RPM Challenge Gets An Extra Day

It seems that an entire year has almost elapsed since the RPM challenge 2007, when musicians around the world took upon themselves the mighty task of writing and recording an album in 28 days. As February is impending once more, the challenge has now been reissued with the marginally less daunting timeframe of 29 days…
(from Music Technology)

Using Deadlines To Inspire Creativity

There is an oft-quoted belief that creativity cannot be rushed, that one must wait for inspiration to strike. In reality, the reverse is true – setting a deadline is probably the single most productive thing any musician can do. However, it is also something that is strangely difficult to do – furthermore, once one actually manages the heroic task of setting a deadline, it tends to be very difficult to actually adhere to. The RPM challenge provides that extra little social push towards doing something that any of us could do during any month of the year, but almost certainly never actually get around to.

It doesn’t matter if the album is any good; that’s not the point. The basic truth is that after creating it, you are guaranteed to have learned something about your abilities and limitations. It’s an exercise in making mistakes as much as making music, and by forcing yourself to create, some musical gems may well turn up that would not have existed otherwise. Check out the RPM site for more details…