Eddie Ludema

Music Program

Written by E.E. Curtis, Bachelor of Arts Professional Writing Major and Music Minor

My dad, he loved to sing. He considered himself an Irish tenor. He’s a Dutch boy. And he would just sing this stuff. He loved listening to Pavarotti. He and my mom, they lived in Hawaii for a couple years when he was in the army, and I remember there was always Hawaiian music in the background. There was always The Beatles in the background. There was always just kind of mainstream popular stuff in the background. It was really cool. But at the same time they really liked to, every now and then, listen to classical music. So there was just kind of music in the house.

But I remember for me personally I think the bug bit when my older sister started taking piano lessons. My competitive streak seriously kicked in. It’s kind of embarrassing. I just fell in love with it. And it just went from there. I kind of got addicted to playing piano, doing recitals, loving it. 

I remember one of the first moments where I thought, “This could actually be pretty cool to keep doing.” My teacher, Mrs. de Friez in sixth grade, she would have us do these monthly talent show things. And I remember getting up there and playing “Axel F.” Oh yeah man. It’s what the cool kids played. I went from being kind of a social outcast and kind of that shy kid in the corner to, wow this guy’s cool! And I was in the cool club for a year, and then I went to junior high and that was all over. 

The junior high came by the elementary school and they played “Superman” and I decided “I want to play the trumpet.” Superman is my favorite thing of all time. And it just kind of went from there. 

The cool thing about being a professor, especially at a place like ISU, is that we get to do so many cool things. You don’t get pigeonholed into any one thing. 

I remember during my struggle in high school, going into college it’s like what do I want to do? Do I want to do computers or music? Computers or music? I remember talking to my high school band director. He was great. I remember him telling me, “Why don’t you do both?” 

There’s another guy, Paul Lansky. He came and I remember him setting up in room 200, (the nice big hall) eight speakers, surround sound. And he said, “Okay find a spot in the middle. Sit down on the floor. It will sound the best.” And he played this thing called “Ride” that he composed and I was mind blown. I thought, This is music? This is cool man. It was like this soundscape music, soundtrack, sound effects, all combined into one really cool thing.

That’s when I realized I need to figure this stuff out. So I started to combine more, where you take computer science knowledge: programming, algorithms, that sort of thing, and try to bring that into the sound world. 

As far as professional stuff goes, that was harder because my dad also was a computer programmer. He brought home an Atari computer one day from work, and we started programming these old Atari games. So I got hooked on to programming for a long time. I was taking programming classes at the technical college. I thought, I might want to do music. I might want to do computers. There was always this back and forth: computers or music?

I think the biggest thing that made the light bulb go on, was when I was living in Mexico. I was on my LDS mission. I’m in this tiny rural area called Tzucacab in the Yucatan. And I had a dream that I missed the trumpet so much that I actually took sticks from the rainforest, from the jungle, and built a trumpet out of wood and I started playing it.

And when I woke up I realized every single day of my mission that I was out in Mexico, I dreamed about music. I never dreamed about computers. Zero. None. It was always music. 

And that’s when I realized that the music was part of my soul and that’s what I had to chase. So I kept chasing it.

When I studied in Germany at a conservatory, I was asked to help start a big band there. It was the first time, 2007 I think it was. A couple of students, they wanted to form a big band. They thought it would be a great idea. And the amount of push-back that we got was incredible. It was just amazing. It’s fighting against a machine, against the tradition. And the students, they finally did find somebody to teach. And we worked. We did it.

We couldn’t perform in the conservatory so we performed at the local jazz club downtown, which was great because normal people were there and they were enjoying the show and it was fantastic. So the fight is real. 

The reason I talked about that story is because here at ISU the vibe is so flippin’ cool. All the students I’ve talked to, they think it’s fantastic. They’re all very proud of everybody’s work. Everybody’s excited. Everybody’s collaborating. No matter if they’re a classical, traditional student or not. The vibe is really cool and it’s really collaborative.