A friend of mine suggested that I try uploading music with just a static image. He then linked me to an example he listens to while he works, and it was a three hour AI guitar thing. He doesn't care if the music is made by a human, but that is what musicians are competing with now.

I had to return the cello that I was borrowing, so I'm going to have to look for a new one. I'm interested in a 6 string cello, tuned BEADGC probably. Carbon fiber seems like it would be interesting. Anyone have thoughts?

Fun (?) Fact! The "no tax on tips" thing in the US doesn't actually apply to self-employed musicians. We still have to report all our tips as income and pay tax on them because we have no employer to report the tips to that creates the deduction.

Did you know the maximum fine for being caught moving an erhu (that was accidentally separated from its CITES certificate) across an international border is US$400,000? I'm going to need a new erhu soon.

Thanks everyone for streaming my Chrono Trigger album over the past year! It's hard to believe that it's already been a year since I uploaded it. I'm still really proud of how it turned out, and of two weeks ago the whole album is also monetized on Spotify!

new music out today: www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRrq... I hope it makes you smile and calm for a few moments @sheaviolin.bsky.social @nicomendozamusic.bsky.social @marimbamatt913.bsky.social

I hope everyone enjoys MAG this year! I'm not able to make it, but I'm going to try to get there next year or the year after! Love seeing pictures of friends hanging out in person 😄

New glasses today! And I'm set up in my temporary studio where I recorded video yesterday for a Clair Obscur collaboration that will be published on Friday! The video is available early for patrons, thanks so much for your support!

I wrote and recorded an original song, and it's really pretty.

Wow! I didn't expect to reach 300k monthly listeners and DEFINITELY didn't expect 400k. Thanks to everyone who streamed my spooky beats on Halloween!

I was worried I was going to hit 999 and get damage-capped.

This October over 150k new people heard my music for the first time when my original collaboration was added to a huge Halloween playlist. The number will probably go up for the *actual* Halloween night parties, but I'm feeling incredibly thankful for all of the collaborations that led up to this.

Someone told me that my playing made them feel the way they felt walking on singing sands in Canada today at my gig.

Even more things that happened today! A collaboration on an Clair Obscur track "Lost Voice" premiered on her channel earlier. www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDwO...

@insaneintherainmusic.com invited me to play erhu on one of the tracks for his Battle Suit Aces soundtrack, and I think it turned out great! open.spotify.com/track/6pnfbC...

So... I just opened a box of magic the gathering cards that I had saved for 25 years while cleaning up and selling things in my house. I looked up the values of a few of them... holy crap. Anyone know the best way to sell these things now? Is it worth getting some of these professionally graded?

Just crossed 100k monthly listeners for the first time on my spotify artist profile!

I had some incredible luck this week when a new original lo-fi collaboration for halloween got picked up by a huge halloween playlist. Relationships that I worked on starting three years ago eventually led to that collaboration, and now thousands more people are hearing my work every day!

Someone in Japan is (or maybe two someones?) listening to my Chrono Trigger album three or four times a day for the last few weeks. None of the tracks have gotten 1k streams yet for the spotify royalty pool, but there's actually a chance if they keep it up. Thanks, whoever you are!

My track with @msevelynrivera.bsky.social on her "Hyrule Cafe 3" album is out today! I was so excited for the opportunity to work with her on this. She's such a fantastic musician and shares so many of my feelings about music. Check it out! open.spotify.com/track/2UN0Lj...

I made a really awesome Chrono Trigger album this year. Someone gave me a $300 tip to put it on Bandcamp because I said I had no reasonable expectation of being able to recoup that cost. When I order the mechanical licenses, would anyone be interested in a physical version too?

First day back at school for the kids and I recorded for 6 hours! Two and a half songs recorded on my way to unburying myself from summer backlog collaboration work. I have 6 or 7 to go and then I'll be able to add more collab work or do something for my channel again.

Someone recently stole my music and another artist's animation for their channel and 60k views on it. YT didn't notify me that my music was in the video. It's a pity that other people can earn 10x more with my music than I do. And that's just one that I found out about because someone told me.

New Clair Obscur video! Monoco is a sax feature that stands out as most different from the rest of the soundtrack. The incredible @joedifioremusic.bsky.social and @yusefkelliebrew.bsky.social played Sax and Drums respectively: www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXCF... #clairobscur #vgm

I'm back from vacation and I have even have a video coming soon again! Sorry for the (checks watch...) 85 day break from posting. 😅 At least I'll have a new video before losing YT monetization for not posting every 90 days!

Ik ben met mijn Nederlandse duolingo cursus eindelijk klaar! Het duurde slechts drie honderd vijftig dagen en ongeveer niveau "A2." Ik moet nu andere cursussen volgen of waarschijnlijk meer podcasts naartoe luisteren en filmpjes naartoe kijken. Ik voel me erg leuk over mijn nieuwe taalvaardigheid!

I haven't said anything yet this year for pride. The world feels a little more harsh this last year. The comments are worse. The looks on the street are worse. Since last year I even understood some Dutch hate speech shouted by a man in a thobe while walking on the streets of Amsterdam.

A first for me this week, I was scrolling Reddit to see if there was any news and I came across a thread on r/gamemusic asking for artist recommendations, and right there in the first comment was a recommendation to follow *ME* I've never seen someone talk about me in a thread I didn't start before

At my restaurant gig last night, someone that lives a couple towns away came again. I think she's been to at least five of our shows, and she brought some others from out of town this time. It's so nice to hear how much my music is felt and appreciated!

With all the *everything* happening in my country (usa) I'm starting to seriously look at what it would take to immigrate somewhere else. It looks like Canada has paused their self-employed immigrant program for musicians and artists until 2027, though. Anyone have ideas?

I am thankful to have so many gigs lately to help smooth out the next couple months, but it's been busy! 5 gigs in 8 days and three of them are "shows" and not just music for eating and drinking!

Last night my gig was mostly empty. We played to literally no one for about an hour. So we added some more vgm tunes to our set list. My guitarist really liked Galdin Quay, though he had never heard it before! We had 6 people come through later that really enjoyed the rest of the show!

I got to play a gig on a LAKE this week. And the next night was a retirement community gig. Usually, the retirement gigs rebook for the next year, but when I asked whether they wanted us back in a year, they looked at me like I was crazy and said "we need you back sooner than that!"

I found out from Pernelle yesterday that she talked to Lorien Testard at a Clair Obscur party at the end of May, and he has seen my covers of his songs on youtube and really likes my work!

Someone commented on one of my videos yesterday again that I had no soul in my work and that I was just doing it for the money. Just a quick calculation of hours invested and money earned equals about $0.10 cents per hour on yt. I don't think they quite understand how little music is worth today.

Milestone post! Thanks everyone so much for watching all the way to 3000 subscribers!

The Clair Obscur soundtrack is been a beautiful gift. Thank you for 2k views in only two days on "Une vie à t'aimer"! youtu.be/rz-pboZwWRE

The album had a great first day on streaming! Thanks everyone!

It's out today! Thank you so much to WLHR for collaborating with me on this project and to Curaga for helping with the logistics! This is my very first time publishing an album with a label and my very first physical video game music album! curaga.to/LoFiNierVol2

Tomorrow.... 10 incredible songs by WLHR & @sheaviolin.bsky.social City Ruins Peaceful Sleep Memories of Dust Birth of a Wish Amusement park A Beautiful Song Treasured Times Pascal Forest Kingdom Wretched Weaponry Pre order here to avoid missing out - curaga.to/LoFiNierVol2BS

There are so many BEAUTIFUL violin features in Une vie à t'aimer, and I had to learn them all. It's hard to pick my favorite parts of this song, but I put four and a half minutes of my favorites in my arrangement! Thanks @sandfallgames.bsky.social! #ClairObscurExpedition33

It's sooooo pretty! It feels a little surreal having it in my hands. @curagarecords.com

I got my order in the mail early! I'll post a picture tomorrow. It's so pretty!

My first physical VGM album is in the mail! AHHHHH! I'm so excited!!

I may or may not have started an arrangement of a biiiiiiiig song from Clair Obscur. But I have to cut it down by like 7 minutes in order to have a hope of finishing it sometime next month 😆

My partner is burned out at work and needs to take a couple months of FMLA unpaid starting next month. If anyone needs some remote session recording (violin/viola/erhu/guitar), arrangement, transcription, or composition help, I'm looking for more work! (I also have a patreon and kofi!)

Most of my spotify followers are totally not bots. The line's movement is definitely not suspicious at all. p.s. anyone know how to get rid of bot followers?

What do you think, chat? Is my cover of "Alicia" soul-less and robotic?

"Alicia" from Clair Obscure is the first song you get to experience from the wonderful soundtrack on the title screen. Before I even started playing the game, I had to sit and listen to appreciate its beauty. #clairobscure #clairobscurexpedition33 #alicia

Thanks for 6500 views on YouTube already!