We recently connected with Dan Wessels and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Dan thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. The first dollar you earn is always exciting – it’s like the start of a new chapter and so we’d love to hear about the first time you sold or generated revenue from your creative work?

I earned my first dollar as a creative playing piano for ComedySportz Chicago. This was a fast-paced comedy show where teams of comedians would take suggestions from the audience and improvise scenes and sketches (think “Whose Line is it Anyway?”, but with a competitive edge). As the piano player, I provided all the live music for the show, and needed to be ready to play any style of music to evoke different film, theater, and music genres, based on whatever the audience shouted out.

During the week, I’d learn different compositional techniques in my college music composition courses, and on the weekends I got to put those techniques into practice to make up the scores for shows. It was a great first gig – I got experience performing, learned how to pace a show on the fly (gotta keep up the energy for a paying audience at a comedy show!), and most importantly for my career: how to interact professionally and collaborate with other performers onstage and off.

Dan, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m the Music Executive for the Netflix series “CoComelon Lane”, and I write and produce music for tv and film. I got my start creating music for improv comedy and musical theater, where I was the guy on the piano playing music live. I have seventeen years of experience creating music for stories, whether they’re told in song, on stage, or on film, and my music has been performed off-Broadway, the Kennedy Center, the Sydney Opera House, and on tour around the world. My specialty is collaborating with storytellers and adding value to their stories with original music, helping creatives attain their vision of how they want audiences to hear and feel their story.

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

The most rewarding aspect of being a creative to me is waking up every day with a sense of adventure. While I often have a general idea of the direction I’m going on any given day, I never quite know exactly what I’ll encounter, or what I’ll make that day. This used to bring me a lot of anxiety (will it be good? will it be bad? will people like it? will they hate it?), but I’ve learned to embrace that feeling as an energy source.

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

There are so many resources for learning the creative craft of your choice, but there’s one book I think is universally helpful to everyone, no matter their vocation: “Getting Things Done” by David Allen. It’s a guide to how our brains engage with work, and provides modern, real-world advice for how to plan and manage projects of any size, so that you can focus your attention on the task at hand, and not spend brainpower worrying about what you’re not doing at the moment (which for us creatives, happens a lot!). Whether your project is composing a symphony, producing a movie, or simply scheduling a oil change, this book has a practical step-by-step system for getting your thoughts and your life under control. I wish I had read this book in high school!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.danwessels.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danieltwessels/
• Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-wessels-54134356
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwJ749IEI705WcAXyTdlAdQ