This being my first ever blog post I just want to take this time and talk about about my experience thus far and how my brain is trying to find the great link between software development and music. It’s week two at Flatiron bootcamp studying full stack software development. Everyday is a like a monsoon storm of information and you have a bucket trying to catch as much water as you can. The connection I’m trying to figure out and make, is to relate components of development with my foundation of music to make it easier to understand. For now I would like to break these similarities down into three groups, classes, meticulousness, and obedience.
-Classes -
My background is not in development but in Music. I studied classical guitar and classical theory, queue the trumpets, and the best way I can describe the relationship of software development and classical theory Is the use of functions and variations of a single class. In Music they say repetition is your best friend but in development we want to stay away from repetition. I see repetition of music, or the motif, as the foundation in development, the class being extended or used as the superclass and using the properties for the basis of all other class. So I’m starting to see an underlying theme that application is written from. We have a hook of a song or a foundation for an app and everything is built around that.
-Meticulousness -
Another similarity of music to development is the need to be meticulous. One of the main focuses of my studies was studying and analyzing classical music. Most days I would perform what’s called a harmonic analysis on classical compositions. That means going through every measure of a composition and writing every chord and how it is related to the overall key of the song. This not only takes a keen eye but a strong sense of understanding of theory. Much like code analysis and coding an application you are the composer of your own application. When reading others works you have to understand the functionality of a class or how that class is working through its methods.
-Obedience -
Practice, practice, practice. I cannot stress enough how much time you have to dedicate to learning how to play a classical composition. The only way to get better and make it feel easier is to practice. I remember walking through the halls in college and some of the music heads would ask why Im not in a practice room. Much like learning a new piece we have to dedicate time to learning a new coding language. The more time dedicated the easier it gets to form a better understanding on overall concepts.
In conclusion development is not easier, same as learning a Bach lute suite. It’s a learned behavior that takes time to get and to understand core concepts. But once you make the connections it makes understanding a little easier. I definitely think studying classical music and studying development gets funneled down to one core concept, we have to practice, practice, practice.