In the classes of my third semester of EMP (Electronic Music Production & Performance), I was constantly being asked, What is my practice and how can you find your place in it? In fact, I had to write an essay answering this question and it was no piece of cake. I had just come out of a point in my life where I knew I would dedicate my life to music but, with a different musical interest from where I once began. I was very confused about what I wanted to do next, and the idea of even thinking about that essay was very stressful. In fewer words, I was clearly having a conflict. In the end, I couldn’t really answer the question the way I would’ve liked to because the time that I had wasn’t enough for me to know exactly what my practice was. I had a very hard time recognizing why it was even a conflict for me. So as I said in Chapter One, conflict comes from a strong disagreement, in this case, the disagreement was between the Santi that wanted to make music for money, and the Santi that wanted to make music for a bigger purpose.
You see, the reason why it was very difficult was that until the end of my first year of university, I never truly questioned myself and my goals on deeper levels. I thought I was a very open-minded person, but the more I learned about my ongoing struggles the more it became clear that I wasn't as open-minded as I thought. From where I come from, a lot of people listen to EDM and my naive mindset thought that everybody liked EDM to a certain degree. I came to Berlin thinking that I would find an ocean of people that liked EDM and that Berlin was THE Place for EDM. I did not have a single clue of what Berlin actually is, and it took me by surprise to say the least. Until that time, I only listened to EDM and I was the only one that I knew who listened to EDM in my friends’ group (which I had very few due to my close-mindedness), and in the entire university. This made me incredibly curious because I had never been in a place where the people that surrounded me didn’t listen to EDM. Thankfully my expectations of Berlin weren’t met, and after realizing this, I decided to take an approach where I would listen to the same music I’ve always listened to but, slowly becoming more open to other options. This process took some time but to this day I do not regret that decision whatsoever, because this mindset towards being a more open-minded person led me to where I am today.
As time went on, I finished my first year of university and with this, I took a lot of good steps towards becoming a better version of myself. I became more connected with myself, I became much more open-minded, I gained so many new friendships and I began my artistic project by releasing an EP under the name of “Luvz”. At this point in my life, I was in a very good place and I had a very interesting observation. The more open-minded I was becoming the less I would listened to EDM. I went on vacation to my home city and I felt like a completely different person, all my family was also telling me how much I had changed. It felt good, because I could tell I was like another person.
Art work by Luvz