Over the last 5 years, I have recorded over 1000 voice memos on my phone.
Stored on iCloud, they've traveled with me through college, through 3 or 4 phones, through my first relationship, through my parents' divorce—through everything. They are all recordings of music, whether it be my own playing or me and my friends playing, and they hold a very special place in my heart.
Some are short (~15 seconds) whereas some are quite long (over an hour), but all provide insight into not only my personal musical development over the years but also how my creativity and inspiration have changed and adapted to the unique situations I have found myself in over the last few years.
I was going through them yesterday evening, as I am trying to create a comprehensive catalog on this website of all the songs I've written over the years. I realized while poking deeper and deeper into it, into the recordings of 2023, 2022, even 2021, that the way I write music and the kind of songs I write has changed dramatically since I began recording music.
Pure and free
An early recording I stumbled upon was a song called "I Think I Love You," first recorded in May of 2022. In the demo, my voice sounded confident and youthful (of course), but also the chord progression I used was quite interesting.
I'm not a technical musician by any means, but the song goes through many major 7 chords, slash chords, and complex resolutions. Compared to the music I make these days, it leans far more on these complicated chords. As for why and where this shift has originated from, I have my own own theories, though of course the exact cocktails of inspiration and context which resulted in these demos are impossible to estimate.
Instrument and influences
During this time, much of the music I was writing was on piano using chords I learned from artists such as Laura Nyro, Todd Rundgren, and Carole King. These artists use lots of major 7 chords and dramatic slash chords. With this context, the overrepresentation of piano demos in 2021 and 2022 makes more sense, though it is important to note I still was recording many guitar demos.
These days, I listen to artists like Neil Young and Bob Dylan, who focus far more heavily on simple, folky guitar chords and memorable lyrics. The music I write nowadays is almost exclusively on guitar and focuses moreso on writing than complicated chord progressions.
Still, there are threads that unite the two styles: the influence of the Beatles, an appreciation for a warm, homemade sound, among others. Additionally, in all the demos which have a guitar present, the vast majority use acoustic guitars; this is due to the fact that voice memos capture acoustic guitar (both steel and nylon) far better than an electric, and until recently I never had equipment which could record electric guitar.
Quality versus quantity
In 2021 and 2022, I was in the early semester of college. The novelty of college and unprecedented level of free time (compared to later semesters) resulted in an early burst of songwriting. Most of my recordings were covers, but when an original did appear, it was clear that I felt confident about it. These early originals often lack focus, but are also full of ideas.
As college became more demanding, along with the struggles of friendship, dating, etc., I seemed to record less. There are recordings I am still going through, but my output didn't recover until 2025. In 2025, there was a bonafide explosion of original music.
You can hardly find covers post 2024, instead replaced by reams of original songs. Some days would have 2, 3, sometimes even 4 songs recorded with lyrics. I was increasing my output, at the cost of memorability.
Songwriting became my obsession, and I fully committed myself to this. This has made me far more comfortable as a songwriter, but undoubtably I create a lot more unmemorable music than I used to. This is okay; the good music I am writing makes this all worth it, and I learned more about music in 2025 than any other year of my life.
Focused sessions
I have been recording sessions with my friends since around 2022. During the early years, the recordings were long, comprehensive, and unfocused; we would sometimes cover songs, dash into a 12-bar blues ditty, and then go back to practicing an original.
As we gradually have been taking music more seriously, the demos are getting more focused. Some demos only record the a single section's practice; others the specific harmonies for a chorus; others still a single cover of a song. It shows our relationship with music has changed; it is no longer just a diversion, but something we genuinely want to be great at.
This heightened bar for practice has led to more performances at parties and family events, and will hopefully lead to a public performance at a bar or
Conclusion
Even as I write this, I'm going through songs I've written recently: revising them, reviewing them, and getting them critiqued by friends and family. My passion for the art has only increased but it isn't the same hobby it used to be.
Ultimately, I play music for fun. That's the main goal. But in the process of pushing myself to see what I can make, I have irrecoverably changed my relationship with the art to the point where it is more a part of me than perhaps I ever thought it would be. Some of the magic has been lost, replaced the illumination of hard earned wisdom.
It's bittersweet when the once divine force of music becomes a tangible, practical organism; but what is lost of its sanctity is gained as greater understanding, not just of music but of art and the world as a whole. In my humble estimation, I'd say the result has been more than worth it.