Welcome to the 'coding for musicians' blog! Where I write about the crossovers between music and software development and how musicians can use their skills to change careers.
Music and software have a lot more in common than you might think. So what if I told you that musicians are naturally inclined to be great software developers? Well it’s the truth! That’s exactly my story of how I got here and I want to spread the good news and help others make the leap.
I went to school for music and wound up getting my masters in music theory and composition (because I didn’t want to enter the real world, truthfully). I thought I was going to teach at a university but it turns out, you need a PhD for that! Crap. Truth is, I was burnt out from school and sick of paying thousands of dollars for a degree in a field that didn’t have many opportunities.
Fast forward to graduation, I immediately moved to Nashville, Tennessee to make it as a music producer and a sound mixer. Surprise, there's 50,000 people already there that are better than you! Anyways, I had some very meager success over those 5 years, but even that little bit of success wasn’t enough to pay the bills. I was starting to see the writing on the wall. Either I was going to have to get incredibly lucky, or I was going to go completely broke chasing ghosts.
I didn’t want to just ‘barely get by’, I wanted to have a better life for myself. But I also didn’t want to go back to school and pay thousands of dollars for just a ‘chance’ of getting a job. That didn’t make sense to me. I wanted a low cost education, with a field I’d enjoy, with a job market that was thriving. Sound too good to be true? Well it wasn’t!
Enter Software Development!
This blog is for me to dump my thoughts from my experience as a musician gone software engineer and to hopefully help others who are interested in making the same jump.
I'm targeting musicians because I am you and believe it or not, you are set up perfectly to build software. Your skills are worth more than a few measly tips at the local venue! I hope you'll join me on this journey and discussion as I think it's not only fascinating but can also be life changing if you're willing to put in a little bit of work.
Best, CFM