User:Willderryberry
At the age of nine, it was the 1980’s, Will was experimenting with tape recorders bouncing his voice and layering it from cassette deck to cassette deck as he explored the world of overdubbing audio. “I remember creating some pretty outrageous concoctions with my tape recorder. I was really into making noise early on and I can attribute those times as a prelude to me making music and writing songs.” In the years to come, finding himself in many different bands all over the music genre spectrum, and involving himself in the recording process, Will not only honing in on his craft as a musician and songwriter, but also as a sound engineer and producer. “My favorite thing is writing a song and capturing its life, personality, and voice in a recording.”
Growing up in the gold country foothills of northern California, Will recalls listening to the local community radio station KVMR. “ They were playing really great music that you’d never hear on pop radio at that time. I was hearing an early and an unknown Ben Harper and Dave Matthews, rare blues recordings by Big Bill Broonzy and Tampa Red, and a lot of great local singer songwriters. I got hooked on a very simplistic way of experiencing music- a guitar and a voice!” From that point on Will was set on making music this way.
It is the late 1990’s, and Will’s songs are receiving regular radio rotation throughout northern California, and he’s touring up and down the U.S. west coast. “I was doing what I thought you had to as a new music artist playing as many shows as possible. I learned what really fulfilled me as a music artist and that was writing and recording.”
In 2007, the music business is changing a lot with the realization of iTunes, CDbaby, social networking, blogs, vlogs, and radio podcasts. Will is working on a bunch of new songs that will be included on his album “Seven”. “ I was right in the middle of writing and recording my songs “Lifelong Lullaby”, and “Seven”, and I got a call from a couple different music publishers, TerriLynn Massey of Imagem/Rescue Records was one of them. She expressed that she was probably my biggest fan and wanted to push my songs to be placed in TV and movies. I thought, I'd love for my songs to find people in that medium!” Getting his songs in multiple TV spots with NBC, and Warner Brothers, as well as movie placements, Will’s music has spread globally. “ It’s humbling and encouraging when you get an email from someone across the world who is losing there best friend to cancer and they want your song to be played at the memorial, and they just want to you to know how much your music has impacted them.”
With His music project, “By Design”, Will digs down even deeper into his stripped down blend of Smokey Americana music. “I didn’t want to be forced into a particular writing formula. I just wanted to be genuine. This entire album was recorded with my guitar and me together the way I would do it in a live situation. Rather than trying for perfection, I wanted to capture that bravo moment that happens more often in a live setting than in studio.” From the front porch, back woods sound of “Man”, to the haunting “Who’s Your Hero”, and the Autobiographical reflection of “Ferris Wheel”, Derryberry reaches his listeners in a very honest, down-to-earth, one-on-one kind of way. “If I can’t be real, and genuine with my songs, then I might as well do something else.”
In a music culture where creating controversy to get attention is becoming the norm, there are still music artists out there who have a love for making noise and along the way realizing within the noise there is a song, your song, and my song.