Interview: New York Multi-Instrumentalist Rob Benny Discusses His Debut EP "From the Rooftop"
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“...I’d want listeners to be encouraged to stay hopeful and weather the storm, even through the darkest most difficult of times. To appreciate life, family, loved ones, and close friends. To never take anything or anyone for granted.”
Congratulations on the completion and release of your debut EP "From the Rooftop"; tell us about your creative process for the development of the 3 songs and how long it took to complete.
Thank you very much! The creative process varies, depending on each individual song. Some chord arrangements come together very quickly; in this case, lyrical melodies and any additional lead phrasing would be added afterwards. In other instances, the lyrics would come to my head first. Then, a melodic line would be written, followed by the underlying chord and overall musical structure. “From the Rooftop” took me about a week to complete.
The songs themselves have actually been written a while back with much different arrangements and styles. So, rewriting and reworking them with new chord structures, rewritten lyrics, and revamped tempos was not much of a challenge. My recording process, itself is very streamlined; Pianos first, Guitars next, followed by Lead Vocals, with backing vocals being the last. Finally, I edit the music myself in the DAW without the overuse of unnecessary effects to take away from the raw sincerity of the recordings. A very subtle mastering effect simply to “gloss it over” capped it all off.
What does the EP's title, "From the Rooftop" represent?
“From the Rooftop”, to me, represents isolation. Whether literally or figuratively looking from the perspective of standing, alone, on a rooftop as you look outward and downward at the rest of the world passing by, the album title reflects that very chilling feeling of isolation - a deeper kind of isolation that goes beyond mere social introversion - one can experience.
This especially strikes a nerve in today's climate - most highly prominent in the Greater New York City metropolitan area - where everyone to some extent has been hit between the eyes by the Covid-19 outbreak.
Describe what it is like to be a Synesthete and when did you discover that you had this sensory phenomenon?
I've known that I had the condition of Synesthesia since I was a very young child - 4 years old, to be exact. Basically, as a Synesthete, you associate individual items, sounds, or pitches with a different color on the spectrum.
Each individual Synesthete has a slightly different perspective and way of associating colors with objects, notes, numbers, etc., so it's fascinating to learn of how others who are aware of their condition have used it in their own Art, Music, Crafts, Writing, Teaching, among a wide variety of additional ways to make use of this relatively rare condition.
For myself, I associate each individual note with a different color, while I perceive major and minor tonality of that same note with a different shade or texture of said color. For example, I perceive the note "C" as the color red; a C Major chord would be perceived in a bright red setting, while a C Minor chord would be perceived in a dark, crimson red manner. The different combinations of chords within different songs I create allow me to visualize an artistic landscape in my head, depicting a particularly different visual plot and artistic setting for each song.
What instruments do you play and are you self-taught? Also, are there any new instruments that you are planning to learn?
I play Guitars, Piano, Bass Guitar, Percussion, and sing. I’m mostly self-taught on each instrument, although I have taken formal lessons and Classical training. I have also played Saxophone for three years as a child in elementary school band, but never carried it further enough to consider myself a developed or skilled player in that regard. Nevertheless, with Guitar, Piano, and Vocals, I studied from advanced instructors and tutors on each instrument to correct bad habits, develop new skills, learn new approaches and exercises to maintain stamina, learn what pitfalls to avoid falling into (especially being a Baritone vocalist with a distinct range that can't go beyond a certain register), and refine techniques that I already picked up through my own study, practice, and discipline.
When someone listens to the "From the Rooftop" EP for the first time, what do you want them to take away from the experience?
I'd want listeners to be encouraged to stay hopeful and weather the storm, even through the darkest most difficult of times. To appreciate life, family, loved ones, and close friends. To never take anything or anyone for granted. Be it indirectly or directly caused by such a devastating ripple effect, internal suffering through experiencing or observing loss or pain is something that anyone of any age can easily relate to.
Looking out at the rest of the world knowing that there's only so much you can do under a pandemic can be demoralizing and desensitizing. Hopefully, my music can allow others to continue to seek the silver lining under the black clouds while never losing hope within or the will to carry on right until the very end.
Read our in-depth review of the “From the Rooftop” EP - HERE
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