Making a track from start to finish with May Zoean, Piano M and Airwave
By focusing on feeling and having fun, May embraces the ups and downs of songwriting.
May Zoean describes her musical style as one fuelled by emotion and intuition. “I just let my creativity lead the way. I try not to overthink my process. I let my emotions and instincts guide me.” Having learned music from an early age with limited access to instruments, May’s musical journey has centred around finding ways to stay true to her sound despite the limitations, and emphasising that emotional core.
To get a closer look at how she works in a spontaneous moment of creativity, the singer-songwriter and producer invited us into her home studio for an intimate look at how she builds a track from scratch, with a pair of Piano Ms, a ROLI Airwave, a fresh Logic Pro session, and, of course, a crucial cup of tea.
Starting with Chords
“They need to flow—nothing too fancy, something simple,” May says as she lays down the chords and gentle harmonies that become the emotional bed of the track. As the session unfolds, we see flashes of inspiration surface naturally, and she captures them instinctively. “That was so pretty! I should record before I forget.” It’s a creative rhythm built on feel, with intuition prioritized over perfection.
Uncertain synth leads
Next, May experiments with synths to give her song a little more sonic intrigue. She’s quick to express her thoughts aloud: “That sounds jazzy... I don’t want that... I’m gonna regret that,” she says, mid-recording, but that’s all part of the process. She leans into experimentation, embracing happy accidents, and ends up keeping the synth line in the final mix.
Let the vocals to the talking
“Writing lyrics is probably the most difficult part for me,” she admits. “Sometimes it just flows easily, but other days, I just don’t know what to write about.” After landing on a playful lyric inspired by her beloved cup of tea, she channels those vibes into the track. Once the lyrics start to take shape, she gets more granular with production details: shaping her bass line in Serum 2, adding sidechain compression, and carefully panning elements across the mix.
Once the instrumental settles into something she feels connected to, May has a lot more freedom to tackle vocals as the final, expressive layer to complete the sonic picture. Through her songwriting process, it’s visible how much her enjoyment of the process translates into the quality of the song she’s creating. By using expressive instruments like Airwave and Piano M, there’s a greater connection between her and the music, and the melodies flow with ease.
Watching May create is a reminder that music-making doesn’t have to be rigid or complicated. When you have instruments like Piano M and Airwave, and a willingness to follow your instincts, it can be a deeply intuitive and expressive journey.
You, too, can tap into your intuition and express your musical ideas in multiple dimensions with Airwave bundles. Take your pick of Airwave and Piano M (or Seaboards if you'd like), or enjoy early bird pricing with Airwave and ROLI Piano available for pre-order now.
