I'm a Senior Citizen Who Produces EDM

EDM is not an appalling physical symptom of an old age infirmity. It is electronic dance music. I may not be the only senior who produces electronic dance music, but there sure aren't many of us. In fact, the most remarkable thing about this is you will be hard-pressed to find a senior who even likes EDM.

Before I go on, let me explain there are many sub-genres of electronic music; house, ambient, acid, techno, trance, dubstep and on and on. These distinctions are unknowable to those who are not experienced listeners. Many people call all electronic music "techno" which is not correct. Neither is all electronic music dance music. You'd be hard-pressed to dance to some of the electronic tracks I produce. Technically, I produce mostly tech-House (EDM) and some experimental.

So why don't senior citizens like electronic music? You know how it is, something too radically different is not readily accepted. You won't see many seniors in a crowd at a rave; a lively party or gathering involving dancing and drinking. They had enough of that in their younger days and would rather get their sleep than stay up all night and feel like garbage all the next day.

But the biggest reason they reject electronic music is they don't think it is "real" music. To a marginal degree, I must reluctantly agree with them. DJs at raves play their music in front of excited crowds and turn some knobs and pump their arms. Truth is, they don't really have to do anything except play their track from their computer like any other song, unless they have a real band with a live drummer or a live vocalist. For most electronic music producers, their creations are generated on a computer. While I may find those DJs amazingly creative, they are not like a real rock star.

My music is produced on my laptop. I downloaded everything I need, for free, to do it from many different places on the internet. I have yet to spend the first penny on any music production. And I have no musical training beyond junior-high school band. But I have listened to a lot of music. I'll admit, it all sounds very bad.

Nevertheless, after I retired from full-time work, I wondered what it would be like to make some little ditties like you hear in the background on most TV commercials now. I researched it and it looked doable, so I decided to mess with it. There are dozens of free downloadable files and plenty of instructional videos.

It turns out, after downloading free VST (virtual studio technology) plugins for my free DAW (digital audio workstation) from places like the London Symphony Orchestra, that I could make tunes that had amazing sound quality.

My wife was taken aback that I was producing tracks which sounded the way they did. "You did that?" Not that she really likes any of my compositions. In fact, it troubles me to say that being a senior, no one in my circles of people really like my music. At least I can blame it on that.

I really enjoy making a song sound the way I want it. I like deep rich tones that often sound ominous or epic, or a little creepy with a punchy beat. So I kept making tracks for God and myself to listen to and put some up on the internet for listeners. Some of these tracks got hundreds of streams, which was gratifying.

A person from a record label contacted me about signing on one of my songs. It seemed suspiciously a little too much like a vanity scheme. I did some research and found that I could instead sign on with one of many distributors, again, for free. So I upped my game and started putting much better tracks through my chosen distributor. My first album, Expanse is now available on over 20 online retailers, including Spotify, where you can stream (typically for free) and download music. I have two more, even better albums; (Accelerator, Night Cruise) and a single (How It Is) already produced and soon to be released. I hope you will check them out. You will feel yourself becoming cooler as you listen to them. Who knows? Maybe I can become the Matlock of music.

You can follow me on Facebook and Twitter to get updates.

So with people like me making music, what will happen to the music business? It looks to me like it will be like the book publishing business where anyone could have Amazon do desktop publishing for them or sell e-books. A saturation of the market by little guys like me, some of whom will hit it big. The biggies will still be around, but there will be endless more choices for the listener to play through their phone on to their TV or on a sound system.