Hi, I'm Adam

   My name is Adam Benjamin Pena, I am 24 years old and have lived in Phoenix, Arizona all my life. I'm going to GCC because having some form of higher education seems to be a prerequisite with getting a well-paying job. Since, increasingly, it seems like a well-paying job is synonymous with something tech-related so I'm going after a degree in computer science. 

   I love animals, I have three cats (and another we've been babysitting so long that it feels more like 4) and one little dog. One of my cats we found in the rain, very sick and malnourished. The vets were worried she wouldn't make it. She pulled through, but never grew very big and has a wonky eye. Picture related. 

I like to cook/bake, play video games, try new foods, play music, and, most recently, lift weights/exercise.  However, my most time-consuming and most long-lasting hobby has been playing music. I mostly play guitar and piano but I have loved playing other instruments and love to dabble in others anywhere I can. If you're trying to get rid of a violin, or a trombone, or accordion, or anything really, let me know. The most fun and fulfilling aspects for me have been looking at the technique involved in instruments and, most fruitfully, how and why music works. The latter is a subject that I could (and often will) go on and on about. It bothers me when people say music theory is lifeless, restrictive or mechanical. To me, I constantly find that everything I've either been looking at or am curious about is already defined and discussed in music theory. It's just a way to describe all the ways we already do make music. It is not a prescription and, with the right approach, it isn't boring. 

   My biggest goal, most recently, is to finish my degree. Anything I'm doing at the time though I'll generally have some goals, however vague. Right now I'm playing trumpet and saxophone, but am mostly focusing on trumpet when I can. I'd like to play better in the lower range and use less pressure in the higher range, I have various ways of trying to work on that.  Progress is pretty slow (I've never been particularly good at just breathing normally, let alone controlling it in all the weird ways trumpet requires) and most sixth graders taking a couple years trumpet in band class ould probably blow me out of the water. But since I enjoy focusing on all the little things its not so bad. For me, a big key to getting a more relaxed, full range in the higher notes was something called "tongue arch" (weird, right?) I won't get too into it but you compress the air in your mouth by very slightly moving some parts of the back of your tongue, which is a lot bigger than you might think. 

Kind of a gross video, but here's a link to an x-ray that sort of shows this type of thing:

Warning: More of the skull and tongue than you usually want to see.

   I might talk more, or mostly, about music here and if I do I'd like to make it interesting. I love to teach people what I can about music and talk about my outlooks on various aspects of music, but it isn't the only thing I am, or that I can be, interested in.