Final Project Manifesto

Manifesto

New Brunswick is not simply defined by the presence of a colorful array of people, but also by the contemplations of lives and dreams of these people. These thoughts, specifically dreams, are incredibly revealing about what shapes the world or rather civilizations that constantly change around us. The very first challenge of this collaboration would be to capture actual dreams.

We resolved to find that I would just find a digital tape recorder and go to our location, George Street, and ask random people for their permission to interview them about what their dreams in life are. I immediately got on the first order of business and interviewed about 8 random people and marked the spot in which I interviewed each person. We decided we would pick our favorite 5 and go from there.

In order to really get the full effect of the dreams of New Brunswick, specifically George Street, Truman and I decided the best way to embody these dreams would be through music. To really personify these random New Brunswick dreams we needed to find some sort of system by which the dreams had some input on the outcome of the music. I could just as simply have solely played whatever each dream made me feel and personally convey it through any means of music, but the challenge of this project is to relinquish control and thus allow collaboration between Truman, the actual dreams and myself.

The most challenging part of this project was deciding exactly what system we could utilize that incorporates the free will of each dream. We had no intention of creating a product that wasn’t in some way shaped by the will of the dreams. We decided that the most effective way of doing this would be to take any keyboard and put the letters of the alphabet starting on the high end of the keyboard in succession to the low end so it went in order from a to z. However, I decided while executing this that it would be more suitable to keep the succession of letters strictly in the key of B. This would allow for some confinement to make sure each song produced a feel or emotion instead of straight chaos, which we wanted a bit of. The system or plan would be that I could only use the keys with the letters that correspond to the current dream. For example, if the dream was work with dogs we would isolate the main subject, in this case dogs, and use the keys on the keyboard that spelled out the word dogs to create an original song for each one of our highlighted dreams. Our dreams/songs included Dogs, Law School, Sail Around Europe, Chemist, and Create.

We knew that the execution of these songs would be vital to the outcome of this project. Since it was my job to create these songs I made sure that I had a full 24 hours to lock myself in a room and produce. Luckily, 2 of my best friends decided that they would love nothing more than to lock up and create until we had finished the project. After explaining the importance of strictly sticking to the keys that spelled out the dreams, we immediately got to work. Using only what we had around us for percussion, a keyboard, and a MacBook we spent hours fidgeting and fumbling with the series of dreams and notes that the dreams had themselves called for. By sticking strictly to this system I was able evoke not only a mood, but a song that I created that was ultimately governed by the words that came out of the mouths of the people interviewed on George Street, New Brunswick. We came up with some short yet sweet little sounding songs that each has a completely different feel. As soon as I had realized that I was pleased with the material, it felt like a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders. I instantly felt that the project was really beginning to build momentum, it was going to be exactly what we had set out to do. And judging by the yardstick of collaboration, we seriously succeeded.

We had succeeded not only in collaboration with New Brunswick, and us but also in uniting us all under the umbrella of humanity. By walking the class to each interview spot and asking everyone individually what their dreams are in comparison to the ones gathered by random New Brunswick citizens we succeeded in revealing how similar we all really are and how important it really is to accept people for who they really are, where they are from, who they are from, and even what they are about. I think people saw how similar their dreams actually seem to be. It also speaks truth about our lives and puts in perspective what we are really trying to accomplish. For example, what does it mean to get pay if your not happy at the end of the day? To me the songs speak volumes in the absence of speech. To me they say, “ Life is too short, live for what makes you happy. Any dream is possible. It just takes passion”.