Marketing your music.

JeffChasteen

A wise man once told me:
"You don't make money playing music. You make money working around people playing music."

TozBourne

@rickwaugh said:
Great thread. Just read through it.

Having spent much of my spare time in the last 40 years in various creative endeavours, while barely making a nickel from any of them, has been both frustrating and enlightening. I would have loved to make a living from being creative, but that didn’t happen, I took the working route, and can’t cry over that now. But now that I’m retired and have the time, I’ve got to once again seriously ask myself, WTF do I really want out of this? Well, I’d like to have zillions of people listen to my stuff and get fabulously wealthy from it. Which makes me laugh.

Because, I do not write anything remotely mainstream, either the guitar pieces, or the electronica pieces. And I have no consistency of style. I can’t turn out pieces once a week, my stuff tends to be too involved to do that; the people who regularly turn out instrumental guitar pieces every couple of weeks, I either have huge admiration for their work effort and talent, or they’re dull as hell. I don’t really want to spend a ton of time on self promotion, and the various sites that promise help in that regard are besieged by folks like us, and are in the biz of making money off us, not in actually getting our work out there.

Which makes me realize that I need to let go of the desire to be “successful”. My success is in composing/playing/recording things that I like, and growing, and getting it out to the few people who will actually give it a listen. The letting go part is a struggle; I think most of us here feel that way, that we spent the time, dammit, and we’re happy with what we did, why don’t more folks want to hear it?

Not that you should give up, Wayne, not at all. Sounds like you still want to fight the fight. But looking at everything in this thread, and everthing else that has been written on the process, it’s a long, hard, never ending, time and resource consuming fight. Which I guess it always has been. I just don’t have the energy or inclination to keep it up.

Except for the guitar player part, this is me too...thanks for expressing this so well.

[Deleted User]

@rickwaugh I hear ya man. No, I’m not nearly ready to give up. The thing is.....I had a performing career ...wasn’t rolling in it, but was decent. Still making my living in the arts, teaching. I know it’s possible, just trying to figure out this new aspect.

rickwaugh

@waynerowand said:
@rickwaugh I hear ya man. No, I’m not nearly ready to give up. The thing is.....I had a performing career ...wasn’t rolling in it, but was decent. Still making my living in the arts, teaching. I know it’s possible, just trying to figure out this new aspect.

Luck to you, Wayne. Hopefully you used up the bad luck with the hand damage, and it’s time for a little sunshine.

[Deleted User]

@rickwaugh Thanks for the good juju! Mountain streams are being stocked with trout here this week, things are looking up!

fprintf

I've heard that the real money is on ambient (background) music for videos and commercial jingles. As far as I am concerned commercial music has become so narrowly focused that it is essentially dead for the independent producer. I just watched a bunch of videos from NAMM and all of it seemed oriented around old style rock music... the usual guitars and basses and drums and I couldn't have been more bored. And everyone had the same look - kind of scraggly long hair, torn jeans and sneakers and the newest was beards. No one stood out. So many notes rushing at you at once.

I say all that to offer that if you fit into the current popular music template then you can figure out a way to make money. If not, then strike way out left or right to find your own niche otherwise you will sound like so many other aspiring musicians who won't make a cent at this hobby.

RedSkyLullaby

You might want to look at doing music for tv/film/games. There are tons of non exclusive music publishers but that is saturated market also with much more supply than demand. Also if you are trying to make money from music likely you will have to change to fit what sells and or work to a brief even if doing music for tv etc. Sometimes that can suck the joy out of it. Best to just keep on keeping on with what you enjoy and if you can make some money great, if not then just enjoy the enjoyment.

[Deleted User]

@RedSkyLullaby said:
Best to just keep on keeping on with what you enjoy and if you can make some money great, if not then just enjoy the enjoyment.

>

Well said.

I’ve always believed that if dominoes are meant to line up, then that will happen. All of life is chance and leaps of faith, if not in something then in ourselves.

One caveat, with regard to ‘what sells’ etc. This is always dicated by a small number of bean counters, never by creative types. However, they know full well - in music, book publishing, and every other creative field - that regurgitating more of the same or weaker versions can only sell for so long. Even the greatly stupefied get bored.

Then comes what terrifies bean counters, the need to risk money on something just a little bit different, or massively different.

Keep calm and carry on making music!

[Deleted User]

A couple of days at this, and the longer I cogitate the more I think this is just a way for anyone calling themselves a Blogger, to make a few very easy quid.

Listening for a minimum of 20 seconds each song, seemingly on trust, these guys can probably churn through a ton of submission each and every day. Sending out their own twist on boilerplate replies, and never being obliged to ask their readers what they think.

The chances of actually connecting with a genuine, influential blogger, interested enough to help spread the word, must be akin to winning the lotto. Only, with a much smaller reward.

That being the case, I’ve deleted my Submithub account, and will be applying what energy I have, elsewhere. Bravo and very good fortune to Wayne, and any others here who plan on sticking with Submithub.

[Deleted User]

@Zen210507 I’m starting to share your feeling about submithub as well. Yesterday they gave me “free” premium credits in an effort to sell me more. I used the free ones. Haven’t heard anything yet. It’s all just starting to smack of pay to play.

u0421793

By the way, this was tweeted today:

https://twitter.com/numanofficial/status/960787727540133889