wisdom that you've picked up along the way where there's something you read or something that you picked up in conversation with somebody they continues to keep you inspired and keep your cup filled up.
• 43:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: The first thought that came into my head was thinking about a younger me and, you know, it's definitely coming from the stuff that we've talked about today, which I'm so grateful for, and the thought was it's all about the people, whether it's people who are hiring you or people that you're working alongside of like,
• 43:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: just like having that focus on those humans and the emotions and remembering that like I say this a lot lately because I'm just in awe of like my child having gone from being able to do nothing to being able to do so many things now we're all just grown up babies like there's no moment where suddenly we're just like expert adult so we go through a portal it's like
• 43:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: We're all still figuring it out like the issues that play us that come from our childhood.
• 44:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's things with our parents and it goes back so many generations.
• 44:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: We don't necessarily get to kind of figure it all out.
• 44:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: We hopefully we can move it down the field.
• 44:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I think like when you're talking about the process of getting notes from an artist or
• 44:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: stuff like that.
• 44:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: Just remembering that there's a person behind the feedback that you might not enjoy or that the difficult news or the rejection or whatever it is, we're all just people doing our best.
• 44:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: And if you can kind of like put the focus on that, I feel like you will have reactions and communications that you'll be more proud of.
• 44:34
  [SPEAKER_03]: So true.
• 44:34
  [SPEAKER_04]: That's also a new one that I haven't heard yet.
• 44:37
  [SPEAKER_04]: I like that.
• 44:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's all about the people from the guy who works alone in this video.
• 44:42
  [SPEAKER_03]: But I mean, you know, a lot of my time is in here alone too, but I love when there's people in here and there's the back and forth in the sharing and all of that.
• 44:51
  [SPEAKER_03]: So maybe it's the absence of the people that makes you more appreciative of the people around.
• 44:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and like realizing the importance of sort of hosting, like how things that don't seem like they're a part of music are really huge contributors to music happening in a joyful and successful way.
• 45:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I feel very interested in exploring that.
• 45:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: that's like latter half of my life.
• 45:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, you know, what can I learn about that?
• 45:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think I used to just think about music as almost a not athletic thing, but like it was a very clear series of steps.
• 45:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: And now I realize how much more nuanced it is than that.
• 45:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: And the role of personality and energy is stuff.
• 45:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 45:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: I've been into much time in the West Coast.
• 45:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: You could do it.
• 45:29
  [SPEAKER_04]: I genuinely love it.
• 45:30
  [SPEAKER_04]: I mean, obviously, this is what...
• 45:31
  [SPEAKER_04]: we do and what I am drawn to but I also love like I knew you so briefly from afar and then what 15 plus years later like I feel the same way about Gabe Cahane like I didn't know Gabe well but like I've gotten to kind of thanks to the internet like watch him evolve into what from here looks like a really beautiful caring, aware person and
• 45:53
  [SPEAKER_04]: It's like one of my favorite parts about this career path is like music is one part of like the whole experience that we have because of music but then watching each other grow and grow up especially when in our 20s we probably were just so egocentric of like am I doing okay am I doing okay do you am I you know and seeing people become parents and just deep in in a lot of ways
• 46:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Welcome aboard.
• 46:25
  [SPEAKER_04]: Thank you.
• 46:26
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm not there yet.
• 46:27
  [SPEAKER_04]: Well, I'd be 40 when this episode comes up.
• 46:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: I think so.
• 46:30
  [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, God.
• 46:31
  [SPEAKER_04]: Okay.
• 46:32
  [SPEAKER_03]: You're feeling nervous about it.
• 46:34
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm feeling a little nervous.
• 46:35
  [SPEAKER_04]: Okay.
• 46:36
  [SPEAKER_04]: I also think there's so many things as a woman.
• 46:39
  [SPEAKER_04]: It feels like
• 46:40
  [SPEAKER_03]: There's a lot of stigma.
• 46:41
  [SPEAKER_04]: There's, yeah, that I'm really trying to fight of just, I don't want to give into all of the things we're told as women, like, I're supposed to freeze your face and, like, not look any older than 25.
• 46:52
  [SPEAKER_04]: And, but it's coming up.
• 46:53
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm aware of the messages that I've received.
• 46:55
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm like, no, all the women I know and their forties are hot and amazing and they're best selves that they've ever been.
• 47:02
  [SPEAKER_04]: So.
• 47:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: I remember my mom telling me that her 60s were her favorite decades so far and that just blew my mind because I would have been like 27 or something, so I feel like hopefully at with each decade that we get to we start to see where the focus is and what the benefits are obviously it's going to get more challenging, but you seem like you're doing great.
• 47:19
  [SPEAKER_04]: Oh, thank you, no.
• 47:21
  [SPEAKER_04]: I'm excited.
• 47:22
  [SPEAKER_04]: We're excited.
• 47:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: The water's nice on this side.
• 47:25
  [SPEAKER_03]: My hip is not, but the water's nice.
• 47:28
  [SPEAKER_04]: You might need a hip replacement.
• 47:30
  [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, God.
• 47:31
  [SPEAKER_04]: All right.
• 47:31
  [SPEAKER_03]: Well, Rob, thank you so much.
• 47:32
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thanks for your time.
• 47:33
  [SPEAKER_03]: Of course.
• 47:34
  [SPEAKER_03]: Bye.
• 47:38
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• 47:42
  [SPEAKER_04]: If this conversation resonated with you, know that it is just one of many.
• 47:46
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• 47:49
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• 47:58
  [SPEAKER_04]: New York Times bestselling author Maggie Smith, Lucius, J.D.M.E.Ferson, and many others.
• 48:03
  [SPEAKER_03]: This show is produced by me and Aaron Shaveer-based with help from the Kayla and Aaron.
• 48:07
  [SPEAKER_03]: And all the music he hears written, performed and produced by me as well.
• 48:11
  [SPEAKER_04]: Our show is edited and mixed by Leeland Holden at Pod Punch and we are proud members of the Bluegrass situation podcast network.
• 48:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thanks for being here.
• 48:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: We'll see you next time.