Building a playground

I have a daughter. She just turned 7. She loves playgrounds and she wants to stay as long as possible, whenever we visit one. Somehow I still manage to persuade her to come with me in the end. Amazing little human. I don’t know anyone remotely like her.

Yeah, I know. Daddy bias. But even her pedagogues and teachers at school tell me. This is a special kid. I don’t know, let’s see. We’ll figure out in 10 to 15 years from now, what she’s actually up to. I’m excited to see which direction she chooses to walk in.

Some of you may have kids, some of you don’t. This is not important to the point I’m trying to make here. What’s important is this. You hopefully all remember the FEELING of being in that age. The FEELING of losing yourself in play and forgetting all about time and place.

I sure do. Back in the 80’s, before Nintendo came to Denmark, if you gave me an old bicycle wheel and a stick, you’d have me entertained for the better part of a day. Yes, I’m that old…

Train rides was always fun. I would curl my fingers up next to the window and pretend I was a figure running and jumping through the landscape. If I was lucky enough to be near a country side river with a Turtles figure or a He-Man, I would be in heaven. I would lose and immerse myself totally in my own little play world. This way of playing, is the BEST way to learn anything and, ideally, it’s also the place we go to, when we write songs or make any kind of art.

Years went by. School happened. Conservatory happened. I got somewhat depressed as a young adult. As much as I love music theory and guitar technique, all this useful and valid information about the inner workings of music became sort of a strait jacket, creatively speaking.

At my final exam at the conservatory, I got a fine statement from the censors, but I was already feeling a weird feeling of being in the wrong place and I didn’t really feel there’s much point in playing yet another guitarsolo.

I felt like I had something important to say, but I had NO idea of how to actually say it.

I tried therapy for a little while, but I wasn’t ready at that time. Later, it would save my life.

Then I moved from Odense to Copenhagen and got into the Pop/Cover milieu there. Wonderful musicians, wonderful people, but I didn’t find my tribe there. As much as I love realising other people’s music, I still felt like a had something important of my own that I wanted to say. Maybe you know this itchy feeling?

Flash forward a couple of years and I was deep in the Copenhagen indie music scene of the early 10’s and I finally found a tribe. I met so many exciting and interesting people, that I never dreamed of meeting. Old and new heroes. Slowly, I started developing a new sense of direction. A higher personal and musical awareness.

I started to define some clear boundaries of what to write and what not to write. I wouldn’t accept sitting with a boring verse, I would change it! I wouldn’t accept a transition that didn’t work. I would make it work somehow.

And I would force myself to stop working on the John Mayer and Tim Christensen like folk ballads, that kept popping into my songwriting mind.

I started paying attention to the things that were uniquely ME. I was a guitar player by education, but also kind of a singer that was really into arranging and music production. I also like playing the piano.

I thought, why not try and combine ALL the talents I have into one coherent thing? Stop comparing myself to John Mayer or anyone else and just figure out who I was as a songwriter and artist. I quickly realised that I had something uniquely me, that no one in the world could ever have excactly the way I had it. I believe each and everyone you have this same potential and this is what I want to help you to discover.

At that time I was probably playing in 8-12 different upcoming and cover bands with very good and long time friends. But realising my own potential I resigned from all of these groups and focused my energy on my own project. My own songwriting. My own creativity. This was a very tough but necessary shift.

As an artist, people often ask you why you play music. There can be many different answers to that question. For me, I play music because I’m good at it after endless years of practicing (I wasn’t the biggest talent where I grew up), endless interest in what makes music work and last but not least, the notion of connecting with an audience.

If you ask me, that is really where the magic happens. Being on stage, sharing your vision of sound with other human beings. The connection. They react. You react back, and they react back again in a potentially endless cycle.

If it works, transcendence and pure magic occurs. 

I was really conscious about this when I was writing. How is it going to be to play these songs in front of audience? How would I like to feel when standing there on the stage? What melodies and rhythms would I like to deliver?

This way of beginning with the end in mind, is an old creative trick and you can read more about this idea in David Byrne’s amazing book “How Music Works”.

Let’s get back to how I built my endlessly creative musical playground.

To understand the feeling of having one, we need to go back to the top of this article and remember how it was to be a child. 

We still have that potential of learning through play inside of us. No matter how old you are. I know, because I’ve seen it in both 7-year olds and 91-year olds.

Psychologically you need to remove yourself from the place you may be in at the moment. Look at yourself. Who are you? What can you do that no one else in the world can do? What is uniquely yours?

Yes, as songwriters we copy and steal. This is how the world works. This is how art works. We stand on the shoulders of those that came before us. We copy, but we filter it through our unique set of abilities and that is by far enough, if you do YOU. You have to be ready to search yourself and ask some questions though. You need to be silent. Something that isn’t always easy in our day age with the bombardment of information streaming and screaming us in the head.

Through setting extremely tight boundaries of what I was “allowed” to write, I managed to remove myself from my John Mayer infatuation and into something that was very different I gave myself three allowed chords. 1st step, 4th step and 5th step. Major Tonic, Subdominant and Dominant. That was it. I then had to vary my melodies and rhythms to keep it exciting. This sounds very restrictive, but coming from a jazz background, it actually felt like freedom!

I would move away from writing on the guitar and write straight in Logic instead. Often starting with a beat and then building on that.

You have to do something similar, when you build your playground. Don’t do it excactly the way I did it (you are free to try of course). Try and find what limitations inspire YOU? What do you want in your playground? A swing? A waterfall? Sand? Trampolines? And what do you NOT want there? This is maybe even more important. It’s time to choose.

I want you to build your own musical playground by becoming aware of what you want to share with this world. Sharpen you awareness and sense of direction. Take action.

Also think about what musical equipment inspires you. Where you are at this moment in time, does your musical vision contain a cembalo or a broken synthesizer? Are you into cuban rhythms? Do you feel excited when you hear an upright bass? Do you like melodies with large interval jumps or are you more into Taylor Swift like one note melodies? Do you like short bumpy notes or should you drench your master in reverb?

I wish I could give you a blueprint, but naturally and inherently, this concept will be different for each and everyone of you. Isn’t it exciting though? You get to choose how you want it!

If you have the option of working in program like Ableton or Logic, I recommend building a template that you can start from. It should contain all the instruments and effects that inspire you. A digital playground, where you have zero setup time apart from opening your laptop.

The space I found was one of endless and limitless creativity. What helped me was not expanding, but focusing in. Setting boundaries. Saying no to certain elements of inspiration.

This exact space is my personal endless playground. Maybe it’s clear to you, maybe it’s vague, But nonetheless, I can write a million songs from this space. Seriously. And you could too!

If I’m ever truly stuck, I’ll always have this very personal and magIcal space to re-visit. A space that might evolve and expand over time, who knows? But right now, I take comfort in the fact that endless inspiration and creativity is always within my reach.

Maybe I can help you find yours?