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Michael Hagan
Hello and welcome to the Providence College podcast. I'm Michael Hagen from the class of 2015, and I'm joined by producer Chris Judge from the class of 2005. Today, we're joined by Dr. Bill Longo, visiting assistant professor of Music, who holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Miami, and Clare Cruz, a sophomore music technology

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Michael Hagan
major from West Boylston, Massachusetts. We'll be discussing Providence College's new program and music technology and production. Dr. Longo Clare, thanks for joining us.

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William Longo
Great to be here. Thank you.

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Clare Krug
Yeah, thanks for having me.

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Michael Hagan
So to get us started, what distinguishes the music technology and production program from the traditional Providence College Program in music?

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William Longo
Well, the traditional.

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William Longo
Providence College programing music, you know, and and the music technology and production program have a lot of similarities in the core music requirements like, you know, we we do great studying music theory, music history, musicianship courses like piano skills, oral skills, things like that.

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William Longo
And where the, you know, being music offers a lot of flexibility.

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William Longo
In pursuing.

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William Longo
Interests within and.

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William Longo
Outside of the music department. The new music technology and production degreed has specialized coursework that's aimed towards writing, recording and producing modern professional quality music.

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William Longo
And the the main focus.

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William Longo
Is on creative composition and developing students individual artistic voices, while simultaneously providing a significant amount of hands on experience with music, hardware, software technology that's used by professionals in the industry.

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Michael Hagan
So, Dr. Longo, tell us a little bit about your path to becoming a teacher of music and music technology.

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William Longo
Well, you know, it's been quite a journey for me, had many different jobs for sure.

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William Longo
In music and music education, but I'll try and give the short version. I think.

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William Longo
I started out as.

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William Longo
A trumpet player, actually, and I really didn't have any ambition of becoming much more than, say, a private instructor at any level after my undergraduate degree. You know, I spent a lot of time playing gigs, you know, teaching some private lessons and really occasionally substitute teaching high school music courses for friends that were in that kind of

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William Longo
career path.

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William Longo
But but a milestone, I guess for me.

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William Longo
Is during my my first round of.

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William Longo
Graduate studies.

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William Longo
Where I began to, you know, focus more on composition and in theory.

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William Longo
And that's where I think I began to consider the.

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William Longo
Possibility of teaching at higher ED as being, you know, a viable path for me. And and coincidentally, my first introduction.

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William Longo
To music technology.

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William Longo
Was also during that time.

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William Longo
But but in truth, it was, you know, kind of limited. I was very proficient in using music notation software to, you know, tape my own arrangements and compositions.

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William Longo
I recorded a small amount in in some home studio sessions, but nothing really serious.

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William Longo
But then for me, I think.

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William Longo
The turning point was economical.

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William Longo
Where where I started having.

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William Longo
Difficulty coming up with funds to, you know, spend some time in the studio and record my music, produce my music.

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William Longo
So I decided that I had.

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William Longo
You know, kind of seek out a path to becoming self-sufficient and learn how to produce recordings of my original music using any techniques that I could find. And in really, at the time I started, you know, playing a doctoral program for composition and.

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William Longo
And I started targeting schools that, you know, had an emphasis in technology production.

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William Longo
And actually a lot of.

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William Longo
Opportunity to record and work in those environments. And then I landed at the University of Miami and and from there, it's kind of history. I, you know, taught courses as a graduate student there and music technology and theory and composition.

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William Longo
And then after I graduated, we were in South Florida for many years and I was an adjunct at really almost every college in South Florida. And just from there, kind of, you know, finding, you know, myself in a position to do a lot of this type of work where you're in different projects writing music.

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William Longo
I worked in recording studios as an engineer, conducted sessions. And I just gained so much experience working with technology to, you know, create products from start to finish from, you know, the inception of my idea songwriting to to recording and mixing.

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William Longo
And then just to, you know, see how everything, you know, working in distribution and things like that. So sorry, that's not that's not the short version, but you know, it hit some points that.

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Michael Hagan
You know, I was I was once a trumpeter myself. Myself, but unfortunately, braces were the end of that. Didn't, did, couldn't endure. So what what kinds of new possibilities for musical composition and performance as technology opened up since you began your life and career as a musician?

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William Longo
Oh goodness.

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William Longo
I you know, I think it's funny, like early early on. I think.

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William Longo
For me, coming coming to it a little bit later in my in my career, it's.

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William Longo
Like I feel like I spent a.

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William Longo
Lot of time just catching up to be current.

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William Longo
For modes of music making. So so really even some things from.

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William Longo
You know, the late sixties and seventies still feel a little new to me.

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William Longo
But but but but I would say this, I'd say, for starters, the digital era that.

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William Longo
We're living in is just opened up incredible possibilities, and it's in the form.

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William Longo
Of access.

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William Longo
Convenience and exposure for everyone. And that's we experience that every day, right? Like from amateurs and professionals, we can make audio video recordings, you know, with cell phones and share them with the world. You know, we can easily broadcast live performances on a variety of platforms from any location I could.

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William Longo
I could run a recording session in one city while producer across the country or on another continent could listen with very low latency and give notes virtually. You know, the laptops we buy now come with music production software as a standard, you know, and and we can make really quality tracks with this.

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William Longo
And really, when I was starting out, you know, this wasn't even part.

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William Longo
Of a of.

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William Longo
My my universe. You know, my world was still very analog, you know, in a way when we're when we're thinking about it, you know?

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William Longo
Um, but you know, actually from it from a different perspective, it's like with all these.

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William Longo
Advances, you know, the speed that we can create music is it's kind of amazing. And then it's also, you know, it turns out to be somewhat of a difficulty. Sometimes, you know, the demand on, you know, creators can be really intense.

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William Longo
You know, project deadlines become a lot shorter. But, you know, sometimes if our techniques and and and you know, you know, other modes of creation aren't in one, we can lead to, you know, increasing quality creativity.

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William Longo
As a result.

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William Longo
So, so really, you know, I think for me, at least finding balance, you know, I guess in all things, but but musically for sure tends to be a direct result of like these new possibilities and these new advances for me.

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Michael Hagan
So Claire, what drew you to study music technology?

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Clare Krug
Personally, I was on a performance based track. I was doing a musical theater concentration for my music major, and pretty early on I realized that I wanted more of a diverse experience while I love performing. I was just looking for something more.

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Clare Krug
So my second semester, freshman year, I just took the initiative music a tech class, and I didn't know what to expect. I had never really used technology that much before, but I it was like so fun. It was fascinating to learn about.

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Clare Krug
And by the end of one semester, I was able to produce one of my own songs, and that was just a crazy concept to me. It felt so cool to be able to do so. After that, I was pretty much pretty much hooked, and I looked at the rest of the courses that were required in the major

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Clare Krug
and their stuff, like songwriting and contemporary arranging and virtual orchestration. And those just all sounded so cool and their classes that you can't get outside. I need a tech major, so I was like, This is what I want to do.

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Michael Hagan
Claire, you said that part of the appeal of music technology was that it would introduce you to a more diverse array of music. Has studying music and music tech introduced you to any genres or music movements and music that you are unfamiliar with before?

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Michael Hagan
And is there anything that you've been surprised to discover a taste for?

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Clare Krug
Well, definitely. one of the things I love about the program is getting to work with other students and hear what other students produce themselves. And just getting to be in the environment is amazing, and in my in my classes I've been in, I've only been into music tech classes.

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Clare Krug
But in both I've gotten to hear the original work of my classmates, which has been so cool because we all have such different styles and we make such different music. And before, before these classes, I was never really into rap music.

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Clare Krug
I didn't like it very much. I was not my style, but coming in here, so many of a few of the classmates they they rap and they make these great like pop rap tracks, and they're just they're so fun to listen.

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Clare Krug
And when I when we get to hear them in like class share day, I'm just like, I'm just Jim, and now I'm having the best time and I'm like, Wow, I never thought that I would enjoy this type of music so much.

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Clare Krug
But but I do, and I think part of it is getting getting to kind of witness the whole process of creating the track and seeing seeing it all come together and seeing how much effort it takes. It's just it's just really cool to watch it.

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Clare Krug
And it's made me more open to liking that style of music, and I really do enjoy it now.

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Michael Hagan
So you're a sophomore, so you're finishing up Civ. You've no doubt taken at least a core course or two so far. Are there any intersections between the kinds of things that you're learning and the kind of thinking that you're doing in music and music tech intersections between that and your core studies in the liberal arts?

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Clare Krug
Yeah, there's a few. I I try my best to incorporate music into my chords as much as I can because it's just what I love to do. But in the semester, we got to do a unit on classical composers.

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Clare Krug
You got to learn about Bach and Mozart and Beethoven, and that was that was so much fun to get to experience in the Civ class rather than in the music building. And also, there is a there's a colloquium class in the Civ department that involves music.

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Clare Krug
Somehow, I'm not exactly sure, but I know that Dr. Gordon teaches it. She's the the head of the music department here, and that's really interesting to me. I hope I could take that class. But other than that? I would say that.

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Clare Krug
Kind of the performance skills that I've learned in the music department over here have helped me a lot in some of my classes where I have to speak more or present or lead a seminar. And it makes me just have so much comfortability and confidence when I have to speak in front of the class and like I'm

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Clare Krug
used to this, I can perform so. So yeah, that's that's pretty pretty much it.

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Michael Hagan
So Dr Longo, what makes studying music tech at Providence College unique from, say, similar programs at other schools?

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William Longo
That's a really good question. You know, it's really interesting.

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William Longo
Especially being in the first year of, you know, talking with prospective students and things like that. It's a question that I receive a lot and.

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William Longo
You know, I usually, you know, talk about.

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William Longo
Technology and production programs as sort of being on a spectrum, you know, and and there are some programs where you know, you hear the two words technology and production, what.

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William Longo
Where are.

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William Longo
We leaning really as a as a program and some schools will be more focused on, you know, gaining the vocational skills in technology. And, you know, other programs may be leaning a little bit more towards, you know, production and creative composition in those sorts of things.

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William Longo
And normally what I end up telling prospective students is that we're we're very much centered on like the creative composition and production production side of things. But at the same time, we're, you know, developing the vocational skills in every course.

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William Longo
So every course that we have in this program is going to, you know.

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William Longo
Require students to.

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William Longo
You know, have to come to terms with using technology to create. And so whether that's you know, using, you know, virtual, you know, virtual instruments in a DSW or if it's recording their, you know, own acoustic tracks, guitar bass, their voices and mixing those things together, you know, in post-production like.

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William Longo
It, it it's.

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William Longo
Definitely the technology supporting the creation, you know?

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William Longo
And you know, and I think the other thing that's unique about where we're.

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William Longo
At right.

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William Longo
Now is just our size too.

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William Longo
You know, like in comparison to larger programs, you know, the smaller class sizes that PC allow for greater, you know, personal attention, you know, and maybe Claire could probably.

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William Longo
Speak to that a little bit. But but it's but it's the truth. You know, we we spend a lot of time together. Um, and and it really, you know, I think gives gives a little bit more special.

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William Longo
Opportunity, special attention to.

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William Longo
Like specific projects that maybe you would receive in a larger school.

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Michael Hagan
Claire, how do you feel about the level of faculty attention and support that you get in your music and music tech classes?

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Clare Krug
I think it's amazing. That's one of the reasons why I'm at this school. I think I I considered when when this program came up, I was like, Well, do I want to stay here or do I want to go to a school that has a more developed program?

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Clare Krug
And I was like, I was like, I think I'll get more opportunity here, being at such a small school and getting so much like one on one time with the professor. I I I feel like at some other schools that are larger, you just don't get the same amount of opportunity that that entails.

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Clare Krug
And I really think it's a great experience to be able to work so closely with with the professors and with the other students, and it's just a great collaborative environment.

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Michael Hagan
So Dr. Longo, one of the classes you teach, is songwriting, and I got to observe part of one of your songwriting classes back in October. And I have to say I had melodies from student composition stuck in my head for days after.

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Michael Hagan
Can you tell us a little bit about the class and the kinds of learning and assignment students do in it?

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William Longo
Absolutely love to sing it. It just first off the being the first semester that's been offered. It's just for for me as an instructor, it's exceeded.

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William Longo
All expectations on on many levels.

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William Longo
But but, you know, to get to the nuts and bolts, it's, you know, songwriting is a project based course. Most of the courses that are in the program are.

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William Longo
Project based.

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William Longo
And specifically is designed to provide students an opportunity to explore and discover, utilize, you know, musical elements that.

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William Longo
You know, create music in a variety of genres, you know?

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William Longo
So we spent a great deal of time listening and analyzing popular music. Um, you know, we we take a, you know, look at the many different ways that we can approach. Writing music in different styles, and then, of course, we.

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William Longo
Jump into developing our own music, you know.

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William Longo
The focus is really on the writing process. For me, I I like to begin with, you know, early idea generation for four songs. So a lot of our assignments are kind of like cumulative assignments where we'll start to develop an original song from like different starting points.

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William Longo
You know, how.

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William Longo
Can we develop a song? You know, if we if we come up with the lyrics first, or.

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William Longo
Maybe we're beginning with the melody that we have, how do we develop this?

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William Longo
Or even just a basic rhythmic idea.

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William Longo
You know, or a groove, you know?

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William Longo
And then after we have this idea, we start to develop a little bit what techniques can we use to develop it into something more, you know, and always referring back to our favorite recordings for reference? And not just referencing the musical content, but then also, you know, the arrangement, how to interpret it, you know, which brings more

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William Longo
of the technical aspects of things, you know? And I think, as Claire said, you know, something special about this course and the program in general is that it's flexible. You know, students are encouraged to develop their individual voice.

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William Longo
I like to think that you feel encouraged clear. So while we're using the techniques that that we're that we're presenting and studying, you know, and you know, just like Claire mentioned, our current class, you know, we have students writing in a variety of genres from pop music kind of indie folk.

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William Longo
The student that's interested in like New Wave ish kind of nostalgia in a way, hip hop and track me trap music, you know? And I really do. I agree. I think that and I'm I'm really happy to hear it from Claire that, you know, it's just having this flexibility gives the writer an opportunity to hear feedback from

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William Longo
an audience that that, you know, they might not seek out that particular style. So. So you're getting fresh years as a writer in in sort of that collaborative environment, which is super valuable. And then the exposure to which you, you know, you may not feel it today.

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William Longo
You know, Claire, but you know, you may you may start to find some, you know, hip hop and rap kind of infiltrating some of your tendencies as a writer, too, just from being exposed, you know? So.

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Michael Hagan
So I have to say, if I were registering for courses and I saw a class on songwriting, as cool as it sounds, I'd probably be entirely too intimidated to sign up because, you know, doing and sharing creative work, it takes courage and confidence.

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Michael Hagan
So, Claire, when you began the course, were you nervous about composing original work to share with peers and professors in class?

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Clare Krug
I don't think I was that nervous. I was more just super excited. I have been writing songs for maybe two years now, and I came from a high school that had no music program at all. So the thought of being able to, like, have a class where I get to do my creative hobby and have it, have

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Clare Krug
it count towards my class and get professional, I don't know. Education on it was just the coolest idea, and I was so excited to be able to have like songwriting, be my assignment or be my homework. It would give me permission to actually spend my math homework time on my, my hobby, what I actually love to do

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Clare Krug
. So it was just so exciting to me to be able to take this class.

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Michael Hagan
So I understand you have some original music to share with us today. So could you tell us a little bit about the piece we're about to listen to and sort of how you're going to introduce it? Are we going to break it down into its parts?

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Michael Hagan
Listen to the whole thing as a whole. How are we going to do this?

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Clare Krug
Yeah. So the song that I wrote is called Good riddance. It is, I guess, pop kind of song. I think Dr. Longo, correct me if I'm wrong, are we going to listen to a little snippet of a certain spot or no?

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William Longo
And I think I do like the idea of coming through and listening to a couple of the elements separately. And then and then, you know, just the little short bits and you can kind of. You know, talk us through a little bit like, well, how did the other piece start for you?

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William Longo
What came first?

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Clare Krug
Right, right, right. So what happened first? I wrote the song and probably early October, but throughout the whole month of September, I had this this little melody like going through my head over and over again. And and I thought that it would be a really cool sound if I could, if I could use it.

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Clare Krug
And I was like, This sounds like it should come right before a chorus. And it would lead to a chorus really well. And I really thought that I wanted to develop the song more. But with my other classes and other work, I just never really had the time to to just write a song.

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Clare Krug
So a month later, when we got the assignment to actually write a whole song, I was like, OK, I'll develop this. So I started off with my little melody that I had, and I just kind of built the puzzle pieces around it that I was missing and it was fun to have it all come together.

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William Longo
But so the first part that that kind of came to you first was that was that red flags part.

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Clare Krug
Yes.

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William Longo
Yeah, she should be. Take a listen to so we can kind of.

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Michael Hagan
Yeah, let's listen.

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Clare Krug
And they were like that. I kept looking past because I wanted to make the good times last. But there were bags that I should have explored so many. So I ignored because I thought I was a third. There it is.

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William Longo
There it is.

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Michael Hagan
OK, so so that was so that was the starting point. So that was the melody that was in your head throughout the month of September that OK. Cool.

00;22;38;00 - 00;22;53;00
Clare Krug
Hmm. And I knew that I needed I needed some kind of verse to go before it, and I needed a chorus to go after it. So then my job was to, you know, build those. And I did find myself using the techniques that we learned in songwriting to build them, which was which was really fun.

00;22;54;23 - 00;22;56;04
Clare Krug
To be able to incorporate that's.

00;22;56;04 - 00;22;57;14
William Longo
Really encouraging to hear.

00;22;57;19 - 00;22;58;01
William Longo
I.

00;22;58;04 - 00;22;58;20
Clare Krug
Yeah, no.

00;22;58;21 - 00;23;14;28
William Longo
Doubt, but I do hear them to myself. They work, folks. No, I I was going to ask you because, you know, I saw this project kind of in pieces and then, you know, kind of like the way we're listening a little bit right now.

00;23;15;02 - 00;23;37;07
William Longo
And then suddenly when we had a, you know, a show and shared a clear drops the project on us that was like, oh, like maybe 90% finished and and really kind of blew us away. But before for other people, that might not kind of get how it comes together.

00;23;37;07 - 00;24;12;13
William Longo
Claire, when when did like the music and the arrangement of it come up because I want to play a little bit of your your track a little bit? Can I do a little bit of that? Absolutely. Sure. But where where did that come from?

00;24;13;27 - 00;24;29;06
Clare Krug
Um, I don't know when I when I wrote the song, I kind of can hear what I want it to sound like a little bit, and I knew I wanted some kind of like angsty electric guitar sound. So I just kind of played around with it until I found something that kind of fit the vibe I was

00;24;29;06 - 00;24;43;19
Clare Krug
going for. But I also knew that I wanted a little like a like a bass intro that was kind of catchy to get into it. And I don't know. I think I feel like once I write a song, I just kind of I I feel the vibe that I'm going for.

00;24;43;29 - 00;24;50;00
Clare Krug
And I and then my job is to just go on the computer and try to find sounds that that match my vision in my head.

00;24;50;10 - 00;24;58;18
Michael Hagan
I really liked that the pause after that initial bass intro, it was like taking a breath before, you know, jumping right back into it. That was really cool.

00;24;59;09 - 00;25;12;00
William Longo
Let's see here. You know, there's different sections and things like that. Maybe we could listen to the track and then, you know, kind of maybe chat about it a little bit more when you think, OK, so here's good riddance.

00;25;19;24 - 00;25;36;08
Clare Krug
Giving you a stable as a carnival ride, it's like being on a roller coaster all of the time. It's crazy and exciting, and it's wild and free. But at any given moment, you could drop me. So when it finally happened, babe.

00;25;36;08 - 00;25;46;01
Clare Krug
I wasn't surprised. Victimized, dangerous. China brushing it off, but I always. When you.

00;25;46;01 - 00;25;47;00
Clare Krug
Claim to care for.

00;25;47;00 - 00;26;01;29
Clare Krug
Me, it just wasn't true. They were. And I kept looking past because I wanted to make the. They were. The for so many. I have not.

00;26;01;29 - 00;26;03;00
Clare Krug
Because I thought I was.

00;26;03;00 - 00;26;09;04
Clare Krug
The taught. Now I see. There were five.

00;26;10;27 - 00;26;11;17
Clare Krug
I I'm.

00;26;12;25 - 00;26;27;01
Clare Krug
Now it's. I just got one last. Good riddance. How can you.

00;26;27;01 - 00;26;39;01
Clare Krug
Expect me to believe that you tried when you think of. Let's. You never called me or replied lost count of all the times you, I only came to see me once.

00;26;40;17 - 00;26;53;24
Clare Krug
These were it I kept looking past because I wanted to make the good times that they were. The Russians have exported so many. I ignore it because.

00;26;53;24 - 00;26;54;20
Clare Krug
I thought I was.

00;26;54;20 - 00;27;06;27
Clare Krug
A third pick. No possible way of doing it. It wasn't worth the fight. I guess I'm. Now it's make. I just got.

00;27;09;06 - 00;27;10;19
Clare Krug
Good riddance.

00;27;27;00 - 00;27;53;01
Clare Krug
Lots of high. I saw it. Now it's me. I just got.

00;27;55;12 - 00;27;56;21
Clare Krug
Good riddance.

00;27;59;23 - 00;28;16;25
Michael Hagan
Wow, that was great. Awesome job, Claire. I I it's it's funny, I'm thinking I I should have a better technical as a former English major, I should have a better technical vocabulary to talk about the lyrics. And I hope Eric Bennett's not listening because, you know, I did take his prosody course.

00;28;17;14 - 00;28;32;18
Michael Hagan
So my my non-technical description, I mean, I'm really struck by the way that you map the lyrics on to the melody. I mean, you at certain points. It's like you're cramming syllables in, you know, at a particularly angsty portion of the lyrics.

00;28;32;18 - 00;28;41;10
Michael Hagan
But at other points, you kind of draw a single word or a single syllable over over a multiple or many notes. It's it's a really interesting sound.

00;28;41;26 - 00;29;01;09
Clare Krug
Yeah, thank you so much. I think it all just came down to what I wanted to say and the amount of room I had to say it I had when I wrote the lyrics, I had this big whiteboard right in front of me, actually in the lab here, and I wrote on the whiteboard all the words and

00;29;01;09 - 00;29;16;16
Clare Krug
I would I would erase stuff and rewrite stuff, and I would. I'd see how much how many measures I had to say what I wanted to say. And and after that, it just comes down to trying to find some kind of rhythm that would fit what I want to say and sound like it flows.

00;29;16;27 - 00;29;18;03
Clare Krug
So that's what I tried to do.

00;29;19;21 - 00;29;31;27
Michael Hagan
Yeah. So Dr. Longo Claire's composition speaks for itself in a lot of ways. It's really excellent. But are there any specific aspects of her work that you'd like to point out as particularly strong, technically, creatively or both?

00;29;32;29 - 00;29;34;18
William Longo
Oh, for sure. Definitely both.

00;29;36;14 - 00;30;00;02
William Longo
You know it. It really was fascinating for me to see how it came together for her, Claire, at least from my perspective, her her process for creative process going through. She starts with the pad and and pencil, you know, to begin with, and everybody has a different way that they want to, you know, begin writing some some

00;30;00;02 - 00;30;12;17
William Longo
folks start with the computer and producing sounds and things. And Claire, you can see that it was a, you know, kind of take an old school approach, which I'm kind of old school. So I identify with that for sure, too.

00;30;14;11 - 00;30;30;23
William Longo
But but really, it's kind of some of the things that you're mentioning, you know, really you well constructed as a song, melodically like the tech setting. Um, you know, and the flow is really, you know, not to sound to, you know, sterile about it, but like magical.

00;30;32;11 - 00;30;47;15
William Longo
You know it. You know, there's never a feeling that even with, you know, so much lyric content that we're that we're overwhelmed. You know, I feel like we get we get the story from start to finish. And it just it sounds exactly as it should.

00;30;47;28 - 00;31;08;13
William Longo
But then, like harmonically and structurally, Claire did an amazing job, you know, really just kind of pacing us through, you know, the section in the middle where, you know, she has her, she has a bridge with just strings that's just, you know, different harmony, but then also signified by the change in texture.

00;31;08;20 - 00;31;23;01
William Longo
You know, I actually think for for me, my perspective, the arrangement and the timing of the different textures is super well conceived and then the other decisions that give it musical decisions that give it more of a personal character.

00;31;23;11 - 00;31;44;15
William Longo
I can't help but, you know, smile when I hear the end of, you know, your phrasing, I hear, you know, to it which to me, you know, it's of the precarious, right? Yeah. And those decisions, you know, they really help the listener identify your individual voice.

00;31;44;25 - 00;32;05;06
William Longo
So in a project for school, Claire manages to go through and in and develop and inject her personal individual experience and voice to it. You know, and I just I think that that's that's a real accomplishment for that.

00;32;05;13 - 00;32;16;19
William Longo
And then I could go on and on so you can stop me for a second. But I also think that something that you all can't see as a listener that that to me really stands out. And I mentioned this to Claire.

00;32;16;19 - 00;32;40;13
William Longo
I think earlier in the semester is that I feel that she's made a really significant jump in her production techniques even from last spring. Taking an intro course like this, this is this is someone that didn't have a ton of experience using technology to create music and just the attention to detail in the mix.

00;32;40;14 - 00;33;04;10
William Longo
The the internet internet. Sorry, always the internet, the instrument selection, layering, you know, all these small things. And I think music as well. And it's really on, you know, but. To bring it to life, you know, using production techniques is a whole another skill, you know?

00;33;05;22 - 00;33;06;00
William Longo
So.

00;33;07;13 - 00;33;14;28
Michael Hagan
Mm hmm. And 11 thing that I don't want to lose, I mean, technology and production aside, the that that was you on the vocals, right?

00;33;16;01 - 00;33;16;15
Clare Krug
Yes.

00;33;16;19 - 00;33;17;22
Michael Hagan
Yeah, you sound great.

00;33;18;15 - 00;33;19;21
Clare Krug
Oh, thank you so much.

00;33;19;27 - 00;33;28;02
Michael Hagan
All right. So, Claire, you're going to be asked this question a lot in the next couple of years. But but what do you aspire to do after graduating from P.S.?

00;33;29;10 - 00;33;43;15
Clare Krug
I just want to work in the music industry and any way that I can. I am. I have a variety of musical interests aside for music technology. I love musical theater. I love performing. I would love to be able to music direct for a musical.

00;33;44;02 - 00;34;02;05
Clare Krug
I'm also really interested in film direction and film scoring, which might lead me to do a film minor here. If time allows, we'll see. But I'll definitely take a class or two. But but my main goal as an undergrad student is to learn as many skills in as many areas of music as I can, like in producing

00;34;02;05 - 00;34;14;20
Clare Krug
sound mixing and composing songwriting. You know, the list goes on along with some theater and performance skills so that when I graduate, I'm qualified to do any job in the industry that I can find. That's that's kind of my goal.

00;34;15;10 - 00;34;28;02
Michael Hagan
All right. Well, that sounds like a solid plan that'll serve you really well. Dr. Longo, how do music and music technology studies at Providence College prepare and position students to make a strong entrance to the job market upon graduation?

00;34;29;20 - 00;34;45;04
William Longo
And it's a that's an excellent question, I think. For starters, our program ends and you know and, you know, music technology and production programs in general, I think that it introduces students to the idea.

00;34;45;04 - 00;34;48;02
William Longo
That there's many different pathways to career in the music industry.

00;34;48;03 - 00;35;05;04
William Longo
You know, coming up as I did, you know, K-12 playing a band, maybe like you playing trumpet, things like that. You know, when you think about careers in music coming from that background, you might be thinking, OK, I can be a performer, or maybe I'll be.

00;35;05;04 - 00;35;08;03
William Longo
Like my band director. Maybe I'll be a educator, you know?

00;35;08;03 - 00;35;23;02
William Longo
But there's so many other things that we can do in the music industry. Music is everywhere, you know? And and like Claire said, the the amount that you can diversify your skill set can just, first of all, spark your interest in a lot of different areas.

00;35;23;03 - 00;35;48;12
William Longo
So our program, as I said before trying to find the balance between creative skill building and, you know, kind of vocational skill building, you know, you can you can move on in a variety of directions. If you're more interested in the technology aspects of things, maybe you're more drawn to audio recording, editing, mixing, you know, all the

00;35;48;12 - 00;36;03;26
William Longo
post-production things that go along with making music and media. You know, there's a clear pathway to from from what we're, you know, teaching in the student experience at PC to what is out there in the job market today.

00;36;04;20 - 00;36;16;18
William Longo
If you're more drawn towards, you know, creative skills composition, more production, of course, you can pursue a career in songwriting. You may decide that you want to focus on.

00;36;16;18 - 00;36;18;28
William Longo
Film scoring or media writing.

00;36;19;14 - 00;36;35;28
William Longo
You know, and start to get into, you know, those industries a little bit. You know, another option, of course, is always more school, and graduates from this program could easily progress from this program to a master's program in composition.

00;36;37;04 - 00;36;52;27
William Longo
You know, like I said before a film scoring media, writing, classical, you know, jazz writing, you know, and and start to, you know, sort of develop an area that just kind of sparked their interest, you know, due to the real diverse nature of what we're doing here.

00;36;53;14 - 00;36;57;17
Michael Hagan
Well, Dr. Longo Claire, thank you both for joining us today. This was a lot of fun.

00;36;58;00 - 00;37;00;10
William Longo
Oh, thank you so much. Really appreciate it.

00;37;00;21 - 00;37;01;11
Clare Krug
Thank you.

00;37;01;24 - 00;37;16;03
Michael Hagan
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