Dream Theater Keyboardist Jordan Rudess a ‘Wiz’ at Musical Apps

Dream Theater keyboardist Jordan Rudess is one of the most respected musicians at his instrument in the music industry, but he's not content to stay static with only playing the keyboards. Perhaps that is what has made him a master at his craft. In recent years, Rudess has expanded his musical boundaries to include the creation of several musical apps, which has put him at the forefront of yet another industry.

Rudess recently spoke with Loudwire about his application business and shared what inspired him to take the plunge into the ever-evolving world of applications. "My app music, Wizdom Music, which is spelled with a 'z,' is something that I'm very involved with," explained Rudess. "I'm actually working on some new apps now, like Ear Wizard and Harmony Wizard, things that are just in the works."

When asked what got him started, Rudess explained, "I'm someone who's always been interested in expressing myself on musical instruments really and synthesizers, and so when technology changes and allows me to create music in really cool and interesting ways, I'm right there."

He recalled, "When the iPhone came out, I remember sitting there touching the screen and it was a super-preliminary app that kind of let you play on a piano keyboard. And when I was touching it, I thought this is really, really interesting, there's a lot of cool things someone could do. And I started to really focus on the whole app space and it was just about the time the whole app store was opening up and people started to create apps or IOS, so I was very focused on it, watching it and as I was checking things out, I contacted one developer who I thought was doing something really cool and started a relationship with him and we decided to build our first app, which was Morph Wiz."

Right out of the gate, Rudess' creation was a hit, winning the musician a Billboard Award for Best App of the Year and taking home several electronic musician award honors as well. "Morph Wiz was the chance for me to take a lot of the ideas I had and really experiment and put something out there," says Rudess. "What it did mostly is I was able to put together in an interesting thing the world of audio and visual as one thing. When you're playing on the playing surface, you're not only morphing the sound, but you're morphing the visual at the same time. So Morph Wiz came out and made a big statement ... and it was just great and it kind of paved the way for me to continue working in that space."

Rudess says his business has expanded significantly since creating Morph Wiz and he currently has developers from all around the world coming up with ideas for different musical apps. "It's turned into this great, really interesting thing that makes my life very busy," concludes the musician. To learn more about Wizdom Music and their various apps, check out their website here.

Stay tuned for our full interview with Dream Theater's Jordan Rudess coming soon.