Trying out the Wordpress App for the iPhone. It seems to be working fine and finding it to be good compliment for blogging in the go.

⁹ A man’s heart plans his way,
But the LORD directs his steps.

Proverbs 16:9

It’s been about two weeks since I was notified that I am no longer enrolled at APU. Since then I enjoyed a two great 4 day weekends where I was able to be with friends and talk to them about my options.

During the fist 4 day weekend I spent some time away from home, I checked into the new London West Hollywood (formerly the Bel Age Hotel) on Wednesday night and just tried to have a quiet and peaceful birthday. Spent the next day lounging around the suite, but after a while I called up a few friends for a nice intimate dinner at the new Gordon Ramsay Restaurant.

The next day some friends wanted to go find me a good present, but one thing lead to another; we walked into a Tesla Showroom in Santa Monica. For those that are unfamiliar, Tesla is a boutique car maker of electric cars. At the time being they are only producing one model, a sport car, that does 0-60 in less than 4 seconds, which is incredible for an electric car. So one thing lead to another; I took a test drive. I was a great drive, there was no engine noise, because there is no engine. It was smooth, but I was a bit put off because it an automatic. There is no way I would be able to afford one, they run about $92,000, but Tesla is in the process in making a sedan that will introduced later this year and model that will be around $30,000 by 2010.

The rest of the weekend was spent with old friends for High school in Laguna and Newport. Overall, it was a nice weekend and was able to spend much needed time with people I hadn’t seen in a long time.

During this past weekend I was given the opportunity to fly out to Miami and do a few mixes for a studio. Seeing that I was going to be in Miami, I decided to check out FullSail, a vocational school that has just been granted University status. On July 3rd I get to Miami with some of my close friends at 6 am. I try get directions to FullSail and right there as I am getting out of the plane it hits me. FullSail is in Winter park, a suburb of Orlando, not Miami. I raced down to the ticket counter to ask if there is any flight leaving to Orlando soon. Luckily a plane was going to leave at 7.

I got there on time and took a campus tour. I have to mention this because it somewhat relevant; this is a school that has been pursuing me for the past 4 years. Even when I was at APU I would get emails from their Admission counselors and their staff. I had accepted their offers to start in January of 2006 but that never came to pass.

This is my first time seeing their facilities, which have been greatly expanded in the last few years. As I looked at the amount of quality equipment they have, sat in labs, and lectures, I could only see that these people are being trained to be technical and giving a type of formula to mix. While it might work in a few places, I strongly disagree with this type of teaching. I have always believed that musicality is the most important thing.

Either way, after a while I got to talking to the staff and they wanted to see what my skill are like. They fired up one of their mixing board and their Pro Tools HD with 7 HD racks and what not. I did my thing. I took me a while, mainly because I wasn’t quite happy how the acoustic guitar was recorded and had to “fix it in the mix” with tons of EQ and plug-ins. They gave me some criticism on some of the things I am sloppy on. They where mostly on fence on my mixing style, some of them really liked it, while some where not quite fond of it. To remind people what I am going to talk about there are three main styles of mixing, LA, New York and London. This does not mean that there are no other ways of mixing it just state they are the main styles. Quick back story, I started mixing in LA; move to New York managed and recorded a band; had a mentor, he was british. I basically have a type of fusion of all there styles with some added things here and there to really make it more of an art form and try to make it musical, instead of a cookie cutter type of process.

They where a bit impressed that I mixed in British EQ. and that I used a when plug-in that are intended for specific things for completely different tasks. After all was done they asked if I can start next month. I’m not too sure about this. Talking frankly with one of the professors there, he said that they really can’t tech me much. I would get an Associate degree in a year but then I would be in the same place I am now. Then he brought up a good point, they have a really Music Business degree. That has somewhat sparked my interest.

I’m still not sure what I’m going to do. I was talking to Austin, I might have come up with an epiphany, God hasn’t let me move from LA in 4 years, and even though I am no longer at APU, I doubt that has changed.

Also for those that have been asking for pictures of Hawaii, and summer, they might be up in a few days on flickr and a few on facebook. I am sorry that I have been a bit late on delivery but I have been a tad busy and you know, trying to do something with life.

I will endure…

en·dure (en-dr’, -dyr’)

To carry on through, despite hardships; undergo

To bear with tolerance

To suffer patiently without yielding.

In my last post I did not go into detail about school. I merely stated that I was down but not out. Well, now I’ve been kicked when I’m down. I’m going to be completely honest. Originally, I was going to talk about how I needed some time to devote to my career and that a sabbatical would do me some good, but why lie and cover things up that sooner or later will come out into the light. I would like to inform you that I have been dismissed for APU due to poor grades. I petitioned and pleaded my case to be reinstated. Even though it was a valid reason and made a compelling argument it was denied because I wasn’t able to complete 24 units in one school year.

My experiences at APU have been great. I enjoyed my myself very much so, and I would not trade the friendships and the people I met there. I did not dedicate myself to the school work. I took things for granted and now, I have to suffer the consequences . All things come to an end. I was there on borrowed time and my time is up.

I usually succeed at everything I do, so to fail has really impacted me in ways I did not know it would. Just as a precaution, I am once more on anti-depressants (low dose, two pills). It was bit hard seeing that I was in a middle of a recording project when I got the call. I had to leave my emotions and my personal life at the door.

I’m not sure what my next course of action will be; if I will be taking classes in the fall at a community college, to return at a later date. There is no possible way I could go to another university to finish my music degree seeing that APU Music programs is vastly different than other Music programs. I’ve been in talks with people with connections in Miami for work and FullSail has always caught my eye as a good vocational school. There is also Musician Institute, or what works for most people, just get out there and work.

It seems like I was a fool to think that a simple audio engineer could be a musician. I started at APU very minimal knowledge of music and musicality, most of what I did was a gut feeling. I now leave APU with a greater understanding of why music is powerful medium.

Thanks to those that knew and prayed for me.

Thanks to those that stopped in halls to have a small chat.