Full Week Schedule

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  Wed, Jul 15 Theory Gym Start your day at the 'gym' with a morning music theory workout w/ Nathan · 5pm (PT) | 8pm (ET) | 1am (UK)
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  Wed, Jul 15 Weekly Beat Challenge Gather and listen to anyone's Beat Challenge song ideas -- just for fun w/ Nathan · 6pm (PT) | 9pm (ET) | 2am (UK)
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  Wed, Jul 15 Office Hours Ask questions, get help, and connect. w/ Nathan · 2pm (PT) | 5pm (ET) | 10pm (UK)
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  Thu, Jul 16 Production Gym Start your day at the 'gym' with a production breakdown of your favorite songs w/ Shane Mickelsen · 5am (PT) | 8am (ET) | 1pm (UK)
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  Thu, Jul 16 Office Hours Ask questions, get help, and connect. w/ Scott Hampton · 2pm (PT) | 5pm (ET) | 10pm (UK)
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  Thu, Jul 16 Office Hours Ask questions, get help, and connect. w/ Jam · 2pm (PT) | 5pm (ET) | 10pm (UK)
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  Sun, Jul 19 Office Hours Ask questions, get help, and connect. w/ Shane Mickelsen · 2pm (PT) | 5pm (ET) | 10pm (UK)
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  Mon, Jul 20 Weekly Beat Challenge Gather and listen to anyone's Beat Challenge song ideas -- just for fun w/ Nathan · 6pm (PT) | 9pm (ET) | 2am (UK)
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  Mon, Jul 20 Office Hours Ask questions, get help, and connect. w/ Nathan · 2pm (PT) | 5pm (ET) | 10pm (UK)
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  Mon, Jul 20 Instrument Gym Practice and workout on instruments! w/ Nathan · 5am (PT) | 8am (ET) | 1pm (UK)
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  Tue, Jul 21 Ear Training Test your ears and discuss - Music, Mixing and more! w/ Jam · 7am (PT) | 10am (ET) | 3pm (UK)
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  Tue, Jul 21 Office Hours Ask questions, get help, and connect. w/ Nathan · 2pm (PT) | 5pm (ET) | 10pm (UK)
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  Tue, Jul 21 Theory Gym Start your day at the 'gym' with a morning music theory workout w/ Nathan · 5pm (PT) | 8pm (ET) | 1am (UK)
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  Wed, Jul 22 Production Gym Start your day at the 'gym' with a production breakdown of your favorite songs w/ Kallie · 5am (PT) | 8am (ET) | 1pm (UK)
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  Wed, Jul 22 Weekly Beat Challenge Gather and listen to anyone's Beat Challenge song ideas -- just for fun w/ Nathan · 6pm (PT) | 9pm (ET) | 2am (UK)
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  Wed, Jul 22 Office Hours Ask questions, get help, and connect. w/ Jon Mattox · 2pm (PT) | 5pm (ET) | 10pm (UK)

What We Covered Recently

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  OFFICE HOURS Covered drum programming fundamentals — anatomy of a drum kit, how to layer kick and snare samples, and how to vary a beat between verse and chorus. Gave detailed feedback on a fully produced hip-hop track, focusing on kick presence, vocal level, stereo width, and multi-band compression on the vocal.
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  THEORY-GYM We introduced Interval Bingo — a browser-based ear training game played in multiplayer and solo modes — and worked through identifying intervals within dyads and triads by listening, singing, and reasoning from known chord shapes. The session focused on the practical skill of isolating individual voices inside a chord: hearing the top note first, finding the bottom, and using chord quality (major, minor) to infer the intervals in between.
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  EAR-TRAINING-GYM We ran two rounds of "Interval Bingo" — listening to mystery chords and identifying specific intervals (perfect fifth, major second, minor second, tritone) by ear. Worked through the reveals chord by chord, using chord inversions as the central challenge: why a major chord in first inversion hides its fifth, why a diminished chord is built from stacked tritone pairs, and how voicing affects what the ear locks onto. Also previewed an upcoming Songwriting Incubator series and a new harmonic synth feature in development.
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  WEEKLY-BEAT-CHALLENGE Reviewed new beats from two participants this evening, with feedback focused on arrangement direction, groove feel, and sonic identity. For the first track — a Spanish-language vocal beat — we covered potential drop placement, groove pool techniques in Ableton, and isolating the strongest melodic and rhythmic hooks. For the second set of tracks, we dug into experimental gas mask vocal recording, contact mic techniques, low-end clarity, and vocal presence in a dense mix.
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  INSTRUMENT-GYM We talked about technique with playing to help alleviate shoulder pain, or any discomfort from posture and the way we hold the guitar. We then worked through some hand warm up exercises, finger dexterity and talked about ways to find the root, 3rd, 5th etc on the guitar neck. We also discussed briefly how 3 piece bands and songwriters write a little differently in terms of self accompaniment and looked at some popular examples. Finally we wrapped up class with connecting and soloing around two scales as part of the Cage theory, and ways to improvise with flourishes like bends, hammer ons, or even just changing the rhythmic feel.

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