Santa visits the Composer Quest studios to kick off this special Christmas episode. You’ll get to hear music from the past three quests. First, we travel out to rural Minnesota for KMS Elementary’s heartwarming performance of our collaborative Christmas musical Elfluenza. Ms. Hamann’s 1st-3rd graders also give us composers some advice. Next, I reveal which orchestral carol arrangements were chosen and performed by the Amadeus Chamber Symphony. Finally, we get to experience Mr. Wilson’s epic journey to find a fortune cookie in Taiwan for the fortune cookie songwriting quest.

Experimental songwriter Ben Simon (aka Felix Frost) caught my ear when I was judging the SpinTunes songwriting contest. His album Phineas Flux has a really shiny pop sound, but it almost never repeats the same phrase twice (in fancy composer language, that’s called “through-composed”). We talk about his elaborate plot-driven songs about cowboys and pirates in this episode of Composer Quest.

Music Psychologist Victoria Williamson is an expert on earworms – songs that stick in our heads. In this episode of Composer Quest, she reveals her findings on what makes a melody sticky. Vicky also answers my other pressing music psychology questions:

Why do babies have an innate sense of rhythm?

Why did Clive Wearing, a severe amnesiac, retain his ability to perform music?

When did humans start playing instruments?

Also in this episode, you’ll get to hear the sound of the world’s oldest instrument, and a never-before-released Charlie song. Enjoy!

Guitarist Dylan McFarling is obsessed with studying the work of other songwriters and composers, all the way back to Bach and his ingenious Musical Offering. In this episode of Composer Quest, Dylan shares his songwriting tips and explains how string quartets have inspired the way he orchestrates guitar and voice in his songs. Also in this episode, you’ll hear some beautiful, previously unrecorded songs that Dylan performed live in the Composer Quest studio.

Composer Richard Russell is a philosopher at heart. In his mission to become a better composer, he went back to school to study the big questions surrounding aesthetics, music, and beauty. He has also dug into both existential and practical composing topics in his podcast Creativity and Composition (one of my favorites). I’m pleased to bring you this Composer Quest podcast interview with Richard, in which we discuss everything from feminist musicology to Plato to getting performance royalties from ASCAP.

After nerding out about video game soundtracks for 20+ years, Michael Chadwick finally started composing his own, a few of which are for games that don’t actually exist. In this episode of Composer Quest, we chat about Michael’s score for his made-up RPG Ebben Flow, his chiptune album Average Town, and his soundtracks he composes for his everyday activities (eating a muffin, doing the dishes, etc.).

DJ, opera singer, and film composer Brooke deRosa is making a name for herself around LA. She recently sang operatic vocals on Ghostface Killah’s new album 12 Reasons to Die and performed on Jimmy Fallon with the group. In this episode of Composer Quest, Brooke gives us some practical advice she’s learned from scoring over 15 films and TV shows in the past five years. She also shares tips on composing for vocalists.

Have you ever drawn a fortune from a fortune cookie and thought, this would make an awesome song? No? Well neither had I, until just recently. So I decided to make that our challenge for the sixth Composer Quest quest. I’m hoping this one will inspire you to meet up with other songwriters and composers to get your creative gears really turning.

Your regular Composer Quest host has been replaced by a Demonic Overlord. Enjoy this talk with William Dodson and Wendell Jones, who compose Halloween music as the duo Sideshow Sound Theatre. Stay until the end to hear a brand new song by the Demonic Overlord himself, about one of his favorite pastimes.

Poet Brian Laidlaw has been teaching songwriting at McNally Smith College of Music, in which he challenges students with assignments like writing from the perspective of a murderer. In this episode of Composer Quest, Brian shares some of the best lyric-writing tips you’ll ever hear on the podcast. We also talk about his Internet Cat Video Festival performance, which aired on Animal Planet. As a special treat, Brian premieres a powerful new song called “One Tree Falling.”