Band Performance Fundraiser

Back in December, a friend of my bandmate invited our band “Unrequited” to play at a fundraising event for homeless people at Mississippi Pizza on January 18th. We happily accepted and for the next few weeks, we squeezed in time to practice a set list of four songs for our performance. The set list consisted of a cover of Sparks by Coldplay and three other songs which were originals called “Someone Like You,” “Rearview Mirror,” and “Moonlight.” It was certainly a challenge to fit band meetings into our schedules with sports in full swing and the end of the semester nearing, however, we were able to make it work.

In all honesty, we didn’t feel too confident on the day of the performance. Although we had scrapped together some band meetings, we still hadn’t perfected each of the four songs so we were bound to make mistakes. Feeling apprehensive, we fit in one last meeting just hours before the show in preperation for what we felt would be a doomed performance. We walked onto the stage both excited and anxious for how things would go.

Looking back on the performance now, I have not one bit of regret for how things went. In the end, everything ended up alright. The performance was far from perfect, yet even with all the mistakes we made, we kept going and we left the stage overwhelmingly happy. It wasn’t the relief from being done with the performance or anything like that, but just true satisfaction with the whole experience, mistakes and all.

As we sat back and watched the other bands, my friend told me how the other band’s guitarist was so much better than him. I agreed that the other guitarist’s skills were great, however I told him that “I wouldn’t take him over you any day because the most valuable thing to me isn’t guitar skills, but spending time with you guys.” And as the night progressed I found this cheesy reply to be true. After the performance our band went out to get ice cream then we spent the rest of the night laughing and playing games. So even though the weeks of effort of fitting in band meetings and practicing didn’t amount to a perfect performance, I went to sleep that night happy that I was able to share this whole journey with my band.

Open Mic Night

My performance of “One Sided” in front of the school influenced my decision to go to open mic night on December 13, 2024. Similar to my school performance I would be playing with my guitarist friend, Masato and we decided to perform two originals that I wrote called “Merry Christmas” and “Nothing Ever Feels The Same.” However, this time my friend and I had a week to prepare rather than a day.

I remember feeling really defeated after taking an extremely difficult biology test on the day of open mic night. I felt mentally exhausted and depressed, but I still wanted to follow through with performing with my friend that night. We practiced a bit in the school recording studio that I have become so familiar with, and then went to get some dinner before the perforamce. I will never forget that drive to Shake Shack.

Joined by our friend Winslow in the car we pull out of the parking lot at school. Suddenly I hear a few familar chords, Masato is playing a raw recording of “Nothing Ever Feels The Same” that I had sent him. As we drove to get food, the three of us are singing along to my song that is blasting on the car’s radio. That moment was so special to me. I got chills from just everything in that moment—hearing my song in the car, singing along to it, and spending that time with my friends. That moment erased all the frustration I was carrying from the biology test. I felt pure happiness and excited for the performance.

Fast forward to the show, similar to most of my performances, I don’t really remember too much from the actual performance just about how I felt after. And if I am being honest, I felt a little unsatisfied with my performance. I thought that the performance for “Merry Christmas” was great, however for “Nothing Ever Feels The Same” I knew that I could have played and sung better. It’s not that I played bad or made an extremely horrible screw-up, but rather that I knew I could have given more in my performance my favorite original song.

However as I replay that night, I realize that a positive came out in performing at open mic night. In the past when I have screwed-up a song at a recital or concert, that moment of failure would ruin the song for me since it would reminds me of the bad memory. I remember screwing up my performance of “Someone You Loved” by Lewis Capaldi in one of my recitals when I was eight, and I still can’t shake the bad memory whenever I hear the song. But as I look back on my performance of “Nothing Ever Feels The Same” I find that I don’t feel the same negative emotions after my underwhelming performance. Instead, I think of the great happiness I felt in the moment that my friends and I blasted my song and sang along together in the car. I think that’s the beauty of performing. It's not about having a perfect performance but about making mistakes, continuing to play through them, and refusing to let a few blunders define an entire song.

School Performance of One Sided

Lately music has been at the forefront of my daily life and I am going to enjoy it because as my junior year in high school starts to kick into gear I know that soon music will have to take the back seat to my academics and tennis schedule. After participating in the PDX songwriting challenge and posting my daily songs on social media, more and more classmates were becoming aware of a different side of me and it has lead to new opportunities to share my music.

Early Wednesday morning, about 5 minutes before Spanish class started, one of my classmates came up to me and asked if I wanted to perform one of my songs in front of the school tomorrow. At first I was hesitant since I would have less than a day to prepare a song with an already tight schedule, however after some consideration, I agreed. I thought that this would be an opportunity to share a side of me my school community does not get to see. Ultimately, I decided on “One Sided” because I felt that it truly highlighted my vulnerability and healing through music.

The next morning I woke up anxious and excited. My friend, Masato was going to accompany me onthe guitar. Yesterday we squeezed in a a few run throughs of the song during lunch break and after school. I had performed songs in front of an audience before, however none of them had held as much meaning as “One Sided” did to me so I was feeling very exposed. I couldn’t stop thinking about what was to come. After biology class came to an end, I headed down to the chapel stage to set up with Masato. Everything after that is a blur in my memory until it was finally our time to go on. I took a breath and settled down. I went up to the mic, did a short introduction, took my guitar, and played. I don’t remember too much from the actual performance other than that I left the building satisfied with my decision to take the opportunity to perform. I remember that my performance wasn’t perfect, but all of my mistakes were overshadowed by the immense joy I felt from being able to express who I truly was. I had never received so many compliments in my life, I felt seen an supported. In the end, I was thrilled that people enjoyed the song, and proud of myself for finding the courage to take the chance to perform.

2024 Portland Annual Songwriting Challenge

September 2024

My English teacher introduced me to the Portland Annual Songwriting Challenge and I had a blast participating. The Songwriting Challenge took place from September 8 to September 14, and for seven days a new prompt would come out. The prompts came out in the following order: The title is the name of a car, Write a poem first, Recurring dream, Write a country song, Tempo or key change, Write a jingle or theme song, What you wanted to be when you grew up. It was the first time I had done anything like the challenge and being on a time crunch helped me embrace the fact that it is ok for things to not be perfect. In my experiences writng songs previously, I oftentimes struggled with dealing with a creative slump where I would run out of ideas for a song. Having the designated prompts and time restraints actually made it easier to come up with ideas and I found that I did not often get stuck writing lyrics. The prompts “The title is the name of a car” and “Write a poem first” were my favorite prompts and led to some of my favorite songs that I have written. The greatest struggle for me throughout the whole challenge was recording the songs because the lyrics and chords were so fresh. For the prompt “Tempo or key change,” the key change I created was so difficult to perform that I had to come back the day after the song was due to get a good recording of the song. Overall, I had a great time participating in the Portland Annual Songwriters challenge and have learned many things about my abilities as a songwriter. You can check out the different songs that I wrote based on the prompts on my Instagram!