PROPERTY OF TENSTRINGS MUSIC INSTITUTE NIGERIA – www.tenstrings.org PROPERTY OF TENSTRINGS MUSIC INSTITUTE NIGERIA – www.tenstrings.org PROPERTY OF TENSTRINGS MUSIC INSTITUTE NIGERIA – www.tenstrings.org Chapter 21 Introduction to Music Business The business of music There are two music worlds. There is the world of pure music, which involves the creative side of things, songwriting. rehearsing, and performing, and there is another world which must come into play IF you truly want people to hear your music...the Music Business. Making music and making a living from your music are not the same thing. When it comes to getting your music into the marketplace you must fasten your seat belt and get exposed to the world of music business. How does it work? From writing your song and copyrighting it to finding a good record producer, getting the job out of the studio, promoting the song, getting a record deal, signing contracts, releasing an album and marketing it, all the way to getting booked for every major gig. You need to know how it works. Did you know that the Supply of Existing Marketable Music Is Greater Than Any Demand For New and Unknown Music? You have to make people aware of your music, and You have to create the demand for it, by getting the attention of the various gatekeepers in the record business and in the media who control the access areas for exposing new music (the record labels, distributors, stores, and live venues, as well as radio, TV, and the print media). No one is sitting at home waiting for you to release your music. What is the Music Industry Like? The music industry or music business consists of the companies and individuals that make money by creating and selling music. Among the many individuals and organizations that operate within the industry are: the musicians who compose and perform the music; the companies and professionals who create and sell recorded music (e.g., music publishers, producers, recording studios, engineers, record labels, retail and online music stores, performance rights organizations); those that present live music performances (booking agents, promoters, music venues, road crew); professionals who assist musicians with their music careers (talent managers, business managers, entertainment lawyers); those who broadcast music (Television, internet and broadcast radio); journalists; educators; musical instrument manufacturers; as well as many others. Until a few decades ago, music business was not such a very serious one. Your parents would tell you they were discouraged from doing music because their own parents could not see prospects in it. But today the story has changed, as the business has emerged as a multi-billion dollar one. Today you find conglomerates and corporations running very large music ventures, with musicians and music industry executives being some of the richest people on earth. However if you don‘t know how money flows in the industry and the rules of the game, you might keep struggling all through your entire stay. The business is such a very peculiar one. Being PROPERTY OF TENSTRINGS MUSIC INSTITUTE NIGERIA – www.tenstrings.org experienced in other fields of business does not guaranty success when you navigate towards music business. You must be acquainted with the tricks and tactics. It‘s so complex that even as the author of this book I have to admit that this section of it is the most challenging. No two countries of the world operate same model of music business. Every market has its own peculiarities and dynamics. Do I describe the industry from the perspective of the placed I‘m based or from global perspective and the ideals of international best practices in music business? If I choose the global perspective, will it be a perfect guide to the upcoming act operating locally? If I decide to go local, will it be an ideal roadmap for the artiste that is hoping to operate in both worlds? Really, it is a daunting task! So, what I thought is best and decided to do is to dissect only those core areas that are applicable to the business of music everywhere in the world, and somewhere towards the end share a few information on the peculiarities of the African/Nigerian music industry. 10 Steps to a Successful Music Career There are few guarantees in today's music business – even a deal with a major record label isn't necessarily going to make you rich. However, what I can tell you is that there are several things that any aspiring musician who wants to take their career further must do in order to give themselves the best chance of success. Hence this guide: if you do nothing else, make sure you do the following. Get good You can't make it in this business unless the music you make is good. 'Good' means that it has a market (beyond your loyal friends and family) and that you can write and produce to a standard substantially higher than average. It's a harsh reality to face but, looking at the law of averages, it stands to reason that not everyone will be above the centre line. If enough unbiased people are telling you that what you do is impressive, do everything you can to become even better. Devote time, effort and - yes - money to fuelling your dream. If nothing is ventured then nothing is gained. Get motivated Write every day. We all know people who have 200 tracks on their hard drives which amount to 'good starts' but no more. This isn't enough. Whether you're making dance, pop or rock records, no successful record has ever featured a single verse or promising intro alone. The art of writing is one that develops with time and effort and, if you're good already, imagine how good you could become with practice. It's amazing how lazy musicians can be with their talents. Take a tip from other competitive industries such as sport where, irrespective of natural ability, no athlete lines up to run a race without having trained every day for years. Get motivated and get to work. PROPERTY OF TENSTRINGS MUSIC INSTITUTE NIGERIA – www.tenstrings.org Multi-task If you're really hell-bent on going it alone, you'll need to learn how to multi-task and organise your time. To start with, you'll find it easiest to commit time to the creative side as this is the aspect fuelling your dream, whereas devoting hours to getting on the phone to chase contacts, updating your website or posting new gig details on Facebook will feel much less fun. However, planning your time so that you're spending enough of it on each task is essential - remember, if any part of your business is ignored, the whole thing will collapse. Discover marketing Never assume that your music will have so much appeal that it will sell itself. Quality alone is no guarantee of success - we all know of music that we think deserves a wider audience while, conversely, we also hear music whose success seems inexplicable. These successes and failures can be explained by a single word - marketing. People who don't know your music exists can't buy it and that's true even if it's the best song ever written. Any and all ways of letting potential fans know of your existence must be explored. Ignoring marketing in favour of churning out new material will guarantee that your fan base won't expand beyond your friends and family. Get social Start your marketing with social networking. This costs nothing but time and it's not hard to bring a network of people together who will begin to understand what your music is about and help you spread the word. Also free are sites like SoundCloud and Bandcamp which let you upload music for your grateful public to hear, comment on and, in the case of Bandcamp, download or buy. Setting up accounts within YouTube and Vimeo for visual content is also free, so you can broaden the appeal of your label beyond the purely musical there. Videos of studio sessions, screen capture videos highlighting your mixing processes, even photo content cut to a rudimentary video over one of your tracks are all powerful marketing tools which you can promote through Facebook and Twitter. And if that's still too daunting, services such as Root Music will easily pimp out your Facebook band page for a more pro look. Go professional As your profile grows, it might be time to bring in specialist marketing personnel. Generally, such people are hired in blocks of one month (three is recommended as a minimum for an album launch) and it's their job to raise awareness of your product. Specialists like this spend their lives keeping in touch with people you'll find it hard to reach yourself, such as newspaper and radio journalists, pluggers, gig bookers and other essential industry contacts. You'll effectively employ them to take your product to market and work as hard as possible to ensure that awareness of your record and label moves a few crucial rungs up the ladder. Often, the momentum generated by a few months of carefully planned marketing can be sustained by you thereafter PROPERTY OF TENSTRINGS MUSIC INSTITUTE NIGERIA – www.tenstrings.org There are things you can do solo though, such as sending your tracks to your favourite blogs or blogs that suit your music. Most of them have SoundCloud DropBoxes too, to make it even easier. Get online Register a domain name, find an Internet Service Provider (ISP) and get a website built.