We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ryan Cleaver a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Ryan thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Did you always know you wanted to pursue a creative or artistic career? When did you first know?

Growing up, I always knew I didn’t want to work an office job. Spending time at my mother’s job made that perfectly clear to me, I needed something more fullfilling and meaningful to me. Music had been a passion for me since birth, ingrained in me from the entire family of musicians that I was blessed to be born into. The combination of my disdain for the office environment, as well as my love for the world of music led me directly toward the path of a professional career in music. By the time I was in High School I was fully immersed in the pursuit of it. I had been producing music fairly consistently since 2015, and I used my talents to assist some of my closest friends in the creation of their music. Being able to help create a meaningful piece of art that truly impacted them, as well as the listeners, made me realize how special producing music really is. The process of making music with someone inevitably spawns moments of wonder and joy, and often sparks the grandest creativity. Being able to do that as a career was clearly the meaningful and fulfilling experience I had been searching for. Nearly 10 years later I continue to work closely with my friend that I started out with, as well as many other artists spanning a wide range of genres.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Ryan Cleaver, known professionally as 1600TRIPP$, and I am a music producer and recording/mixing engineer. I began my career producing hip-hop beats and EDM on Ableton, and have always had a passion and drive for music creation. After I graduated highschool I left my home town to go learn as much as I possibly could about producing, recording, and mixing/mastering music. My main talents in the areas of music production/composition include creating instrumentals and backing tracks for a variety of genres, writing parts for songs/instruments, writing lyrics, creating formal arrangements, and choosing the sonic arrangement for songs/projects. I am also an avid recording/mixing engineer, and have been able to deliver high quality products for artists in many genres including rap, R n B, EDM, rock, soul, folk, indie, and experimental. I recently recorded, mixed, mastered, and produced every song on a rap EP, making it my first project over 5 songs that I made with no outsourced services. One of the main things that makes me unique is my ability to not only help creatively design songs/albums, but to be able to then bring those things to life through recording and mixing.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

The connection I get to make with the artist. There have been moments in the studio that have been describable as nothing short of magic in my eyes that I have not experienced in many other facets of my life. Hearing an idea for a song slowly but surely come to life as you work is an incredibly endearing feeling that I have trouble putting into words. I have gotten chills, cryed, laughed, and felt just about every possible emotion you can feel while working on music with people, and I get to share those things with the world. I realized recently that although a career in music is a ton of work, it’s worth it to get even one chance to experience that sense of amazement from what I’ve helped create.

Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

Find a teacher/mentor who you can comfortably sit with and have them critique your work, and show you possible solutions. This could be a trained professional who you are paying, or just someone you really look up to in the industry who is willing to take some time to assist you. It took me years to figure out certain musical concepts on my own, and by the time I got to college I realized how much more quickly I could have picked those things up had I had the proper guidance. Music is not something that one person discovered and created, it has been developed carefully by billions of people over thousands of years, and we shouldn’t expect ourselves to be able to figure it out all on our own. Sometimes a small misstep or calculation that we can’t quite see can hold us back from advancing. A mentor has a birds eye view that can make our seemingly monumentous issues become clear and manageable.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/1600tripps/

Image Credits

Mohammed Abdo, Melissa Callejas, Bryce Owens, James White