This past weekend, I had the honor of receiving the 2010 Vanguard Award from the Aspiring Minority Business Leaders & Entrepreneurs of Harvard College. The award was presented during the group’s annual Spring Career Conference, and there were roughly 100 students who had come there to be mentored by professionals in the areas of Entertainment, Marketing, Fashion & Media.
I finished this visual piece when I returned from the conference to illustrate that creativity is fueled by ACTION. Even while I was shooting this on the staircase of the building next door to my own, I was stopped by a young man who asked me – ‘how do I measure my creative potential?’. I responded to him the same way I responded to similar questions from the students at Harvard: ‘create, collaborate and share your art with the world – and do it now.’
The internet provides an incredible outlet for both emerging and established artists to communicate with their audiences. I firmly believe that when your art is truly remarkable, people will be inclined share the experience they have with what you’ve created by passing it on to friends, family and new acquaintances.
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The musical score in this piece was written in keeping with the theme of my collaboration with adidas Originals – my hood. Once I’d composed and recorded the score, I worked with Evan & Aram on my video team to visually interpret the lyric/melody using natural light from my street, a camera (Canon EOS 7D), a tripod, and props that we could make without spending any money. Evan used tape on a toy piano to create the 3 adidas stripes and Aram suggested the flicker effect use in the first half of the piece. Once we’d shot and edited a rough cut, I re-imported the video file into pro-tools and wrote a synth line to follow my slow-motion movements in the second half, resulting in the visual you see here.
When you’re as passionate about music, video, and sound as we are at NextSelection, the process is much more fun than work.
For all of you aspiring musicians, song-writers, rappers, singers, dancers, comedians, filmmakers, and the like, I urge you to create as often as possible and use the channels that you have on-line to distribute your art. Give it away in an effort to earn the respect of those that would be your fans and future consumers, in the same fashion that I’m giving this piece to all of you. You’ll know when you’re doing something special because people will respond by sharing your art. When you’ve amassed a respectable following, you won’t have to worry about ‘how to get out there.’ Instead, you’ll be fielding calls from corporate collaborators who know how to capitalize on thevalue that you’ve created. Take it from a guy who’s living proof that this strategy works.
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