DIY TOURING
WITH CHUCKIE CAMPBELL

Hallwalls Cinema @ 2:00PM

Get ready for the road with a pro hip-hop recording artist (Automatic Records, NYC), poet, fiction writer, editor, publisher, and educator.

During this workshop, Chuckie Campbell covers a wide range of DIY touring topics, including naming and routing your tour, writing booking emails, how to handle different types of booking (house show, promoters, clubs, shows with other artists), getting audience to your shows, hotels, food, packing, mental and physical health on the road, contracts, and getting paid. Workshop topics also include creating a tour tracking spreadsheet, putting together an effective EPK and one-sheet, how to create an ad mat for image consistency.

CHUCKIE CAMPBELL is an American recording artist, booking agent, poet, fiction writer, editor, publisher, and educator. His music has appeared in Billboard Magazine, The Huffington Post, DJBooth, The Source, Young Hollywood, and The Examiner. In the past, he’s won A3C’s “This Is My Year” Contest, and took home All WNY Music Awards for “Best Hip-Hop Artist” and “Best Hip Hop Performer,” ArtVoice Awards for “Best Hip-Hop Artist” and “Best Original Music,” as well as Canalside Buffalo’s Battle of the Bands.

For his stage shows, Campbell performs with a six-piece band for a live approach to hip-hop filled with fluid instrumentation, lush musical arrangements, and heartfelt poetic nuance. Together, the crew has touched 46 states and two countries (Canada and Costa Rica), attended A3C as official artists (the largest hip-hop music conference in the United States), SXSW (the largest music festival of its kind in the world), NXNE (the Canadian equivalent of SXSW, held in Toronto, ON), while sharing stages with hip-hop legends such as Ghostface Killa, Ras Kass, Pharoahe Monch, Pete Rock, EPMD, Elzhi, EnVogue, The Soul Rebels, Black Milk, Blueprint, Chris Rivers, Crooked I, Shabaam Sahdeeq, and more.

Campbell’s newest project is set to be released in May 2022 by Automatic Records based in New York City. He is currently sponsored by Three Chord Bourbon, and works as a booking agent for Wavelink Agency.

THE CHANGING FACE OF MUSIC JOURNALISM (& WHAT IT MIGHT MEAN FOR YOUR CAREER)
WITH JEFF MIERS

Hallwalls Cinema @ 3:00PM

Three questions make up the heart of this discussion: 1) Why do you want to be a musician? 2) What can you reasonably expect if you plan to pursue a life in music? 3) Why does music matter?

Buffalo News music critic and independent musician Jeff Miers will cover a variety of topics relating to the radical changes in the structure of music journalism, and discuss the significance of YouTube reviews and reaction videos, podcasts, and the decline of music and arts coverage at daily newspapers.

Most people know JEFF MIERS as music critic for The Buffalo News, where he has been writing about popular music since 2002. That makes him the second-longest serving daily publication critic in that role after Dale Anderson (BMHOF, 2003), who did the job through the 1970s and 1980s. But Miers also brings the most onstage musical experience of any music critic at The Buffalo News. He’s been a professional musician for far longer than he’s been a music critic, and he has also participated in educational ventures in music and the arts in the region. His involvement in every aspect of the Buffalo music scene earned him the 2014 President’s Award from the Buffalo Music Hall of Fame (BMHOF).

Born in the Berkshires of Massachusetts, Jeff Miers moved to Buffalo in 1990 from Saratoga. He had recently graduated from the State University of New York at Fredonia with a degree in English and a minor in music. While at Fredonia, he met fellow Buffalo musician and Buffalo Music Hall-of-Famer Nelson Starr, and together they started The Tails, a band that would release two EPs, two full-length CDs, and one live album over the course of their 11-year tenure. Miers went on to play with numerous other Buffalo bands, including The Dollywatchers, Relics (a Pink Floyd cover band), The Jeff Miers Band (with his son Declan), Bravado, and several others. He has also been a studio musician, including recording sessions for Ian Gillian of Deep Purple and others.

He began his career as a music critic with a piece about Lollapalooza 1993 for Metro Weekend (which later became The Buffalo Beat), and by 1998 he was editor-in-chief of that alternative newsweekly. His writing has been featured in Rockstar Magazine, Guitar Player Magazine, and others. In 2008, Miers was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for his music criticism at The Buffalo News. He has also won several New York State Associated Press awards for music journalism, taking the award for Arts Entertainment Criticism in 2005, 2006, 2009, 2010, and 2011.

In the summer of 2022, Miers will release his debut album as a solo artist, Dharma for None, a thematically linked collection of original songs featuring contributions from a broad range of musicians from the 716.

LIGHTING FOR VIDEO CONTENT
WITH OMERI MONROE

Hallwalls Cinema @ 4:00PM

Have you ever purchased a camera and turned it on, just to be disappointed? The videos you shoot still don’t look like the videos you see online? Well, that’s because of lighting.

Sit with Omeri Monroe for an impactful hands-on tutorial on working with lights to get better videos. You’ll learn how to make your video lighting flattering or dramatic instantly—and with a small budget.

OMERI MONROE is a musician, a freelance videographer, and the owner of TuneWorks Media, a video production company that services businesses and artists with video content and promotions. Omeri can do it all—from producing commercials, music videos, and live event video of all kinds, to writing and recording custom music and jingles.

“When people think about hiring videographers, they look at it in terms of someone coming to shoot the video and that’s it. We care about the projects and companies you have just as much as you do. Our team gets enjoyment from knowing that we had fun and did more than what was expected. We are put here to create videos for just about anyone with a dream who cares to invest in it.”

CONFIDENT DRUMMING (GIVE THE DRUMMERS SOME)
with Griffin Brady, Joe Goretti, & Damone Jackson

Hallwalls Cinema @ 5:00PM

Take a rhythmic trip around the world with three of Buffalo’s top drummers and percussionists—and learn how playing with confidence helps them keep their musical careers moving.

During this masterclass performance clinic and panel discussion, Griffin Brady, Joe Goretti, and Damone Jackson will first explore drumming with confidence together across a variety of styles, then discuss the state of session drumming (and session playing in general) in the Buffalo scene, and beyond and how their performance confidence translates into artistic success.

GRIFFIN BRADY has a Master of Arts degree from Goddard College, with a focus in Ethnomusicology and Music Pedagogy. His Master’s thesis and adjoining musical method books were inspired by his work as a touring musician and educator with groups such as the SAAKUMU Dance Troupe of Ghana, West Africa. Upon founding the Slyboots School of Music, Art & Dance in Buffalo, NY in 2006, Griffin has been teaching and performing at over 800 universities, colleges, high schools, elementary schools, and clubs across the United States promoting the Slyboots mission: positive social change through cultural arts education and performance—and bringing the world together, on the sly.

In addition to his touring efforts, Griffin also works as a teaching artist in WNY schools, has been a featured speaker at various panel discussions and events including the TedX Buffalo conference, and he also organizes and implements a study abroad program that has brought WNY students to Africa nearly every summer since 2010.

Griffin is also widely known for the community events that he produces, including weekly drum and dance classes and the annual multi-day music, art and dance festival SLYFEST, as well as his audio production work in association with Ripe Audio at Nights Of Fire, Bidwell Park, Larkin Square, and Buffalo Ironworks. He was recently named the Executive Director of the newly created Bernard Woma Dagara Music Center USA 501(c)3.

JOE GORETTI is a full-time professional freelance drummer, producer, and educator currently based in Buffalo, NY. He has performed around the world, and on national and international television, laying down the groove for a wide variety of artists that include Moby, Ne-Yo, Robyn, AJR, Ingrid Michaelson, Sam Moore (Sam & Dave), The Temptations, and more.

Hailing from Buffalo, NY, this Berklee College of Music graduate has a career span that includes not only live performances and world tours, but TV credits as well. He has accompanied various artists on Saturday Night Live, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, The Late Show with David Letterman, The Today Show, LIVE with Kelly & Michael, VH1 Big Morning Buzz, PBS Front Row Center, MTV Online Awards, Moby Live From Arras, France, The iTunes Festival, and the Moby Destroyed Deluxe DVD.

Joe’s versatility and musicality keep him in high demand as a performer, producer, and teacher. In addition to his many accolades as a performer and sideman, he also offers a very practical and unique drum course called The Drumming Career Course^®. This is a course designed to give the student all the tools necessary to building and maintaining a career as a full-time professional drummer. Joe conducts clinics and private lessons here and abroad, and has appeared alongside legendary drummers Dave Weckl, Peter Erskine, JoJo Mayer, and Thomas Lang.

DAMONE “A-MIRACLE” JACKSON is a drum set specialist and percussion teacher living in Western NY. Damone graduated from Villa Maria College in 2014 with a B.A. in Music Performance and a concentration in jazz. He has won several awards, including Best Blues Drummer in 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019 by the Buffalo Music Awards.

Recently, Damone has been on tour in South America and Europe playing shows and teaching master-classes. He is thankful that music has provided the opportunity to play with many truly fine musicians in the Buffalo area as well and all over the world. Damone gigs extensively throughout Western New York and is one of the areas most in-demand drummers for both live shows and studio work.

Currently, he is the drummer and founder of The Damone Jackson Outcome.

TURNING CHAOS INTO COLLABORATION
with Sara Elizabeth, Eric Crittenden, & David Cloyd

The 9th Ward @ 2:00PM

Unleash your most powerful artistic self AND be a part of the change you want to see in your local music scene by relentlessly pursuing creative collaboration—both on and off the stage.

During this panel discussion and open forum, the program director of Music Is Art and the co-founders of Buffalo Music Club discuss how their personal experiences as artists has allowed them to develop innovative ways to collaborate in every aspect of their careers, using their creative superpowers to benefit themselves, their fellow artists, and the world around them.

Based in Buffalo, NY, SARA ELIZABETH picked up her first guitar on her ninth birthday, at which point she began eight years of classical and jazz training, followed by a Bachelors in Music and Minor in Sound Design for Theatre from the University at Buffalo by the ripe age of 19. She then turned to a full-time career as a singer/songwriter, and after a decade of performing around the Northeast region, Sara’s raw and heartfelt songs and intriguing stage chemistry have gathered and inspired an audience of faithful followers.

She has performed numerous music venues around WNY, the Northeast region, and beyond, sharing the stage with the likes of Bedouin Soundclash, Chris Trapper, Rachel Sage, and Neyla Pekarek of The Lumineers. In addition to her responsibilities as Music Is Art’s program director, Sara Elizabeth has stayed busy as an artist throughout the pandemic era, releasing two self-produced singles, “The Strangest Bunch” and “100” in 2020. Most recently, Sara stepped outside her element to collaborate with hip-hop artist and producer Ethos Logos Pathos Music, releasing the co-written EP Electric Heart 3 to an eager and receptive audience.

As Jeff Miers of The Buffalo News has said, “Bringing an indie-rock mentality to the modern folk-based troubadour school is Sara’s deal, and it’s working . . . she’s become one of the more buzzed-about artists on the local indie-pop scene.”

ERIC CRITTENDEN has more than 25 years as a touring performer under his belt, sharing the stage with the likes of Bob Weir and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead, Sinbad the Comedian, Michael Franti, G-Love & Special Sauce, Jefferson Airplane/Starship, Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and so many more. Since his birth in Buffalo, NY, Eric has been immersed in the funk and feel-good soul sound of Motown. (After all, his father played with James Brown for 13 years.) But it was in his twenties that he really discovered the organic self expression of jazz, listening to Eddie Harris, John Coltrane, and Herbie Hancock. Branching further out into rock, including the Grateful Dead and Pink Floyd, completely changed his life and started him on a path to genre mixing that was accessible to everyone.

As a highly respected music educator, he has conducted over a hundred workshops and edutainment performances, and has been a key force behind numerous arts education efforts in Buffalo and Western New York, including The IMAGE Urban Arts Workshop, the Buffalo Center for Arts and Technology, and his music camp program “Future Sounds of Buffalo.” Eric Crittenden has a degree in Music Performance from SUNY Empire State College, and a M.Ed in Career and Technical Education from SUNY Buffalo State College. Today, he teaches music in the public school system of Buffalo, NY, where he continues to perform and dedicate his career to the local music scene and the youth in the community.

In 2020, he started Buffalo Music Club (with co-founder David Cloyd) to create and foster a vibrant and sustainable local music scene by constantly reimagining the relationship between life, music, musicians, and the community within the city of Buffalo, its surrounding areas, and beyond.

DAVID CLOYD has led what could only be called an eclectic musical life. He began as a pianist at the age of 4, after his family discovered him picking out Mozart by ear. He spent the next 20 years adamantly pursuing classical music as a pianist and woodwind multi-instrumentalist, completing his Bachelor of Music Performance at the University of Texas at Austin. To make a living and start his career, he began teaching music and performing live—everything from chamber music and pit orchestras to local rockabilly bands. But he spent much of his time outside of class teaching himself how to play bass and guitar, and playing as many instruments as possible in a variety of original bands, eventually writing and singing his own songs in some of them.

Today, he is a solo recording artist whose debut album Unhand Me, You Fiend! hit #1 on eMusic’s Album Charts, and he is currently in the studio finishing up his third studio album. Alongside his duties as ECR’s Executive Vice President of Creative Operations, he also spearheads and A&R’s his own imprint, Hook & Ladder Records, home for the developing artists emerging from his Buffalo recording and production studio. He is also an actor, creator, writer, scoring composer, and producer with PizzaDog Studios, the Buffalo production company behind his new web series, Cloyd.

In 2020, he started Buffalo Music Club (with co-founder Eric Crittenden) to create and foster a vibrant and sustainable local music scene by constantly reimagining the relationship between life, music, musicians, and the community within the city of Buffalo, its surrounding areas, and beyond.

DIVERSIFYING YOUR MUSICAL INCOME
with Walter Kemp 3, Jacob Jay, & Edreys Wajed

The 9th Ward @ 3:00PM

Necessity may be the mother of invention. But as most musicians know, creativity is one of the best possible tools for turning a need into an opportunity.

During this workshop and panel discussion, three career musicians from Buffalo’s music scene talk about the many ways they have made their living—and how their creative processes help them constantly develop new income streams out of their art and artistry.

Viscount^®-endorsed artist WALTER KEMP 3 owes much to his father, a classical and gospel composer, who sparked Kemp’s early interest in piano. Seeing and hearing his father’s compositions performed at Carnegie Hall opened Kemp’s eyes to a world of music. He soon began studying classical piano, and after a brief interest in drums, he gravitated toward jazz, continuing to play gospel organ.

Kemp, the lead composer and pianist for Kemp + the Reyvolation, and the Walter Kemp 3oh!, has won widespread critical acclaim for his classic and compelling compositions which experiment with traditional chord progressions with inventive finesse. As the winner of numerous awards with his international touring and recording projects, he has collaborated with various musical greats like Juini Booth and Rey Scott, of Sun-Ra’s Arkestra, Bobby Militello, (Dave Brubeck), and Sabu Adeyola (Ahmad Jamal).

As a highly-sought professional in the progressive music scene, Walter is the youngest musician in more than three decades to serve as Artistic Director for the CMC Jazz Festival. He teaches jazz piano at Villa Maria College.

JACOB JAY is a professional trumpet player, educator and composer based in Buffalo, NY. A versatile trumpet performer, Jacob has performed with various ensembles and artists ranging from chamber music and orchestra to rock, hip-hop and jazz. As a music educator, Jacob is the Adjunct Professor of Trumpet at Villa Maria College, Brass Instructor at Community Music School of Buffalo, and an Instrumental Music Teacher for the Buffalo Public Schools. As a composer, Jacob has written and arranged professional and educational music in several styles, including big band, small group jazz, orchestra, and brass quintet, as well as rock and hip-hop horn sections.

Jacob is a graduate of SUNY Buffalo State, where he received a Bachelor of Music degree in Music Education with a Minor in Digital Music Production. He also completed a Masters of Music in Jazz Studies the University of Arkansas at Monticello. While at UAM, Jacob served as a Graduate Assistant and was a member of UAM’s award-winning Jazz One ensemble. Jacob has studied trumpet with Gerry Youngman, John Maguda, Kyle Resnick, Dr. Mark Filsinger, Freddie Hendrix, and Dr. Alex Pope Norris.

Past performances include the Queen City Jazz Festival, the Northwest Jazz Festival, the Pappy Martin Legacy Masten Jazz Festival, the Pine Grill Jazz Reunion, the Nietzsche’s Jazz Festival, Elmhurst College Jazz Festival, Hotel Henry, Babeville’s 9th Ward, Pausa Art House, the Tralf Music Hall, and Kleinhans Music Hall.

EDREYS WAJED is a Buffalo native, a catalyst of inspiration, and a walking enterprise of all things creative. His approach in each endeavor is soundly unique, high quality, and signature in presentation, having found his course as a creator early in life.

“Let the guidance be the vision.” Unlike most who plan with predictable steps and procedures, Edreys’s approach is to be obedient to his curiosity. This musing becomes the roadmap
where discomfort and disorientation yield personal growth and discovery through solution-driven, explorative art making.

Edreys probes and meanders proficiently through music, video, theater, metal smithing, illustration and painting, seeing art as language with which he is multilingual. He investigates humanity through storytelling, consumerism, and social justice, with an affinity for the beauty of human error in handmade objects, mark-making, and documenting human experience.

As an artist, he finds himself fluidly moving between disciplines, some of which merge seamlessly at times as each of his interests inform and influence one another. Rhythm, line, vibrant color palettes, and form are elements that bind his work as a thread across practices, whether exploring sound, figurative and abstract imagery, or small wearable objects.

The energy fueling his exploration and productivity in making art is his personal objective to leave artifacts (or “art of facts”) as evidence of his existence and his efforts as an artist. Edreys’s objective is to create beauty and positively influence the lives of others and provoke compassion, where his artistic offerings are the catalyst.

RECORDING STUDIO ETIQUETTE 101
with Elijah Hooks

The 9th Ward @ 4:00PM

During this workshop, Elijah Hooks will cover best practices for production, preparation, studio time, mixing and mastering, and more.

ELIJAH HOOKS (also known by ElijahThinkalot) is an American audio engineer and music producer from Buffalo, New York. His career began as a teenager, working alongside his father’s company Unity Productions in marketing and concert promotions. The company teamed up with Russell Simmons’ Def Comedy Jam and became the official promoters for Western New York and Canada. During that period, Elijah worked with All-Star comedians such as Kevin Hart, Mike Epps, DL Hughley, and many more. The comedy and music worlds are closely interwoven and shortly after, Elijah started booking Hip-Hop and R&B acts such as Notorious B.I.G., Das EFX, Nas, and Common, just to name a few.

In 2010, he co-founded ThinkAlot Recording Studios and began working with local artists and teaching music programs in several schools and community organizations. In 2014, his production helped land a recording contract for Quadir Lateef with the infamous Ruff Ryders label, with Quadir touring through 2016 with flagship artist DMX. After much consideration, Thinkalot Recording Studios decided to close its doors and Elijah was welcomed into the GCR Audio family. Since then, he has worked with many prominent recording artists, most notably Lil Wayne, Lil Baby, A Boogie wit da Hoodie and Buffalo’s own Griselda Records: Westside Gunn, Conway the Machine, and Benny the Butcher.

Elijah Hooks is a staple in the local music community providing world-class audio engineering and production to up-and-coming talent.

THE SONG PYRAMID
WITH DAVID CLOYD

The 9th Ward @ 5:00PM

Explore songwriting—the inside, the outside, and the mystery in the middle—with an award-winning indie singer/songwriter & recording artist (ECR Music Group, NYC), founder of Hook & Ladder Records, and co-founder of Buffalo Music Club.

During this workshop, David Cloyd breaks down his brand-new unified songwriting theory, and how its style-agnostic, customizable, and non-formulaic approach can help all artists strive to become their best, continue to evolve, and connect with audiences by writing songs that feel inevitable.

DAVID CLOYD has led what could only be called an eclectic musical life. He began as a pianist at the age of 4, after his family discovered him picking out Mozart by ear. He spent the next 20 years adamantly pursuing classical music as a pianist and woodwind multi-instrumentalist, completing his Bachelor of Music Performance at the University of Texas at Austin. To make a living and start his career, he began teaching music and performing live—everything from chamber music and pit orchestras to local rockabilly bands. But he spent much of his time outside of class teaching himself how to play bass and guitar, and playing as many instruments as possible in a variety of original bands, eventually writing and singing his own songs in some of them.

Today, he is a solo recording artist whose debut album Unhand Me, You Fiend! hit #1 on eMusic’s Album Charts, and he is currently in the studio finishing up his third studio album. Alongside his duties as ECR’s Executive Vice President of Creative Operations, he also spearheads and A&R’s his own imprint, Hook & Ladder Records, home for the developing artists emerging from his Buffalo recording and production studio. He is also an actor, creator, writer, scoring composer, and producer with PizzaDog Studios, the Buffalo production company behind his new web series, Cloyd.

In 2020, he started Buffalo Music Club (with co-founder Eric Crittenden) to create and foster a vibrant and sustainable local music scene by constantly reimagining the relationship between life, music, musicians, and the community within the city of Buffalo, its surrounding areas, and beyond.