Riley Alexander — Pittsburgh Recording Connection

Ayeee what\'s up world? My names Riley, I\'m 21, and I\'m a student at Audible Images Studios in Pittsburgh. I\'m a bartender right now at Tonic, however my plan is to become a producer, gain prouction experience, and eventually produce my own music. I currently play the guitar, ukulele, bass, mandolin, piano and I sing and beatbox nonstop. I enjoy long walks on the beach and watching the sunset over the ocean. And I like you if you laughed at that.

So I\'ve always been a huge fan of music of all types. I grew up listening to Frank Sinatra and lots and lots of country music (my mom was obsessed with country). As I grew older, I started listening to Hard Rock, bands such as Whitesnake, Winger, Foreigner, Styx, REO Speedwagon, and so on. When I went to Richland High School, most people were into more mainstream music like Katy Perry, Lil Wayne, Drake; just Pop, Hip-Hop music, so that\'s what I listened to. In eighth grade I was in my first musical: Les Miserables; I played the role of Enjorlas. That was when I realized I was an exceptional singer. From then on I was in every musical, every year at my high school, taking the lead in many. It wasn\'t until about tenth grade where I hit my scene phase. I would listen to Sleeping with Sirens, Ice Nine Kills, The Used; music like that. Eventually my playlist just became so diverse in genres that I just, in a way, became my own person. I played football and basketball, ran track in high school, then I would turn around and be in chorus, band and participate in all the musicals and plays. Obviously, criticism was harsh; high school kids are the worst; but I have always been, thankfully, strong enough to not let people and their opinions phase me.

Anyway, I\'ve been playing the guitar since I was 12 years old. I took one guitar lesson, and taught myself everything else I know to this day. When I was 14 I started messing around on piano. I would learn from youtube videos, or from my chorus teacher, but no lessons ever. I picked up a bass when I was 15 and got that down pretty easily because of my guitar experience. When I was 16 I got a ukulele, and to this day it is my favorite of all the instuments I play. It just has such a beautiful sound and its so easy to play. I got a mandolin when I was 20 and have been messing around with it ever since. I started beatboxing when I heard Pentatonix for the first time, probably age 18. They have inspired me so much. I would go on record saying the people who make up Pentatonix are by far the most inspirational, talented and influential people I\'ve ever come across in my entire life. Then when I went to college, my roommate showed me that he had been beatboxing for years, and he taught me most of what I know now. Its crazy, he always talks about how much better I am of a beatboxer, and it blows my mind because he\'s basically the one that taught me to beatbox in the first place. Him and Kevin Olusola. So as you can see, I am an artist; or atleast I try to be.

The reason I\'m studying musical production is because my goal, my dream in life is to become an artist. But I want to produce my own music. So if I can learn how mucis works, essentially, and get all the \"behind the scenes\", if you will, stuff down, then I will be better off to produce songs that I\'ve written. Songs that I\'ve written all vary in genres as well. I have a few raps, a few acoustic songs, some on the ukulele, one or two on the piano, and actually a few just beatboxing; you could call it EDM. Like I said, my music taste and style is quite diverse, and I can only hope that people will accept and enjoy the music I produce.

I\'ll be posting blogs weekly about my progress and hopefully I\'ll be updating my SoundCloud account as often as possible too. You can follow me on Instagram @vivianriles. If you\'d like to contact me, you can shoot me an email or a DM on Insta. I love meeting new people and I\'m constantly searching for new friends/people to collaborate with. So hit me up, for whatever.

Everyone has a dream. Whats yours?