"Why did I choose music? I wouldn't say that I chose music Chris, I would say music chose me."

00:01 Hello, my name is Chris Della Rosa. I'm 16, and today is November 22, 2023.

00:08 And you are here with Mister Mills, Mister David Mills

00:11 Yup. Alright, so first question I have for you is why did you choose music?

00:19 Why did I choose music? I wouldn't say that I chose music, Chris. I would say music chose me. You see, as a young musician, I found myself gravitating towards my instrument, the piano. And, you know, this was before, like, video games and big distractions where I would actually wonder, what would it be like now? There's so many distractions. You know, we had a Nintendo back then, but, you know, something to do. Just something to do. I had fun playing my piano, and I spent a lot of time before school, after school, just noodling around, you know, I was the third kid. My older brother and older sister took piano lessons in my. My mom would bring me to their lessons. It was at a church, go up the stairs to that balcony, and that's where the piano lessons were. So I would be sitting there, coloring as a little kid, a little tyke, you know, and listening, listening to what they were doing. And I think my mom kind of thought I was just coloring, but I was listening. I was listening. And I remember feeling certain emotions when I heard passages of music. My brother was working on a song, you know, I can't even remember the name of the song, but I remember how it felt. That's something that's unique. Mike was playing a song and I remember feeling emotional about it. It made me feel some kind of way. I've always had a deep connection with emotion and music. So as I started to get better as a piano player, started taking my own lessons. Really took off a lot faster than my older brother and older sister did. And when I started to excel at it in high school, my parents realized that this was more than just a passion, you know, they supported me as I decided to try to make a career out of it. Very hesitant, of course, rightfully so. Like, if my kid tells me he's gonna be a musician, nope, go do something else with your time, bro. You can play music, but try to make a career out of it. It's very scary, it's very challenging, and you gotta have a hunger, you know? So, you know, I feel like if you tell a musician, an up and coming musician, no, I'm not gonna support you, and they say, all right, and they go another path, then it wasn't meant for them. Like, my parents tried to tell me, no, I wasn't having it there was no way that I wasn't doing music. There was no way. I remember, like, bluntly telling them, don't confuse us for a conversation. I'm gonna be a musician. I'm making music my life. This isn't a conversation, you know? And they fought back. But like I said, if you're that hungry for it, there's nothing that anybody could say that's gonna stop you. That passion, that drive. So why did I choose music? Nah, man, music chose me.

03:09 That was really deep. That was good. Do you ever feel like, to some extent, like, you appreciate how, like, music has influenced you over the years, or do you think just like, the same thing about how music is choosing you?

03:20 I feel like the musician's brain, the analytical side of a musician's brain makes you just see life through a different lens than the non musician. You know, everything is connected. And as I go through my daily life, it's just an observation, a deeper observation of life, you know? So it definitely transcends just music, you know? Yeah, it's part of everything. You know, you will be sitting at a bus stop and something has a pattern, the blinking light, and you're just, you're automatically just analyzing it, hearing it, improvising on it, hearing music to go around it. It's just, you don't, there's no off switch. You know, when you talk to, as a songwriter, when I'm talking to somebody and I'm hearing their story about their life, whatever, it could be a conversation, but that could spark an idea for a song. Something they said could be a lyric, something they said could be, will be noted in the back of my mind. Like, oh, that could be the title of a song. And then the whole thing blows up in my brain and I'm just looking at them as they're talking to me and they're not even realizing that I'm writing a song in the back of my mind. And the side of us, as we're having a conversation, you know, it's just inundating. It's everywhere.

04:35 So you feel like you're almost like splitting your brain into two sometimes.

04:39 Oh, yeah. Well, you know, just like the musician does, right? The drummer splits his, all his, like, four limbs. Four. It just blows my mind that drummers can do that. People are amazed at piano players, but we got two hands going on. You got four limbs going on.

04:52 Well, I mean, some piano players have four. Like, look at Corey Henry. He has a base.

04:55 When you walk on the bass, that's definitely.

04:56 Domi has the tricky pads on everything.

04:59 That's definitely. Or the people who play and sing, like a guitar player who's playing a riff and singing on top of it, that's really, really hard. John Mayer, when he's doing that, he's like Dave Matthews. He's got this crazy riff going on that's hard to play as it is. Sing on top of it. You're definitely splitting your mind. You know, a lot of processing power. Musicians are smart people.

05:22 I agree.

05:23 You know, gotta be.

05:26 Yeah. What's one of your first memories of us meeting? Or, like, do you remember anything of the first?

05:32 Okay. I remember you playing drums on stage for middle school.

05:38 Yeah.

05:39 And you were really hyped about it. I remember you, like, looking at it. I was like, that kid's really hyped about playing the drums. I believe you had a strong support system there, too, in the audience.

05:48 My mom and my sister and my.

05:49 Grandma, and everybody was seeing. You were. They were smiling at you clapping. You were smiling at them clapping. You took photos afterwards. I remember that. I remember observing that, being like, oh, this kid's got a nice sport system, and he's real. I can tell that he's passionate about the drums. Yeah. And for sure, when you came up, you got that hunger, you got that thirst. I said that you are like a sponge, you know, throwing stuff at you, and it just sticks, you know, and you've got, what you have is the inquisitive musician's mind, where you want to know why? And that's what I had, man. I wanted to know why certain notes when played together, certain chords when played together in a passage, made me feel a certain kind of way. I wanted to know why, you know, that was music theory. I needed. I wanted to know why I didn't know that it was called music theory. I just didn't, you know, I just was interested in it and just kept digging and digging and digging. I couldn't get the answers, and I kept digging for answers. When I found an answer, it opened up another question, musically. And that allowed me to just really just, you know, now it's a, you know, I feel like I'm the architect now, you know, and I can create what I want when I want. And that's awesome because I know it, but I wanted to know it when I was. Your agenda, just like you want to know it. You come in with a lot of whys. Hows, you know, why does this work? How does this work? What is this? What is that? You know, and its not many students that ive had in my 18 years of teaching that have that kind of question and that kind of hunger and everyone that did is doing something with the music. You know, theres not one of them that had that kind of level of intense questioning and desire that has not gone on to make music their life. You know, that's a good thing.

07:35 Do you ever feel like, to some extent, like you feel like you maybe have, like, seen someone who had the potential but you maybe as a supporter, didn't support them as much as you should have and led them to go somewhere else? Or maybe just not as I think.

07:49 That if I was in support of this, it really doesn't come, has nothing to do with me, has to do with them, their desire, their hunger. I've seen the opposite. I've seen potential that was unrealized. I saw kids who just had a natural knack for music and just didn't put the work in and nothing ever came of it. And, you know, but the thing is, you can't force that. You know, you can't force a flower to open the flower bud, to open. It's got to open on its own. You know, I can encourage it. I can shed light, I can water it, you know, but until that person wants to, they're not going to. You have to want to. Yeah. It's a shame. I'm just listing in my mind right now so many people who were really, really good. A lot of them were vocalists and just didn't, just didn't take that step, you know, didn't want to learn the next part, didn't want to put the work in. The work is that's part of it.

08:48 Do you ever feel like, when you talk about work, do you ever feel like certain, like things that you do for work is almost, like, not enough or just not necessary when it comes to music?

08:59 I've always felt like I didn't like to practice. I didn't feel like I was practicing. I was playing, you know, it never felt, it never felt like it was work. You know, it just, when I would drill in my scales, when I would work on something, when I practice something, like, only if I didn't like it. If I didn't like it. Like when I was going through my classical phase because I knew I needed to study it, if I didn't like it, that was a struggle. And I had, I had to push myself to practice because I did not like it. But that's really kind of the way that I am as musicians. I'm very, I'm passionate. If I'm passionate about it. It comes easy. It's. It's a. It's a layup. If I'm not passionate about it, then I tend to, like, you know, have to really push myself to. To work on it, you know?

09:46 That's cool. I don't know. I feel like I'm finally learning, like, more things about you as this interviews going on, which is nice.

09:53 Interviews are for.

09:54 Yeah.

09:54 Right.

09:55 I feel like we've never just debriefed. Yeah, it's good.

09:58 Well, I have a question for you. Oh. What, um. What. What makes you, what makes you tick? What makes you want to learn this? Why is this so important to you?

10:11 I don't want to use the word envy, but I've always gotten jealous of how people just play and have fun, you know, growing up, like, it was never just like, oh, I'm gonna go hang out with my friends, or I'm gonna do this. Like, I used to live on the corner of the street. I would walk to school in Pleasantville, and I would just come home, do my homework, and just play guitar hero. And it's all I had, you know? And I feel like just all those, like, old records on those songs, like, they meant something to me. Like, every time I played that one no doubt song, I would be like, dang, this is fire. Or I would play that one three doors down. So I'd be like, oh, I'm rocking out. But I've never felt the excitement of doing it live or with people. And now that I finally have that chance, it's like, this is what I need. Like, it's like. It's therapeutic.

10:52 Absolutely.

10:53 And I feel like it is therapeutic. It's. It's just something that I don't feel like people are gonna ever experience in their lives, no matter even if it's music or not, you know?

11:01 Isn't it a shame for those who don't have an outlet?

11:03 Exactly.

11:04 You know, I've been through all of my emotional moments of my life has resulted in me ending up at a piano, playing it out.

11:11 Yeah.

11:12 You know, the highs and lows, man.

11:13 Exactly.

11:14 I wrote a song. My son was born, and I wrote a song when I got divorced. You know, like, the highs and lows, all the emotion, it's got to go somewhere.

11:22 It does.

11:22 So. And I know. Yeah, drummers, you guys beat the crap out of those drums.

11:27 Yeah.

11:27 That's a good way to.

11:28 I remember my first drum. Yeah, my first drum. So my mom grounded me, and she took away. She took away my first phone that I got, and she didn't let me go out. And I remember just playing those drums, and I broke the drums. I broke them, and that's why I didn't have a drumstick until my freshman year.

11:43 It must have been pretty loud.

11:44 It was horrendous, dude. I, like, I broke the sticks. I threw the sticks on the wall. I was so mad. But it makes me even, like, think about it. Like, nowadays, like, people don't know how to do it. They don't know how to let out emotions. So they don't. Even if they don't even have the outlet, what are they gonna do within their own, like, realm? You know what I mean?

12:00 Yeah. You know, I guess the people find their way, though. They figure it out. They do something, you know? We're just lucky that we have such a channel, such a direct, pure channel from emotion, thought, to creativity and art. That's. That's incredible. That's a really thing that we're blessed to have, you know? And I can. I can recall being envious of some of my friends with my high school. Like, we're super talented kids, Mandy. These kids were really talented. So we were all pushing each other. Like, my circle of friends that were my best friends were all, like, all staid. They were just incredible singers and players and actors. And I always felt like I needed to prove something, and I wanted to be on that level. And I wish that I could sing as good as John, and I wish that I could play as good as so and so, you know? But as I got older, kind of realized the path, I guess. It's really when I went to Berkeley, when I got surrounded by players who were much better than me that I realized this isn't a race. This isn't a competition. This is just for me. You know, this is for me, nobody else for me. And once you start doing things for you instead of other people, changes. Changes the outcome, changes the expectation, you know, and you grow at your pace that you want and just a little more free, you know? It also allowed me to enjoy music more, man. Like, I remember my apartment after college was full of young guys that I, you know, from the fire department of town over. You know, they had just all, you know, the guy, the fire chief bought the apartment. Real quick story. He bought the apartment complex, and he populated it with firefighter guys, right? So. Which is, like, I was cool with that because they're fun people. We all instantly became friends, all of us, but they all grew up together. And I was the outsider. I was this musician outsider who looked like, was a whiz on the piano, and they were, like, all amazed at that, right? So we'd end up in my apartment and I'd be jamming out, and then I started bringing instruments home. I said, you pick this up, you pick this up, you pick this up. And they were all like, I don't wanna say they were trash, but they weren't musicians, you know, but I didn't care. We were having fun making music. And some of them got little. Some of them started, actually took it up. One kid got passionate about the bass and started practicing and playing bass, and then he could start holding down lines. I mean, they weren't like professional musicians, by no means, but the fact that we could all sit together and just make music and co create. Let me say that word again. Co create. It's a powerful word, Manda. We were all sitting there co creating a musical moment together. That was, that's awesome. That's fun. And it didn't matter to me that I was a professional musician and they were just a bunch of kids that were, had all. Were it guys or an electrician had their own professions, you know, it didn't matter. We were all, at that moment just people making music. That's fun.

14:36 That is fun.

14:37 Yep.

14:38 That's a, that's an eye opening thing. I didn't really think about it like that. I always feel like sometimes, like there's always, like, something that has to be done perfectly for in order for someone to be happy.

14:48 Well, there's always a level of perfectionism as a musician. You're always looking for that professionalism, and we'll never retain it, we'll never reach it, and that's good. You know, if you hold yourself to that standard, if you keep working and try to try to be perfect, you know, then you're working towards something, you know, I always want to write the perfect song, but what if I did? What if I wrote the perfect song? What would I do next? What would I have to, to work for? You know, just keep it, keep it moving. Keep, keep your standards high, but also know when to relax and be easy on yourself. You know, cut yourself some slack. Yeah, we're all, we're all, we are all way too hard on ourselves, man. We are all way, way, way too hard on ourselves. You know, you gotta be nice to yourself. You gotta take care of yourself. You gotta care about how you feel. Caring about how you feel. Once I started caring about how I felt, I started making different choices and putting my energy into different places, you know, that's a big one. It's free, becomes free. And then you can start enjoying this life, which is the end of the goal, isn't it?

15:46 It is. After all, we die one day. Someday, I should say.

15:50 But might as well enjoy this roller coaster.

15:52 Yeah. What's one thing you enjoy the most about our relationship as, like, musicians? Not only a student to teacher.

16:01 The creative banter, the talk, you know, the talking, chop. Talking about music, talking about ways to get better, talking about just anything music related, just, you know, when you're. When you're into something and then you meet somebody, is it also into it? Then you guys have something to talk about and it's like, it's. That's. That's fun. Like, for instance, my fiance is not a musician. I can't sit down and talk to her about why that chord change was awesome. Did you hear that turnaround? Oh, my God. That was a tritone sub of the most, least unexpected. Did you hear that line? Like, she. She don't hear it, you know, she doesn't get any of that. So I won't have banter with her about that. I will, though, with my other musician friends or, you know, Mister Tinsley, for instance. We'll talk about. We'll hear songs and he'll play something for me. He'll hear something, listen to something. He'll find something on instagram and send it to me because he knows that it's going to be something that will pique my interest, you know? So, yeah, the banter, the talking shop, as they would say, you know, it's.

17:04 Like a relief almost, right?

17:05 Yeah, it's just fun. So it's. Yeah, definitely. It's good to have someone to talk to about that kind of stuff. And any level, you know, I don't. I never see anybody as above me or below me. We're just people, you know, a seasoned musician who's a whole just destroy me to go neck and neck or newbie, we're all people. I'm not. I'm not a, you know, like. So when I meet a young musician, I'm just meeting. It's a musician, it's another music. It's another person in the family, you know? I think that's a good perspective to have.

17:38 I think it is.

17:39 Kind of keeps you in check. And again, just. It's downstream then. Downstream. Row, row, row your boat gently down, not up the stream. That's not easy. Going up. Going up the stream is hard. That's work. And you don't get very far. And eventually your arms will fail. And your boat's gonna turn around and you're gonna go downstream again. I try to live a life downstream. That's my path. It's easy. It's the way it's supposed to be.

18:09 I think that's a good way to end it. Moving downstream.

18:11 Here we are.

18:12 All right. Thank you, Mister Mills.

18:14 Thank you.