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Global Meetup Day – October 5 2011

‘The Meaning of Sound, According to You’

Every day we encounter sounds that affect us in many different ways. We use sound to communicate, to connect with people all over the globe, to process information, to express ourselves. We create sounds for the same reasons, sometimes explicitly, sometimes implicitly.

Sounds can remind us of the past, of people we’ve met, they help us to connect and relate, they can define how we’re feeling and can make us want to get up and dance or just lay in bed all day. Sounds have a meaning.

Gear up, start organizing today! On October 5th connect, meet and create for SoundCloud’s Global Meetup Day and let the world know what sound means to you. How does it fit into your life? What makes you remember a sound, what kind of ideas does it spark, how does it inspire you? Express the meaning of sound through a song, spoken word or simply the sounds of the world around you.

From Sydney to San Francisco and from Tokyo to Rio, we’re calling all SoundClouders and enthusiasts to join us for a global get-together. Get creative with like-minded users in your city to record songs, thoughts, ambiance, whatever it is that lets you express what sound means to you! Let’s show the world the true volume of sound and shout it from the rooftops of the SoundCloud Community!

How to organize?

1) First check whether there’s already a meetup scheduled close to you. If there isn’t, you can easily create one, check this step-by-step guide to learn how to set up your meetup
2) Find a venue, you’ll want somewhere that enables you to communicate and collaborate to create sounds together. This can be a studio, office, your living room, a bar, it’s your choice! Just make sure there’s access to the web so you can create and share from there.
3) Promote your meetup on Facebook and Twitter and invite your friends to join. We can help you promote your meetup through our channels and every registered meetup will get some meetup swag for their event.
4) GET EXCITED!

How to participate?

1) Find an event going on in your city by searching our Meetup.com page and click “Count me in”
2) Help spread the word, tell your friends about it on Facebook, tweet about it, do whatever you can!
3) Get inspired and join other SoundClouders in expressing what sound means to you and create something cool this October 5th: express it via song, interview friends and collect opinions, share sounds that mean something to you…whatever you do, it’s going to be cool!

Ideas for your meetup

Thanks everyone for participating on this Global Meetup Day! It is quite thrilling to see so many different SoundClouders get together all across the world on the same day. We thought it’d be fun to share some of the amazing things we’ve received from you, so feel free to take a moment to right dive in and check it out!

London, United Kingdom

• SoundClouders met on the rooftop of The Queen of Hoxton in East London for a barbecue with several acoustic performances, featuring Right Click Save As and Sadie Jemmett, in addition to SoundClouder of the Day Dave Gerard and special guest Liam Bailey.

Tokyo, Japan

• For a second time in a row, SoundClouders met up in Tokyo. Users brought with them portable gear with smartphone producer-devotee Kaz Mashino performing a live jam!

Nelson, United Kingdom

• Held at SoundClouder of the Day Jay Stansfield‘s house with each attendee instructed to bring along four notes, chords or rhythms and six meaningful words. It was then combined into one song with the entire session performed live and recorded in stereo straight to analogue cassette. Donna recorded it all, it’s quite amazing so check it out!

Antwerp, Belgium

• With very good weather, it was the perfect day for a meetup in the city’s center. At peak time there were dozens of people who stopped by to witness the performances by Alien Robot Dance and Vegas!

Copenhagen, Denmark

• Every month producers and music-aficionados meet at Cafe Retro to share tips and tricks with one another. This time, SoundClouders were invited. That Soundcloud is the collaborative music producer’s best friend is a sure thing! More details in their blog post.

Vilnius, Lithuania

• A creative workshop environment was arranged where SoundClouders divided into groups with each one of them creating a track. Here is what SoundClouder of the Day Vlad Solovjov and his group created together:

Torino, Italy

• Meeting for the first time, SoundClouders arranged the get together in Megabeatz Studio – a former primary school converted into place for local artists and musicians. The idea was to simply break the ice and plant the seed for a more connected SoundCloud community in Torino blog post here.

Little Rock, Arkansas, USA

• As told by Caleb Olson:

We put on a little dinner for some of the people in our downtown homeless community. My group of friends and family, Spread The Love, were asked to provide the meal the day before when we previously thought were just needed to help serve the meal…We were able to provide food for about 40 people. I organized the meetup and recruited one of my very talented SoundCloud friends to help us serve food and play guitar. Another SoundCloud user, who was a complete stranger, found me through the Meetup page and got in touch with me via my About.me link on my blog. He drove about an hour for the dinner and played his guitar while we ate pizza. Here is a clip of Tony Mason “Proverbalist” on the guitar:

By the end of the evening, both of my friends were playing the guitar while the rest of my friends & family served up watermelon for dessert. lt was a great time!

Check out Kick Homelessness to help raise funds and volunteers for the 2011 Paris Homeless World Cup.

Sao Paulo, Brazil

• One year ago, the first SoundCloud meetup in Brazil was held in a house about to be demolished and occupied by artists of the Galeria Choque Cultural. This time around for the second meetup focused on hearing new music productions and to make room for those who wanted to come and showcase their own material!

San Francisco, California, USA

• The SoundCloud San Francisco Bay Area Regional Users Group (in short, the SCSFBARUG) had their get together at Bar Casanova. Courtesy of Asher, here’s what the meetup sounded like:If you live in the bay area, check out the San Francisco SoundCloud group.

Don’t forget that it’s always possible to hear different sounds from SoundCloud meetups all over the world with our SoundCloud Meetup Map. Mark your gathering by tagging your recording ‘scmeetup’!

Upcoming meetups: Indianapolis this Saturday and New Delhi on June 8th.

Want to organize your own or find one in your city? Click here to get started!

Wouldn’t it be awesome if on Global Meetup Day, SoundClouders around the world create the song of their city? You could go out there, capture the sounds of your city and together with other SoundClouders re-use them in a song that reflects your city best. The Song Of Los Angeles? The Song Of Paris? The Song of Melbourne? If this sounds like you, then let’s unmute your city on May 25 and see your song featured right here on the blog afterwards.

Not a musician yourself? Not a problem at all. Everybody can participate:

Audio tour of your city: invite your friends to a sound safari across your city. Weird and odd, beautiful and frightening. Experience your city in a different way and record & share the sounds of your city with us and the world.

Sound City: in one minute or two, ask each other answering three simple questions: 1) Who are you 2) Where are you and 3) What’s special about your city and why. Ok, technically, that’s four but don’t tell anyone.

City Sound Ambassador: at your meetup with other SoundClouders ask them questions and record their favorite SoundCloud moments. Everyone’s got a story, we want to hear it.

Have another crazy-brilliant idea involving sounds? Let everybody know in the comments and go download our free iPhone and Android apps or find more awesome sound creation apps in the Apps Gallery to gear up.

Here’s how to get involved:

1. Find out if there already is a meetup planned in your city or fill out this form so we can help you getting started and send you a meetup kit with shirts, stickers and name tags
2. Set up your meetup over on our Meetup.com community from where you can spread the word to your friends
3. Record a meetup shout-out in your language to inform friends & fans: http://soundcloud.com/upload
4. Send us a tweet saying: “Hey @SoundCloud, I’m organizing a meetup in [insert your city] and we’re planning to [insert the awesomesauce you're planning]!” and add the link to your recorded meetup shout-out so we can retweet it
5. Be happy and get excited to see the sounds you create on the SoundCloud Meetup Map

Word on the street is that Santiago will be hosting a workshop and session at a music studio and that the Chicago meetup will be held at a book and music store with a guest appearance by SoundClouder Chill Factor-5. To get inspired, also check out these videos from meetups in Glasgow, London or Amsterdam.

SoundCloud’s Global Meetup Day is about you and your creations. Join thousands of SoundClouders in hundreds of cities all around the globe and together, let’s unmute your city.