Meet Jeremy Harvey

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jeremy Harvey. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Jeremy, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?

I believe my resilience comes many examples and places in my life, but among the most notable are the examples of my parents. They adopted me when I was six months old. When they learned that I was born with Cerebral Palsy and retinopathy of prematurity, they were undeterred, and said, “Let’s see what he can do.”

As I grew older, my parents taught me how to communicate effectively with people from whom I needed help. I learned that rather than simply telling people what I needed, effective communication requires patience–and certainly resilience–as I “bring people into my world”, and empathize with them as they learn to understand me, and I learn to understand them ignorer to have my needs met.

Most importantly, my parents would always discuss perspective. When I would struggle with the emotional aspects of a problem, they would listen carefully but mostly focus on broadening my perspective and how I viewed a problem. They taught me to acknowledge my feelings, but to not allow them to cloud my view of things as they really are. I have learned for them to keep an open mind and option options when it comes to problem-solving. All of these skills require great resilience.

Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?

I am a pianist, composer, arranger, and recording engineer. My work allows me to combine and balance my passions for expressive music and the human elements of technology. I started playing piano when I was two years old. Since I’m almost blind, I learn all my music by ear. When I was about 11, my family had borrowed a basic keyboard from a theater group that my mom directed. One day, I told my dad, “This keyboard can’t record enough tracks to record my concerto.”
“What concerto?.” he asked.
“The one in my head!”, I responded.
For Christmas that year, my parents gave my family and me a very nice full-sized music workstation keyboard with all kinds of cool features, including a touch screen and a multi-track recorder that could record up to 16 tracks. I finally recorded my first piano concerto–layering every instrument one at a time on top of each other. I recorded the piano, strings, brass, woodwinds, and percussion in three movements.
My music journey continued, and I received some great music training when my family and I moved overseas to China for my dad’s job, and I attended international schools in Beijing. There, I dove headfirst into music theory, composition and music technology. I learned about recording, and self-produced my first album at home of original compositions for my mom for her birthday.
After returning to the US, I graduated from high school, and began university. I studied piano performance and composition for my undergraduate degrees. In my spare time, I kept recording and learning about music tech, and began producing electronic music. I even began taking on clients as a recording engineer.
After I graduated with my Bachelor’s of Musical Arts degree from Brigham Young University-Idaho, I struggled to find work because of my disabilities. I was fortunate enough, however, to produce music for two product promotional videos for ICON Health & Fitness. for products from ProForm and NordicTrack.
I then went back to school for my Master’s degree in Computer Music Composition at The Peabody Institute of the John’s Hopkins University. There, I learned much more about how to use technology as a compositional tool. Notable works include a musical visualizer that reacts in real time to the dynamics, pitches, and tempo of music and changes depending on the time of day the piece is played; a piece recorded using samples of kitchen utensils and equipment; and a piece of music that reacts in real-time to inputs made in a flight simulator
Following graduation with my Masters Degree, I taught for a semester at a small college in Ephraim Utah, where I designed a course in electronic music and sound design, teaching students the elements of synthesis, MIDI, and sampling techniques.
Today, my music journey continues. I’m still looking for full-time work, and taking on whatever musical projects I can. However, I’m most excited about a new technique I’ve developed to produce music. It involves entering MIDI notes one note and chord at a time into recording software, then manipulating their duration, time, dynamics, etc. to make the performance human. I was inspired to do this by the fact that although I can play the piano, my Cerebral Palsy prevents me from realizing my musical vision fully through real-time performance. With this method, though, I have ultimate control over how everything sounds and I’m freed from my physical limitations. I believe that this method of “performance” has applications beyond persons with disabilities. It changes they way performers think about and experience executing a piece because it allows them to focus entirely on musical and interpretive aspects of their performances. Encouraging performance majors at school, for instance, to use my method of rendering a piece would force them to look beyond the physical aspects of their instrument and signt-reading, and focus instead on interpretive aspects of their playing. It would also enable them to hear their music in new ways by developing their awareness of shaping, balances, elasticities, and punctuations in their music. Then, when they return to the real instrument, performers can attempt to bring their live performance in-line with their musical vision they’ve realized by building a performance note by note.

I look forward to the future!

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

The three biggest skills/realizations that I’ve developed throughout my journey are 1) Learn to truly listen, 2) Make every note have its role, and 3) The performer is essential, but they are not the star. The music is the star.

1) Spend enough time really listening to music. Don’t just pay attention to the obvious things like rhythm, melody and harmony, but also pay attention to phrasing, shaping, the balance, inflection. Internalizing these things will help you bring life to your own performances and compositions. Also, learn to listen to what people mean, not just what they say.

2) Learn to be musical. Think in terms of phrases and sections, not just individual notes. Let each note have its role within the larger context of the music. Shape, balance, elasticize, inflect. Make each note count!

3) As important as performers are, the music is the star. Have the goal to realize the composer’s intentions. Of course, everyone’s interpretation will be unique, but I believe our main goal is to bring the composer’s vision to life, even though we view that vision through our own lens as performers.

How can folks who want to work with you connect?

I’m looking for composers or performers who want to record their music. I’m looking for people who are at ease and trust the recording process.

Contact Info:

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