Caden Williamson is a senior from Fayetteville, Arkansas majoring in computer science and German. Last year, he volunteered as a DJ at KXUA, the University of Arkansas campus radio station, the “Eclectic Destination of the Ozarks.” His show, The Trans-Pacific Groove Haul, featured Japanese jazz-fusion and other international pop music. We tracked Caden down in Darmstadt, Germany where he is participating in the International Engineering Program (IEP), to hear more about the intersection of his passions in music and engineering. He is currently in the process of planning his thesis and has added a year to his college plan to allow him to include the IEP study abroad experience. He’s still considering his future plans after graduation, but hopes to continue to work in audio engineering and eventually develop music production software. And be sure to read to the end where we’ve included a playlist Caden created for us!
1. Tell us how the Trans-Pacific Groove Haul show on KXUA came about.
I have listened to KXUA since starting at the University and have always liked the unique variety of shows that the station offers. After hearing about how open the station was to new DJs without prior experience, I was excited to apply and become more involved in the local music scene. Japanese jazz-fusion and funk have been some of my favorite genres for a little while now, and I saw KXUA as a chance to share my excitement about this music and take a deeper dive into other genres of international popular music.
2. Why Japanese jazz and funk? What is it about that genre that you appreciate?
I think a lot of people have misunderstandings about this kind of music until they hear it. Japanese popular music, especially from these decades and genres, in many ways sounds like the American pop music that my parents’ generation grew up with. I don’t know a single word of Japanese, but even the lyrics sound familiar because of how energetic the vocals are, and because of how similar the singing cadence is to that of American popular music. For me, there is something comforting about not comprehending anything that’s being said, but still understanding the emotion of the song. In my opinion, Japanese jazz-fusion also has some of the best lead guitar playing that I have ever heard. Combining the amazing electric-guitar solos with other aspects of the genre, like its common rhythmic and aesthetic influences from Brazilian Samba, makes this type of music especially thrilling to listen to.
Caden conceived of and hosted the Trans-Pacific Groove Haul show at KXUA.
3. You say that the Bryan Hembree class, Live Music Business Industry, was a favorite. What did you like about it?
The music industry deals with so many interconnected things like live shows, touring, streaming sales, and marketing through social media. In Live Music Business, we discussed all of these interconnected parts and more through a lens of current events. For example, we discussed the impact of social media on the live music business by examining Universal Music Group’s decision to remove their catalog from TikTok, a big decision that impacted many artists and creators. We also spent time creating hypothetical tour plans for and with local bands Ted Hammig and the Campaign and Ozark Riviera. Bryan Hembree was the perfect person to teach this class, as his local music connections and extensive experience with the music industry as both an artist and organizer gave us a valuable perspective and allowed us to have special guest speakers and external observation opportunities that made the class incredibly memorable. My classmates were also all so talented and engaged, which made the class even better.
4. What instruments do you play? What’s your musical background?
My passion for music has grown a lot in the last four years since I started playing guitar during Covid lockdown. My uncle is a blues musician, so I naturally gravitated towards playing the blues at first, but I also enjoyed a lot of classic rock and some funk music. After having put a lot of practice in during the first couple years of playing, I decided to join the Intro Jazz Combo on campus to expand my guitar skills and to get my first musical group experience. I didn’t know really anything about jazz guitar before auditioning, but thankfully my instructor, Susumu Watanabe, allowed me to audition with whatever
The Intro Jazz Combo play together around campus.
I felt comfortable playing. I ended up playing the song “Lenny” by Stevie Ray Vaughan, which is still one of my favorite songs today. I was allowed to play in the group for the Spring semester of my sophomore year, and it was one of the best experiences of my undergraduate so far. That exposure to jazz and my concentration on the stylings of jazz guitar also brought me further into my appreciation of Japanese jazz-fusion. Since then, I have continued playing guitar at home and through one-on-one instruction through the music department, and I plan to play locally when I return from study abroad.
5. How do you think your interest in music influences your work in computers? Or is it more of a casual relationship, like you do your best work when you’re listening to music?
Currently, music is fairly separate from my math/science life. Studies can be stressful, so I often rely on music to relax and distance myself from certain responsibilities once they are taken care of. I often study and do homework to the music I play on the radio, though. I hope that I can eventually combine my interest and education in engineering with my passion for music into a career. Outside of guitar, I have been learning music production and audio engineering through courses offered by the new Music Industry certificate, interning for an engineer in Nashville, Tennessee this past summer, and working on my personal musical projects. Next semester, I will be doing an internship with a German engineering company as a part of my German degree, and I hope to secure a position with one of Berlin’s many music tech companies like Ableton, Native Instruments and Soundcloud. Creating music production tools with one of these companies would be an amazing opportunity to combine my Computer Science and German degrees with my passion for music.
Caden was kind enough to spend some time creating a playlist for us to share. This list features some of his favorite songs that he played on his KXUA show. Enjoy!
Tokai – Taeko Onuki
Business Man, Pt. 2 – Makoto Matsushita
Breeze – Jiro Inagaki and His Soul Media
Sunrise – ZEROSEN
An Undersea Stone – Boys Age
Scramble – Hiromasa Suzuki
Kiska – Tatsuro Yamashita
You Can Never Come to this Place – Masayoshi Takanaka
You Can Be a Robot, Too – Shintaro Sakamoto