micro/Maker by Loose Leaf Transmissions

Gabriel Bolaños is fully Nicaraguan, though his parents fled the Sandinista revolution in 1979 with three kids and two suitcases. Growing up abroad, moving every few years, Nicaragua remained the one constant—summers with family, guitar lessons with folk guitarist Julio Vásquez, marimba training. But Bolaños resists incorporating those traditions into his notated work. He learned early that folk music's vitality lives in embellishment and performance practice, not the bare-bones transcription on the page. To him, presenting Latin American folk music in concert halls with polished instruments and performers disconnected from its history feels disrespectful—like putting something living in a cage. Even when expectations arise, he holds back, only hinting at those roots sparingly, as hidden gestures rather than central features.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Emma O’Halloran reflects on Ira Glass’s famous “gap” quote—the reminder that every creative must endure the distance between their taste and their early work. She shares her own struggles with that gap, the importance of making “bad art,” and why practice is as vital for composers as it is for performers. From clearing space with meditation and movement, to filling the well with curiosity and new discoveries, to the discipline of showing up every day—Emma outlines the pillars that sustain her creative practice.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon.Follow us on Instagram @loose.leaf.transmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Nicolás Lell Benavides reflects on the bridge between rock, jazz, and composition — how early band rehearsals unknowingly taught him orchestration, and how writing music became a way of organizing thought. He and Tyler talk about teaching creativity, the value of notation as a tool for clarity, and the humility required to stay curious long after formal training ends.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Austin Hammonds opens up about what it really means to take ownership of a creative career — after years of working under others, learning the ropes, and navigating industry instability. He shares the courage it takes to step out on your own, the deep self-reflection behind that decision, and how family, mentors, and curiosity continue to shape his evolving path as a composer.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram @loose.leaf.transmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jessica Ackerley applied to an Arctic residency on a whim, partly motivated by a childhood spent reading Farley Mowat's accounts of Northern Canada and a long-held desire to reach the polar regions. What they found in Svalbard, Norway — one of the furthest points north on the planet — was almost the inverse of what they'd imagined: the gap between preconceived idea and lived experience became the subject. The island carries centuries of layered history, from fur traders and whalers to coal excavation to current scientific research on climate change, and sits at a geopolitical flashpoint as nations jockey for influence over the Arctic. Ackerley describes their ongoing work rooted in that experience as an attempt to share something most audiences will never witness directly — and to let music do what language can't quite manage: convey the essence of being there, and make listeners question what they thought the Arctic was.Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hannah Boissonneault describes how her songwriting and concert music practices have become more unified over time — and how improvisation has remained at the heart of both. She shares how voice memos, nontraditional instruments, and a love for slow-moving harmony help her tap into musical intuition. Whether writing a fixed media piece or recording with her band, she embraces the same curiosity, layering textures to create immersive, emotionally grounded sound worlds.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions. Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Through his Vital Organ Project, composer and organist Graeme Shields is reintroducing audiences to an instrument that’s often misunderstood—or overlooked entirely. He and Tyler talk about making the organ accessible outside of church walls, connecting with new audiences, and showing that this centuries-old instrument still has a vital place in today’s musical landscape.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Nicky Sohn traces a real shift in how she lives and works back to meeting her husband Nate, whose ordinary nine-to-five routine — gym at six, regular hours, a clean line between work and the rest of life — struck her as almost unbelievable after years immersed entirely in musician culture, where identity and self-worth get tied up completely in career outcomes. Watching her brother Justin's old nine-to-five (before he left it to become a ceramicist) planted a similar idea: what if composing worked that way too. The bigger realization underneath both is that music isn't life or death, despite what conservatory training can leave people feeling — that a slow commission year doesn't make her a terrible person. She's since pulled back from all-night writing sessions and constant email responsiveness, trying to build in actual breathing room. Marrying outside the music world has helped in another way: Nate offers something composers rarely give each other, plain, unguarded encouragement, alongside occasional outsider feedback sharp enough to be genuinely useful, like noticing that an opening passage didn't sound like a beginning at all.Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Han Hitchen shares how his identity as a queer, transgender, nonbinary man has shaped his music, from early subconscious works to intentional explorations of belonging and transformation. He reflects on the freedom he’s found in embracing both masculinity and femininity, and how composition became a vehicle for expressing identity with honesty and depth. For Han, music is not just notes on a page—it’s a way of making visible the truths of selfhood.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michael Frazier outlines three guiding pillars that now shape his creative life: fun, patience, and the embrace of identity. Reflecting on earlier periods where composition felt more dutiful than joyful, he describes how reconnecting with jazz, rhythm, and later his Latino heritage fundamentally shifted his relationship to writing music. Fun becomes not a distraction from rigor, but a necessary condition for sustained artistic investment; patience allows musical ideas the space to unfold fully; and identity offers a source of sincerity rather than constraint. Through recent works shaped by rhythm, dance, and cultural memory, Frazier describes a turning point where composition becomes not only meaningful, but genuinely enjoyable again.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions. Follow us on social media @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ania Vu discusses The Music She Writes, a project co-created with pianist Eunmi Ko to spotlight the work of Asian women composers. She talks about curation, community, and the power of making space for others — all while resisting narrow definitions of identity-based programming.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions. Follow us on social media @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For Christopher Stark, what makes a residency valuable has little to do with geography. Across stints in Italy, Norway, and upstate New York, location left almost no mark on the work itself — the people did, offering a rare baseline of cross-disciplinary curiosity and genuine attention that felt validating in a way daily life rarely does. Residencies also provide distance: a chance to step outside routine and assess whether it's actually serving his goals. A year in Rome clarified this from the opposite direction — Stark found himself missing the chaotic, diverse American art scene he could move through in a single week, despite conditions he describes as inhospitable to art-making. That contrast extends to artistic community itself: away from home, everyone starts from a baseline of mutual unfamiliarity, but in St. Louis, identity, history, and local politics attach to everything, including a string quartet, in a city with little of the ironic distance found in scenes elsewhere.Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Baljinder Sekhon talks about intuition, timbre, and the gap between the music we love and the music we create. He reflects on early experiences with sound, the influence of Mario Davidovsky, and why loving many kinds of music can actually make it harder to define a singular voice as a composer.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on social media @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

C. Jacqueline Wood reflects on art-making through the lens of loss, disillusionment, and resilience. Once embedded in the world of festivals and nonprofits, she has shifted toward creating on her own terms—outside the systems of grants, gatekeepers, and institutions. In this conversation, she speaks about why she no longer measures success by accolades, how her microcinema became a space for nurturing potential, and why sometimes the most important work emerges when artists stop waiting for permission.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Phong Tran reflects on how disillusionment with the classical commissioning system led him to create a more autonomous performance practice. He shares candid thoughts on the institutional structures that shape musical labor, and how writing an essay for I Care If You Listen helped clarify his position.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions. Follow us on social media @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Satisfaction is slippery. Tyler Kline and Marc Mellits trade notes on finishing a piece, cringing at what they’d change, and carrying those fixes into the next work. Mellits lays out his “three thirds” view—composer, performer, audience—arguing that interpretation by great players (and the listeners who complete the circuit) transforms notes on a page into art. Along the way they celebrate how performers can uncover things in a score the composer didn’t know were there.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chris Opperman remembers the day Final Fantasy music struck him like lightning. What began as a teenage obsession with Nobuo Uematsu’s soundtracks turned into a surreal journey—meeting his hero, joining the Distant Worlds team, and eventually orchestrating music for Final Fantasy concerts across the globe. From Carnegie Hall to Japan, Opperman shares how a lifelong fandom became a career bringing joy to thousands of gamers and concertgoers alike.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Beyza Yazgan reflects on how limited her early exposure to living composers was while studying piano in Turkey, where the focus remained firmly on the classical canon. That began to shift only after moving to New York, where encounters with contemporary music, free jazz, and improvisation classes quietly rewired her listening and sense of possibility. An improvisation course—initially peripheral to her formal training—became a turning point, offering permission to imagine herself not just as an interpreter, but as a creator. Now composing daily without having formally studied composition, she navigates a hybrid creative life shaped by curiosity, self-teaching, and practical demands—from sound libraries to stylistic flexibility. Rather than a clean break from tradition, her path reflects a gradual widening: a willingness to let unfamiliar sounds, disciplines, and questions reshape what a musical career can look like.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Anuj Bhutani reflects on what his non-linear path into composition may have actually been teaching him all along: a process built on following curiosity down paths that mostly don't pan out, until the one that does becomes obvious. A comment from Ted Hearn about watching him rework material over and over crystallized something Bhutani had been doing without fully naming it. A separate piece of advice from teacher Andrew May — that it's every person's right to gather evidence, form a hypothesis, and test it — reframed decision-making itself as a practice rather than a destination. The excerpt closes on a conviction both composers share: that no matter how abstract or apparently non-referential a piece is, it carries the life of the person who made it. The composer who claims otherwise, Bhutani suggests, probably hasn't looked hard enough.Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Skydiving and Kurosawa might not seem like obvious musical influences — but for Emily Koh, both reshaped how she experiences time, perception, and meaning. She shares with Tyler Kline how the surreal suspension of a 40-second free fall, and the multi-perspective storytelling in Rashomon, deepened her thinking about how music is felt, heard, and understood. For Emily, the goal isn’t to control the experience — it’s to leave space for listeners to find their own version of it.Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Emma O’Halloran opens up about what drives her to make music—not from an external push to “say something,” but from an internal urge that feels inseparable from who she is. She reflects on creating music that channels emotion directly, sometimes bypassing traditional ideas of form or intellectual justification. Along the way, she unpacks her resistance to the “tortured artist” myth, the layered honesty she seeks in her work, and how trusting her inner world has shaped her creative path.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon.Follow us on Instagram @loose.leaf.transmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sinclaire Marie frames artistic growth as something both practical and deeply personal: a balance between whether an object does what it’s meant to do and whether it communicates what the maker hopes to share. For her, success begins with function—whether a mug feels right in the hand or a teapot pours cleanly—but extends into conceptual clarity, where texture, weight, and surface convey warmth, care, and intention. She describes pottery as a layered record of decisions: how the clay was handled, how the surface was treated, how fire touched the piece, and how much of that history the maker chooses to reveal or conceal. Rather than chasing polish or perfection, growth shows up in consistency, experimentation, and the ability to keep making—allowing each pot to carry not just use, but evidence of process, emotion, and presence.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Austin Hammonds shares how a brief connection with composer Jay Flippen sparked the realization that a life in composition was actually possible — even from small-town Kentucky. He and Tyler reflect on what it meant to meet a living model of creative longevity, and how moments like that can shape an entire path forward.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram @loose.leaf.transmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Composer and performer Hannah Boissonneault reflects on her early creative impulses—playing an out-of-tune family piano and inventing music long before she knew the rules. She talks with Tyler about how those childhood experiences laid the groundwork for a lifelong relationship with sound, one rooted in curiosity, freedom, and exploration. From classical piano to upright bass to electric ensembles, Hannah’s journey is about staying open and connected to what music feels like, not just how it’s supposed to work.Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions. Follow us on social media @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Deadlines once drove Tyler Kline to crank out a new score every month—but three years spent perfecting a single piece reshaped his outlook. In this reflection he unpacks the shift from chasing constant output and external validation to finding satisfaction in slower, more deliberate work. The goal now: balance paid commissions with music made purely for the love of making it, and let the process itself be enough.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Andrew Noseworthy describes how his engagement with genres outside classical music—prog rock, ambient, hyperpop, and electronic scenes—has shaped his thinking less in sound than in structure, access, and dissemination. He points to the way these genres treat recordings as primary artistic objects rather than documentation, allowing albums to function as clear entry points, statements of identity, and tools for connection beyond live performance. In contrast to classical music’s archival relationship to recording, Andrew emphasizes the importance of high-quality, intentional releases—especially for listeners without regular access to concerts—and questions institutional assumptions that fix a work’s identity too early. The conversation reframes recordings not as endpoints, but as evolving representations, opening space for revision, multiplicity, and flexibility over time.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ania Vu talks about her deep connection to musical storytelling — from interpreting the emotional structure of Beethoven to shaping her own sound world through color, timbre, and discovery. She shares how listening to composers like Joshua Hey and Katherine Balch helped expand her palette beyond pitch into something more nuanced and personal.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions. Follow us on social media @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Kurt Rohde traces his understanding of what a piece needs in order to exist: not a formal prompt, but a person, a story, an imagined life the music can grow out of. Writing Double Trouble for violist Ellen Ruth Rose was the first time all the linkages were in place — knowing the person, knowing what she'd done, knowing the piece was meant to be played by her — and the experience clarified something that had been forming for years. Rohde describes a pre-compositional process of extensive journaling, working through ideas that are mostly non-musical, then finding ways to bring them into sound. Design, for both Rohde and Tyler, becomes the operative word: not structuralism, but a practice that holds form, material, and time together — and gives the piece somewhere to go before a single note is written.Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Daijana Wallace shares how grad school became a pivotal period of creative self-discovery. She reflects on overcoming uncertainty, experimenting with graphic notation, and how a collaboration with bassist Will Yager pushed her toward a freer, more intentional compositional process. Wallace and host Tyler Kline explore how shedding limitations opened new creative doors.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook @loose.leaf.transmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Brett Copeland reflects on how graduate school clarified what a sustainable artistic life actually looks like—not as a single role, but as an ecosystem built from composing, performing, teaching, and collaborating. A formative cohort in Tampa showed him the power of working alongside artists across disciplines, especially dancers, whose physical relationship to sound reshaped how he thought about musical density, gesture, and clarity. That same instinct for intentional separation led to the creation of DJ Electro Tuba: a space for music unconcerned with recital halls or academic framing, built instead from beat-driven collage, improvisation, and stylistic borrowing. Drawing from artists like Parliament, clipping., and later drifting toward more ambient influences such as Brian Eno and Aphex Twin, Brett describes an evolution toward restraint and spaciousness. Tools like Ableton Live and Audacity—especially the PaulStretch process—became ways to slow sound down, stretch small ideas into immersive environments, and let taste, rather than chaos, guide where the project continues.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sugar Vendil quit social media again after reading How to Break Up with Your Phone—the data on time spent and brain impact was horrifying. She briefly checks Instagram when people invite her to collaborate, then deletes it. The "work" she got from being active was superficial; meaningful projects come via email, not DMs. Her newsletter has a 60-70% open rate, far better than whatever eyeballs see Instagram posts. Social media peaked and businesses are realizing it's mostly bullsh*t. Everyone's attention is fragmented; even if they see your post, they won't click through. Vendil's reading more books than she has in years—she knows it's because she's off her phone. She'd rather make really good work without maximum attention than get sucked into a platform that makes everything look and sound the same. And the "privileged" argument doesn't land—none of us are making money purely off art anyway. Everyone has a job. She's choosing where her attention goes.Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Vanessa Ague shares how her blog The Road to Sound began as a personal outlet and grew into a meaningful platform for artist-centered writing. She discusses how encouragement from mentors like Will Robin helped her claim her voice as a critic, and how the blog ultimately opened doors to new writing opportunities, lasting collaborations, and moments of both joy and challenge.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on social media @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Before studying composition or even imagining a life in music, James May’s first creative spark came from an unlikely place: the Boy Scouts. In this conversation, James reflects on early musical memories—from Catholic folk groups and piano lessons to self-taught electric guitar riffs—and how those beginnings shaped his curiosity about sound and creation.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Charly Daniels talks about synesthesia not as a quirk but as the core engine of how he writes — a way of hearing harmony as color, sensing timbre as light or shadow, and shaping form through visual landscapes that unfold in his mind long before notes hit the page. He describes how this inner world emerged from childhood daydreaming, early experiments with his father’s keyboard, and years of listening without notation as a guide, eventually becoming a fully integrated compositional tool. His music grows from these sensory crossovers: clarinets that glow blue, strings that bloom in green, harmonies that brighten into orange or sink into brown, all feeding into a flexible structural intuition that shifts as a piece takes shape. For him, imagining music visually is both a starting point and a feedback loop — a way of staying inside the emotional truth of a sound as it evolves.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram: @loose.leaf.transmissionsmicro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Shelley Washington shares how her lifelong love of textiles — inspired by her mother's artistry — finds its way into her musical thinking. From modifying vintage fashion to composing pieces like Uniforms, Shelley describes how fabric, memory, and creativity are all tightly interwoven.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on social media @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean Hamilton shares how improvisation became central to his artistic voice — and why his compositions now live at the intersection of the fixed and the fluid. In this excerpt, he explains how environmental and emotional factors shape every performance, why he's moved away from traditional notation, and how indeterminacy opens new dimensions of expression and possibility.micro/Maker episodes release every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday!Listen to music/Maker with Tyler Kline wherever you get podcasts, or at musicmakerpodcast.com.Support Loose Leaf Transmissions on Patreon at patreon.com/LooseLeafTransmissions.Follow us on Instagram and Facebook @LooseLeafTransmissions.micro/Maker is a production of Loose Leaf Transmissions: Made for All Ears. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.