Inspiring Grads: Humanities 2

Bubele Booi

Job history

2016 - Present Record Producer & Songwriter Noble (Los Angeles)

2013 Assistant Sound Designer Sterling Sound (Johannesburg)

Academic history

2018-2022 MMus in Music Technology NYU Steinhardt

2014-2017 BMus in Music Technology University of Cape Town

Describe your job – what do you do?

I’m a record producer and songwriter. Every day we get into the studio and write and record songs with artists. Additionally, we occasionally get the chance to do music for screen (i.e. documentaries and short films). My favourite part of writing music is that moment when the song seems to materialise out of nowhere and you know it’s special and everyone starts dancing around the room.

What advice would you give to music technology graduates starting out?

Don’t wait to start your career until you’ve graduated. Start now. It’s likely that no one will ask you for proof of qualification, but they’ll always ask for proof of competence. So use the edge that education gives you to enhance your competence beyond that of your contemporaries in order to gain more career leverage. Once in the industry, forget any notion of ‘rules’. You can craft your own path – there’s no one way to do it and no one way is the same.

How have your degrees helped you to get where you are?

My degrees helped prepare me for the fact that nothing is handed to you easily in the creative job market and it’s all about synthesising disparate elements to formulate something new – much like research.

What has been a highlight of your career so far?

I think the highs and lows are incredibly big in the entertainment industry so I try not to put too much focus on them as a source of happiness. My biggest highlight is getting to do what I love and getting to do it from a studio with windows (a rarity).

How did the pandemic affect your career?

It killed a few deals that were in the making but opened opportunities that would otherwise not have existed. It forced a lot of introspection and reassessment on the topic of “what actually matters?”. The remote nature of COVID-19 meant that deals could happen from anywhere in the world, which was helpful to my production team. The pandemic also slowed the world down just enough for us to sneak into Los Angeles and get situated before the massive machine of the music industry took off once again.

What are you planning to learn in the near future?

I think it’s important to never stop learning. If I go a week without learning something new, oftentimes that is my least inspired week. Inspiration is synonymous with discovery and education to me.

BOOK recommendations

“No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention” by Erin Meyer and Reed Hastings

I found it really great for understanding some things about building teams with high density talent and optimal creative output.

“Name of the wind” – Patrick Rothfuss

Possibly one of the greatest novels ever written and the main character is a musician, which makes it resonate a little more with me personally.