Today we’d like to introduce you to David Smith.
Hi David, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’ve been interested in music for as long as I’ve been alive. When I was about 3 or 4 years old, I started playing the drums. I have an older brother that also plays drums and we would often fight over who gets to play. So my mom encouraged me to learn how to play the piano so my brother and I could play together. My mom taught me the little knowledge she knew about the piano and that was enough foundation to let my creativity go crazy. I started creating a lot of my own songs. Growing up in the black church, it was a dream of mine to someday play the organ. My church had a program during the Sunday morning service called “Children’s church” where we would all go downstairs in the middle of service to sing songs and learn about God. I started playing regularly down there. I would also play for our children’s choir that would sing during the main service. The very first time I got to play during a service was for our youth night (4th Sunday). And I had just recently got my first real keyboard. My dad had no idea what I was capable of at the time so he was a little worried at first. But then when he heard me play, he was amazed that I was able to play along with the songs people were singing.
By the time I was about 9 years old, I had gone through a couple of different piano teachers but I wasn’t very fond of them. They couldn’t teach me the type of music I wanted to learn so I was very bored. Until we heard about Mr. William Duncan. Someone that attended my church at the time recommended him to my mom as someone that could teach me how to play the organ and piano. He came as a guest organist one Sunday night for our night service and the rest was history. My mom soon after signed me up for lessons at Walker West Music Academy and I took lessons there from 9 all the way to 17. He gave me the foundation that I have for playing the organ that will stick with me for the rest of my life.
At some point in 2014-2015, I started getting into producing music. I was mostly just messing around with Garageband trying to make beats. I didn’t become at least decent with it until around 2018, so that’s when I like to say I started producing music. There are a couple of different things I would make: drumless play-along tracks, trap beats, live arrangements (music programming), orchestral arrangements, and I even tried making a country song at some point. Needless to say, I like to try to do a little bit of everything. Out of all these things, the two that I enjoy doing the most (and also got the most opportunities and connections from) are the drumless tracks and live arrangements. I started making drumless tracks to practice to since I saw a lot of drummers making covers to different tracks on youtube. I also was inspired to do live arrangements of songs from watching other people make them on youtube (Ex: Strange Arrange). Now, as I’ve grown and made a lot of connections through creating different drum challenges on social media and from making live arrangements to songs, I’ve had the opportunity to inspire musicians all across the world. I recently partnered with shedtracks.com (The leading drumless tracks distributor) to create tracks for drummers to play along to. In November 2020, I released a short free track called “Sonic” and it blew up! Drummers from countries I had never even heard of were making covers to the track I created. Every now and then, I still see people making covers to that same track! In January 2021, I released a 6-pack of tracks with Shedtracks titled “The Gospel Experience” and a lot of people bought the pack and made covers to the tracks that were included in it. Many very famous drummers have covered my tracks from Shedtracks and they are showcased on the Shedtracks Instagram page. As for live arrangements, I started making them in 2017 and now I have had the opportunity to make them for Grammy-award-winning artists such as SZA and Jazmine Sullivan. Live arrangements are what you hear when you go to an artist’s concert and they’re performing with a live band.
Recently, I’ve started trying to perform the national anthem at sports events. In November 2021, I had the opportunity to perform the National Anthem alongside Jovonta Patton (5x #1 Billboard Charting Artist) at Target Center for two major high school basketball games, one of them including Kanye West’s prep school. With that being said, I got to perform in front of Kanye which not a lot of people get the opportunity to do. Also in February this year, I performed the National Anthem (solo this time) at a University of Minnesota basketball game on my synthesizer.
Lastly, my music production career. Since 2019, I’ve run a small music studio out of my apartment and I have been blessed to work with a couple of different artists to release music. I usually prefer to make everything in the studio with the artists that I work with, but I don’t mind sending out beats that I have created. With all that said, that pretty much sums up my story to how I got to where I am today. It has taken a long time to get here, but I wouldn’t change the path at all.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
I guess the biggest challenge has probably been myself. I often feel like I’m not good enough and that weighs me down sometimes. When those moments come up, I like to remind myself of how far I’ve come and how amazed 9-year-old me would be with all the things I’ve accomplished now.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am a music producer/programmer, aspiring film scorer, audio engineer, but at the base of it all, I’m simply a musician. I specialize in producing Gospel, RnB, any rap beats (besides drill, I haven’t really attempted that yet), and also play-along tracks for drummers which is almost a genre of its own. I’m well known for playing keys/organ and making great drumless tracks for drummers to practice and make covers to. This is also what I’m most proud of. My drumless tracks are literally just me putting all my crazy ideas into one track. There are no limits to what I can do when I make them. With other genres, there tends to be limits with what you can do. I don’t like having limits, I like to push the boundaries and be free. Making tracks for drummers to play to really allows me to be my full creative self with no strings attached. I’m also known for making live arrangements (Music Programming) for artists. Some artists I’ve had the opportunity to do work for are SZA, Jazmine Sullivan, Tiana Major9, Savannah Re, Maya Marchelle, Asheley Turner, and 1111. I’ll also create short live arrangements for fun and post them to Instagram, then other musicians will often ask for the track so they can cover my live arrangements. I’m also known for being a great music producer. Some artists I’ve produced songs for include Jovonta Patton, Lil Byron, Biddl3, 7AE, Courtland Pickens & Known, Toné LaDon, Katira, Leita, Jakob Shaninghouse, and madamebluu.
I feel like what sets me apart from other producers is that I try not to sound like anyone else with my style. I know people say that all the time, but I feel like my sound is truly like no one else in my area. There are times that I do try to make beats similar to how a lot of other producers make them in order to fit the current wave of what artists are looking for, but whenever I’m doing something custom for an artist, I like to add my own flavor to it.
Have you learned any interesting or important lessons due to the Covid-19 Crisis?
An important lesson I learned is to always know more than just your instrument. Music producing is something every musician should get into. There is always someone out there that wants to make a great song that is willing to pay you for what you’re worth. Plus, companies that have TV shows are always looking for music to put on their shows. That’s something I’m trying to get into now but haven’t made a big push yet.
Contact Info:
- Email: davidmsmith0308@gmail.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dsmith.p/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCobhOpQNUGDKBOI0x4BocQw
- SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/dmsmithproductions
- Other: https://www.beatstars.com/dsmith_p
Image Credits
Ethan Yeshaya
Jeff Wheeler
Nagashia Jackson
Chinemerem Anene
Daniel Musherure
Wesley Dean
