Music Industry | Solveig Whittle

Whose Music Career Do You Want To Have? – @TerraNaomi

May 16, 2016 13 Comments

Artists Sharing Their Own Journey

In my quest to learn about music marketing I’ve encountered many smart people, some of them music industry professionals, some social media and marketing professionals, and several who are, like me, musicians actively practicing their craft and trying to make it (whatever that means… but I’ll get to that in a minute).

There is something particularly genuine and relevant about advice that comes from another musician. The advice and perspective that comes from industry professionals is valuable too, it’s just coming from a different place. Non-musician professionals have an overall vision of the industry that is uncolored by their own ego and participation as an artist.

But musicians being vulnerable about their own journey – now that’s something immediately relatable to me some of them may have started with some beginners drum lessons and become later talented musicians.

[Tweet “I find the musician as marketer perspective particularly relatable.”]

There are a lot of smart musicians who are actively sharing – mostly for free – what they’ve learned through their own experience, and, through interviews, the experience of other musicians. Basically, what I do.

Here are a few practicing musicians whose blogs, books and podcasts I follow:

Ari Herstand
Dave Ruch
Marcio Novelli and Ross Barber’s Bridge The Atlantic
Brent Baxter’s Songwriting Pro (AKA Man vs. Row)
Sean Harley Tucker‘s The Spark and the Art
Bob Baker’s The Buzz Factor
Bree Noble’s Female Musician Academy
Shannon Curtis’ book on House Concerts

If you know more artists who are offering great music career and marketing advice based on their own experience and that of other real, DIY musicians, please feel free to add links to their websites or podcasts to this post in the comments section.

Terra Naomi

I recently had a very productive conversation with a musician of that ilk named Terra Naomi. She gained fame doing covers and originals on YouTube in the mid-2000s, winning the first YouTube Award for Best Music Video in 2006. Her original music video, Say It’s Possible, has over 4.8M views as of this writing, and she has many (hundreds?) other videos of both cover songs up and originals on her YouTube channel.

Marketing, Music, Social Media

10 Simple Ways To Promote Your Music

February 10, 2014 4 Comments

[The following is a guest post by my friends at Ditto Music. That’s why the spelling is British 🙂 Ditto Music is an online music record label services and digital distribution company servicing over 50,000 artists across the world. Services include chart eligibility, royalty collection and online promotion. I have guest posted on their site.

This post is particularly relevant for me this week. Being a DIY musician, I have done each of the things suggested below myself to promote either my current band, Solveig & Stevie, or my former band, Shades of Red. So I can personally attest to the fact that they are all important. I think #6 below is something that many bands and singer-songwriters wrestle with, myself included. I’d love to hear your feedback on this.

Stevie and I are planning a professional photo shoot and a band website redesign this month, and I’m pretty excited for that. You’ll probably see a blog post or two from me about those experiences. Meanwhile, here are some great music marketing tips from Ditto Music.]

If you are embarking on a career in music, having talent and determination will only get you so far. In order to reach the heights of international stardom, you will also need to promote your music if you decide to go down the road of independent publishing. The internet and the wide range of digital outlets available will provide you with many opportunities to spread the reach of your music. By adopting these 10 simple strategies, you can maximise your chances of reaching the top of the charts.

Interviews, Marketing, Music

Setlist Music Part I: Cafeteria Style Marketing For Musicians

November 18, 2013 8 Comments

I recently interviewed two of my favorite, no-nonsense women in the Seattle music scene, Robin Fairbanks (A&R) and Elizabeth O’Keefe (Operations). They are both part of a music consulting company called Setlist Music Solutions, headed up by Sean Hensley, which specializes in artist development and management. Part I of this series offers Elizabeth’s perspective, and Part II will showcase Robin’s point of view. Both of these women have a lot of hands-on experience helping indie artists succeed.

It’s no secret that the options for self-promotion are greater than ever before for musicians. As a DIY independent artist myself, I often find it overwhelming just to understand all the different business and marketing things I need to do on a daily basis in order to be successful – to say nothing of actually getting them all done – and I have an MBA (and experience in marketing!) Like many artists, I fantasize about a record label riding in like a white knight, begging to sign me and to do all the work to promote my career as a musician. While this still happens for some artists, for most of us, it’s important to move forward with the reigns of our careers still firmly grasped in our own sweaty, trembling hands.

So what’s a girl to do when she realizes there is no way she can do it all herself?

Boutique Label

The idea of a boutique recording or music label has been around for a while, and has been written about in articles like this in-depth Baltimore City Paper article published in 2010 or in this article about the Arizona-based Cosmica Artists label. While the terms indie label and boutique label often seem to be used interchangeably, a boutique label generally focuses on a small artist roster, or even a single emerging artist. It may even be started and owned by a producer, or the artists themselves. It could be a non-profit artist collective.

The signed artist(s) may do none, or some of their own marketing. The boutique label may or may not act like a traditional label, providing (and funding) most or all of the services an artist needs, from recording to promotion, booking and tour management. Artists may have to pay for some, or all, services provided, but they get to say they are “signed” to a label. Boutique labels will not sign just anyone, but they might take a chance on a relatively unknown artist. The artist and label’s brands are associated with each other. The boutique label generally chooses the artist, not the other way around.

Marketing, Music

Female Guitarist Alice Stuart Shows Us How It’s Done At 71

September 14, 2013 7 Comments

She was featured in Guitar Player magazine in 1974. Rolling Stone did three stories about her in the 1970s.

“There would be no Bonnie Raitt without Alice Stuart.” – Dick Waterman

If you want to know how to be successful long term in the music business – and how to continue to be successful in the 21st century new online, Do-It-Yourself model – you would do well to study the example of Seattle musician Alice Stuart.

She may not be a household name, but Stuart is a pioneer with a loyal fan base who has had remarkable lifetime success and longevity in a tough industry.

A Trailblazer For Women in Rock

Alice Stuart blazed the trail for women in rock and roll as one of the only females in the country to write her own music, front a male band, and play lead guitar on national and international circuits.

Stuart has played with many greats, including Jerry Garcia, John Prine, Albert King, Richard Greene, Elvin Bishop, Joan Baez, Doc Watson, Phil Ochs, Mississpi John Hurt, Frank Zappa, The Chambers Brothers, Tower of Power & Commander Cody.

News

DIY Musician Wisdom From Seth Jackson Of HowToRunABand

August 18, 2013 1 Comment

I like to profile indie DIY musicians in an effort to distill practical music marketing lessons that the rest of us can learn from. My fellow Seattleite, Seth Jackson, has been doing this on his website, HowToRunABand, for much longer than I have. Like me, he’s a musician, blogger, and music marketer (as well as a techie – website designer and software developer), and he’s been a role model for me for almost two years now.

Seth and I met in early 2012, when I was just beginning my journey as a music marketer. I was present at the first In Real Life (vs. social media) meeting between Seth and Brian Thompson at a Hard Rock Seattle music marketing panel discussion. Two peas in a pod, eh?

Seth has a new podcast series on his website called Work Hard, Rock Harder (WHRH), where he interviews other musicians who make a living fulltime via their musical talents.

Seth is now up to interview #37. I thought it was time to check in with him and see what this WHRH thing was all about.

Conferences, Music

Lessons From Hit Songwriters Of Every Genre And Race

April 8, 2013 7 Comments

The issues faced by DIY (Do It Yourself), DTF (Direct-To-Fan), AKA indie musicians cut across both musical genre and race. Many of the sources of information for musicians today seem to come in silos delineated by genre: hip hop artists read hip hop books and blogs, and get advice primarily from hip hop industry people; jazz, rock, metal, pop and folk artists do the same. Yet we all face many of the same issues, and these sources of information repeat much of the same advice to those who want to make a career in music. When we all share our experiences, though, we see how universal it is to be a musician, no matter what type of music we make, what cultural background we are from, or what age we are.

I was reminded of this when I attended the Pacific Northwest Recording Academy’s (Grammy organization) inaugural Songwriter’s Summit this weekend at Seattle’s EMP (Experience Music Project). There were people of every age and color at the Summit, but the concerns and frustrations voiced by the attendees were nearly identical:

How do I make a living in this crazy business that I love, but which changes under my feet every year, every week, every day?
Where is the real money to be made in writing and recording music?
How do I write a hit song? Then, how do I write another hit song?
How do I rise above the noise in the music industry and get my music heard?
How do I register and copyright my music so I can get paid?
How does the byzantine world of music licensing work?
Is the music business still all about relationships and who you know, or is the internet the great equalizer?
What is a mechanical license, what does a publisher do, who is SoundExchange and why should I care?
(and why does Rhapsody hold 30% of their licensing revenue from streaming plays because they cannot figure out who to pay? This amazing statistic courtesy of Jon Maples, Vice President of Rhapsody Product Management)

Marketing, Music

Cover Song Music Video Licensing Walkthrough

February 25, 2013 5 Comments

Last year I recorded a cover of an old favorite song of mine called Menta e Rosmarino (I Won’t Be Lonely) by the Italian artist, Zucchero (AKA Sugar Fornaciari). He’s a famous singer, songwriter, and guitarist in Spain and Italy. He’s less well-known here in the United States, despite his many collaborations with American artists like Eric Clapton, Joe Cocker, and Randy Jackson, among others. I also hired a friend of mine, Josh Moore, to shoot a music video for my Zucchero cover. All together, I spent a few thousand dollars on making the video, including paying for time at the studio where we shot it and compensating the other people involved.

I thought it might be useful to share a walk through of my relatively cheap and easy experience securing the mechanical and synch licenses for both the audio and video files. As a writer of original music, and also because I spent my own time and money making these high quality audio and video recordings, I felt it was important to comply with the legal licensing requirements. This was not a video of me singing the song by myself with a guitar in the living room in front of my computer’s video camera. Although I thought it seemed unlikely, I didn’t want YouTube to take down my video channel because of this single cover video. Most important to me, however, I feel it’s only right to legally compensate the original artist for their work.

Music

The Un-Virtuous Music Industry Business Cycle

September 1, 2012 2 Comments

***UPDATE: Google To Launch Music-Streaming Service (Market Watch, May 14, 2013). This could be a game-changer, as Google is a major infrastructure challenger to Apple. Also missing from my analysis below is Amazon, who could also become a major player, and does have a cloud-based music storage system today.

***UPDATE: Apple announced a streaming music service on September 7, 2012, causing Pandora’s stock to fall precipitously. The impact of this service, which was also reported by the Wall Street Journal, is likely to be profound, although EricA Ogg of GigaOM speculates on whether Apple will succeed in this space given the relative lack of visibility of iMatch.***

It’s fall, the season when fruit ripens and leaves let loose and tumble to the ground. As I was walking my dog this morning, I was reminded of the stark difference between fruit and leaves. One is sweet and ripe, heavy with the burden and promise of life. The other, cast off like snakeskin, is the detritus of the season, dry and lifeless.

It’s the fall season in the music software industry as well. Every software business has predictable cycles for startups, and the music industry software startup cycle is no exception. The clock is ticking, and some music software businesses seem on the road to becoming lifeless, a step from being cast off from their investors like so many drying leaves. It’s not clear if any will bear the fruit – the financial returns – their investors were hoping for. It’s hard not to take as a warning the fact that projected 2012 Facebook revenues were downsized by $1B . Even this relatively successful consumer software platform continues to struggle to generate return on investment. Also in news this week, TuneCore founders Peter Wells and Jeff Price were ousted by the Board (read: major investors in the company take the reins, looking to change company direction to increase profitability). Slightly older news is that Spotify and Pandora are not yet close to profitable as of mid year 2012, and in fact, Spotify profitability appears to be moving in the wrong direction. Rhapsody was revived by absorbing Napster in a buy-in from Best Buy, and they are still owned almost 50% by RealNetworks, so theoretically they have deeper investor pockets. They are supposedly close to profitability, but their revenue and cost structures are less well understood. I’ll believe it when I see the numbers.