You may have seen elsewhere that Darren Hayman is embarking on a process driven creative project in January 2011. I am a fan of process driven work and am intrigued to see what Darren produces throughout the month, but I must confess that it comes at a time when I myself am re-evaluating my online presence and the importance of certain parts of the creative/learning process. Mainly it is around the value of publishing, performance, audience and the resultant conversations. I’m thinking that there is too much production, too many babbling dialogues and not enough space for thought or listening.

When technologies have made it is so easy to make and share does this not flag up our collective responsibility as publishers? Just because we can, doesn’t necessarily mean we should.

Dare to disengage.

Having said that of course, if anyone is capable of making a month long ‘public’ process project enormously interesting it is folk-hero Darren Hayman. Over to him:

I have decided to write, record and release a song on everyday during January 2011. Every song will be released as a high quality download and will be be completely free for a limited period of time.
 
It’s an experiment to see what will happen to my creativity. Being a musician is essentially an easy job and even though I consider I work hard I wanted to see what would occur when I imposed a strict discipline on my songwriting.
 
I’m not expecting every song to be good or successful but I am expecting the imposed time restrictions to lead me somewhere unlikely and exciting. I have decided to release the songs for free because I also didn’t want any commercial considerations to spoil the party.
 
I’m also tired of trying to work out how to make money from music. New fan funding sites have broken my heart with what they have persuaded musicians to sell. I thought I’d give it away and see what happens.
 
I’m expecting to have the time of my life. I get to do my favourite thing every day all day.
 
I’ve got a lot of my friends to help me out; The Wave Pictures, Terry Edwards, Allo Darlin, The Voluntary Butler Scheme and Ballboy as well as total strangers and musicians across the globe in virtual link ups. Trumpets, harps, saws, synthesizers, saxophones and Spanish Flamenco bands are all due to appear.
 
As well as writing the songs I will draw, write and film throughout the days. Pages of my journal will be scanned and appear at http://januarysongs.tumblr.com/ alongside mini movies and the actual songs.
 
On the 6th and the 30th Jan I plan to play live shows where I will play that day’s song. On 11th Jan I will broadcast that day’s song on Resonance FM.
 
It’s hard to know what this is a press release for. There is no conventional record to review although there is a project to write about and songs to play on the radio.