This librarian shall be conducting a "DIY Music remixing and publishing workshop"

In this earlier post, I mentioned that the conjunction with World Book Day and Copyright Day (Apr 23), the Public Libraries has organised a series of events.

Here's another one this coming Saturday, 24 Apr 2010 (I'm conducting this one, btw):

DIY music remixing and publishing workshop
This is a free hands-on workshop, for and run by, DIY music enthusiasts. It is an introductory session for those interested in self-recording, producing and publishing their audio, music and podcasts online -- with simple and inexpensive recording and computer equipment.

Participants are encouraged to bring their own laptops and thumbdrives for the session.

The session will cover GarageBand (for Mac users) and Audacity (a free and open source application for PC and Macs). Music samples will be from ccMixter.org and FreeSound.org.

The session is led by Ivan Chew. In his day job, he is the Senior Manager/ Librarian from NLB. Off work, he dabbles in music and arrangement and volunteers at Creative Commons Singapore. Samples of his work, all created and mixed using GarageBand and Audacity, can be found at myrightbrain.wordpress.com/my-discography

This event is organised in conjunction with World Book Day and Copyright Day.

24 April 2010 (Saturday), 2.00pm – 5.00pm, Bukit Merah Public Library, Radin Mas room, Level 3.

In truth, I had apprehensions about organising this session.

Not from lack of confidence or uncertainty about the content itself. I've done podcasting workshops before, where participants -- with zero knowledge and experience -- were able to create usable audio tracks after 3 hours.

I was concerned about the turn out. Will people turn up? Will there be interest in such a workshop?

We shall see.

More details of how I intend to run the workshop:

Objective:
By end of the 3 hours, participants will be able to use an audio editing/ sequencer software and piece together a music track, using free and legal sound samples from the Internet (e.g. ccMixter.org, Freesound.org).

Pre-requisites:
Ideally the participants need to bring their own laptop computers and earphones. Also their computer microphones (optional). Those with Macs should check if they have their preloaded GarageBand software on their computer. For PCs, they may wish to download the Audacity open source software.

Sequence of the session:
1) Welcome of participants.

2) Installation of software (open source freeware) if desired.

3) Introduction to basics of Audacity and GarageBand.

4) First hour: demo of GarageBand (30mins) and Audacity (30mins). Demo covers:
- Importing tracks
- Basics of editing, sequencing, recording.
- Fade-in/ outs
- Sound effects
- Saving/ exporting tracks

5) Next hour - participants will try on their own.

6) Finally, we will showcase some samples produced by participants (if any).

7) Sharing of how one can publish a music album online (free file hosting; copyright considerations; Creative Commons).

8) End of programme.

I've created a Facebook event page. You may wish to sign up at the Facebook event page.

Currently it's still 1 person attending (me!)

Which is rather scary and maybe even embarrassing... but heck, nothing to be embarrassed about. Even if one person turns up, and is an old lady who knows nuts about computers and wish to learn more, I'd be happy to share :)

[Post-event update: Total of eight people showed up. Sweet! Thanks to Arul, Wan, Raman, Ms Tan, Edmund, Lee, Judy, and Linus. You rock!]