UI Design Exercise - Music Player

I recently applied for a UX apprenticeship and was asked to complete a design exercise. The brief, in short, was to design a single music player screen/wireframe to accompany the playlist view which was provided by the client.

I was allotted three hours to complete the exercise and so I quickly began sketching, conducted several user interviews, and then contextual inquiries for my first iteration.

From the interviews and contextual observations of my low-mid-fi wireframe, I created the music player (right) you see here.

Although I was not accepted into the apprenticeship program, I still got a lot out of this exercise. Constructive feedback is appreciated.

thank u, next.