2018 The We Love Music Conference : My Experience

Hi Everyone. It has been a while since I've checked in. Been blessed to have a busy summer thus far and also promoting and pushing my single "Saturday Night" and also working on a couple albums that I can't wait to share with you guys. But in short I wanted to talk about my experience

at the "We Love Music" Conference which was a conference that was hosted by Songwriting legend and grammy award winner, Rico Love. For those of you that might not know Rico Love, He has written songs for Beyonce, Trey Songz, Mary J. Blige, the list goes on. I was able to meet Rico and listen to him speak on a lot of things that had me inspired. Funny that I'm almost into my 5th year in college and I learned a lot more in two days compared to five years of college. No shade to my Berklee Online family. Because some things that we learned at the conference as far as "songwriting" which was a lesson given to us by Rico Love himself was really a spin off of what my professor, "Caroline Harvey" was teaching me. Which made that subject a lot fun for me during the conference. But it taught me that learning in a classroom does not beat hands on experience from industry professionals sometimes. The things that I learned was basically something I needed moving forward in the upcoming weeks. I got to chat with my favorite producer, Bryan Michael Cox, Marcella who is one my favorite engineers out of Miami, FL. She had a complete conversation with me about mixing my songs and that advice has gotten me opportunities to mix a couple of albums in the future. For the people that attended, I got to meet a lot of people that sing, rap, A&Rs, Manage other artists and presidents of companies. Its a lot to cover but, I want to thank Rico Love for putting on a wonderful conference. I love how this conference wasn't about, "Getting put on" or "How can I get my music heard." Even though it was topics on that but it was more of a networking, building relationships and learning about the being the best in the competitive industry event which was really good for me to realize. This was my first year attending and I can't wait to go next year. The atmosphere was amazing. I've been to a lot of conferences and sometimes the air in the room is kind of "arrogant" or people feel like they're too good to be around you or you gotta be around their crew in order to have a conversation with them. That I will talk about later, but as far as Rico's Conference, I didn't get that vibe at all. I was blessed to meet people from all over the world. As far as networking, this was the best networking I've had honestly since being at Michael Jordan's Basketball camp in high school. Even though it was a basketball camp, I had the opportunity to network with a billionaire and also network with celebrities that attended the camp that allowed me to join their circle in the industry as far as going to networking events, industry parties etc. The networking was unlimited. I'm back home now planning my next album and I have a lot of people to get advice from and also people that I can potentially collaborate with in the future. So I just want to say Thanks to Rico again for everything dude! But I will tackle more of my experience later on, but I will look into going to this conference next year. If you're really serious about your music career like I am. People thought I was crazy to take a trip twice to Baltimore from New Jersey and back just to go back to Baltimore the next day. Yes I didn't sleep for 42 hours out of a 48 hour (2 day) span. Because I cared so much about my career that I was willing to do anything to network and learn more about what it takes to be the best in this industry. To be the best, you have to learn from the best. Blessed to say I was around like minded individuals including individuals that are totally better than me that told me, "We can work on whatever you're putting out soon, you have my number, don't hesitate to call me." And soon as you know it, that will turn into us being family and friends within just two days of meeting each other, yet these people can really sing, really manage your career and can really produce the hell out of a record. In conclusion, I can't wait till next year's conference. This will keep me motivated while working on the next couple of albums. Thank you again Rico.

Deryck R.