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The Importance of Music Licensing Agreements
Working in the music industry is highly competitive and can oftentimes become stressful when handling money, legalities and costs or fees involved with producing and distributing music. Whether you are an artist trying to earn a living from your music or a producer and distributor looking to generate a profit from helping artists, hiring a music licensing lawyer is often necessary to avoid any potential legal issues from arising in the future.
A licensing lawyer who works in the music and entertainment industry can help to assist you with any potential legal battles, threats or disagreements you encounter whether you have written the music yourself or agreed to distribute it for an artist. Hiring a licensing attorney which works with music is highly recommended whether you are new to the music industry or simply seeking protection to avoid any legal confrontation regarding the music itself.
What is a Music Licensing Agreement?
A music licensing agreement is a contract that is often agreed upon between artists, record labels and music distributors depending on who is managing the artist and the type of sales that are planning to be made. Music licensing agreements cover the legalities of who has the legal rights and ownership to the music that is being made and sold and who is legally capable of benefiting from the profits that are generating.
Covering royalties, licensing rights and even costs or fees will also be covered in any music licensing agreement or contract that is drawn up by another legal team or your own lawyer. Licensing agreements may also include information about the limitations or restrictions involved with licensing the music to radio stations, online or even within television shows and movies. The more detailed the agreement is, the easier it will be to keep yourself protected legally regardless of the position you are in. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
Who Needs a Music Licensing Agreement?
Using a music licensing agreement is necessary for both artists and entrepreneurs who are producing or distributing music as a business for profit. Having a music licensing agreement in place often involves multiple parties and clearly states all individuals' responsibilities as well as the profits they are entitled to earn once the music has sold. Keeping a music licensing agreement in place is a way to avoid any legal action or disputes between anyone involved in the entire process of creating, marketing and distributing the music to any size audience.
The Necessity of a Licensing Agreement in the Music Industry
Having a licensing agreement in place with any deal you make in the music industry can come in handy if you are ever faced with a lawsuit or if the parties and individuals you are working with want more money in the future that was not agreed upon. Having a licensing agreement can protect you financially and legally to keep your career intact whether you recorded the music yourself, distributed it or developed it as the artist or musician yourself.
The Benefits of Hiring an Entertainment Lawyer
When you hire an entertainment lawyer who specializes in working with music publishing and licensing agreements, they are able to read and review all paperwork or documents that you are required to sign to ensure you are thoroughly protected legally. A music licensing lawyer is also able to find the best solutions for you individually to ensure you are earning as much money as possible without causing issues or legal problems. Music licensing attorneys have the knowledge of various types of contracts, whether you are in need of a single song contract, or if you are searching for a partnership contract when joining together with an artist, producer or music distributor in the industry.
Having an attorney by your side while creating a licensing agreement or reading through one is a way to ensure you are making the right decisions to keep yourself legally protected at all times. A lawyer who specializes in licensing can also inform you whether or not the agreement or contract is fair to you and how you can benefit even more from the right type of agreement that is written with you in mind.
Finding the Right Attorney
Hiring the right music licensing lawyer is possible by asking for a referral locally in addition to researching qualified professionals online. Comparing lawyers who specialize in the music and entertainment industry is ideal to save time and to ensure each professional you are interested in hiring is qualified and experienced enough to take on your case personally.
Perdomo Klukosky & Associates are NYC Lawyers [http://www.business-lawyer-nyc.com] that specialize in all aspects of entertainment law, including music, film, and movie law. Learn more about copyright protection by vising their website.
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What Are The Most Popular Kinds of Music?
There are many different kinds of music genres in the world today. It would be very difficult to name, mention and discuss them all within one article! However, I will outline the most popular genres and types of music that individuals like to listen to today and explain a little about them. Music is certainly a wide topic to talk about and music really does make the world go around. Without music our planet would be a boring place. Music can say a lot about our personalities, our way of like and the way we live. People also use music in many different ways. It can be a way of life, relaxation, something that people make in their spare time or some people just cannot live without it! Music is also used in therapy and healing. Below are some genres that people love.
Pop Music
Pop music - short for 'popular music' came about in the 1950s. Pop music is very upbeat electric and has many kind of beats and instruments. It often also interchanges between dance, rock and country sounds but definitely has its own kind of unique sound and quality. Pop music is very commercial and you can find it on any street corner. Most people tend to listen to pop music growing up and there are some big artists who have influenced the way pop music sounds and its general impression on individuals. Great pop artists are Madonna, Micheal Jackson and Abba, who have all influenced and created a scene for pop. Justin Bieber, One direction and Take That are also very popular amongst this genre today.
Rock and Roll/Rock Music
Some people argue that Rock and Roll is in a whole category of its own, but others say it is a genre of pop music. This genre evolved and grew in the US during the 1940s and has two meanings or concepts. The term 'Rock and Roll' can be used to describe the music that was popular during the 50s, or be used to put rock music in a genre of its own. Within the genre of rock you can find classic rock, punk rock, heavy metal, indie rock, alternative and pop rock. Great rock artists who have influenced this type of genre are Elvis Presley, The Beach Boys and Jimi Hendrix. U2, Queen, Bon Jovi and the Foo Fighters are popular rock bands and artists that many fans of rock listen to nowadays. An example of a heavy metal group is Slipknot.
Hip Hop and Rap
Hip hop has changed over the last few years and it has become more connected to the rap side of the music industry. Hip Hop was a very particular kind of genre where the music would consist of a rhythm and a speech that is chanted to the beat. It was highly associated with beat boxing, graffiti and break dancing and was also seen as a way of life and culture. Most people tend to place Rap and Hip Hop music in the same category. Rap music is highly urban and is an art where people rap or chant to a beat. Great hip hop artists include Mos Def, artists such as Nas and De La Soul have influenced hip hop music. Rap artists that are popular today are Rick Ross, 50 Cent and Eminem.
Soul and R&B (Rhythm and Blues)
Soul and R&B (short for Rhythm and Blues) is also a music genre that has changed dramatically over the years and is still very popular to listen to today. Many people listen to R&B and it is a popular African-American genre that came about in the 1940s, but in the 1980s a new form of R&B was developed called contemporary R&B. Johny Otis and The Clovers were popular artists that influenced R&B in the 50s. In the 90s and 2000s was when R&B became more based on the pop genre. It is questionable whether artists such as Beyonce and Lady Gaga are actually R&B artists or Pop artists.http://www.chrisbitten.com/
There are of course many more types of genres such as Country, Jazz, Jungle, Garage and Folk music that we have not mentioned but these are just as popular as those mentioned in detail above, and also remembering that different countries and cultures also have their own kinds of music too! Music is a huge part of our existence and there will always be new kinds of music being invented.
If you have questions to ask about music [http://musicquestion.com/ask] and want to know where to find out how to play an instrument, where to find music [http://musicquestion.com/] to download or even when your favourite artist is performing next, you can ask music questions online. If you are an expert on music then become part of the community and earn points.
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Healing Our Body Through Relaxation Music
"One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain."
- Bob Marley
Ancient Greeks were of the belief that music had the power to heal the body as well as the soul. The power of meditation was also discovered millennia ago when the early man stared into the flames of fire and entered into a peaceful state of mind. Meditative or relaxation music is a combination of two such powers as mighty enough to deliver individuals from their mental as well as physical problems. Although discoveries were made ages ago, it was only in the 1940s that medical experts and scientists started to research the influence of music on the human body and its assistance to overcome various ailments.
Music has been used as a therapy tool by doctors for several years. Relaxation music allegedly distracts patients from their pain and helps chrisbitten them calm down in troubled times. However, scientific evidence from the Research Center at the Utah University has confirmed that music can help divert patients' minds to lessen their pain. A musician and university professor, David H. Bradshaw, noted an affirmative connection between relieving pain from headaches and practicing music through personal experiences.
Study Proving the Influence of Music on Pain
Intrigued by his curiosity, he joined forces with four other university doctors - from the University of Utah's anesthesiology department and used more than 150 healthy volunteers to confirm his theory. The subjects were divided into two groups and each group received shocks or painful stimulations of varying intensities from electrodes on the tip of their fingers. One group went through the mild pain in an environment where music was being played in the background while the second group was delegated with several musical assignments of differing difficulties. The tasks involved recognizing the changing directions of a melody or the identification of deviant tones. The harmonies used for the research were the compositions of Miguel Chuaqui - the head of the university's School of Music's composition program.
When the subjects received shocks, researchers found that there were quantifiable electrical potentials within the subjects' skin conductance, pupil dilation, and nervous systems. Using this data, the researchers measured their subjects' peripheral and central arousal, or the level of pain they experienced. Based on the study, Bradshaw's team uncovered that the alterations in stimulus arousal or net engagement related to the performance of musical tasks decreased when the difficulty of tasks increased. The research team proved, through the test, that the subjects' overall pain decreased when they focused on the music and the task at hand.
The Magic of Relaxation Music
The sensory channels in our bodies are activated by music. They provoke emotional responses and captivate mental attention to fight against the pain channels. The synergy of music and pain therefore reduces our bodies' response and increases tolerance. However, the magnitude of pain reduction differs among individuals owing to personality traits such as their ability to focus on a particular activity and their anxiety levels.
Relaxation Music Therapy to Help People with AIDS and Cancer Patients
Music's influence on pain has extended its use into several fields in terms of health and well-being. Music therapy is becoming increasingly popular and emerging as a whole new field in itself. The AMTA (American Music Therapy Association) reports that music is useful in addressing social, physical, emotional, and cognitive needs. Treatment does not only involve listening to music, but also singing, creating, and moving to music. Alleviation of pain, management of stress, improvement of communication, and enhancement of memory can be successfully completed by using music therapy.
Many recent studies have been conducted in different parts of the world to test the influence of music on people with personal issues and illnesses. The Drexel University's researchers, for instance, discovered that music can improve the BP levels in cancer patients and also elevate the moods of people suffering from AIDS or Alzheimer's disease. Researchers at Sweden's University of Gothenburg revealed that relaxation music not only helped subjects relax when listening to it, but also proved that they experienced a flurry of positive emotions at a higher frequency and with higher intensity. In addition, the same subjects showed signs of lower stress and their cortisol levels (stress hormone in humans) also reduced significantly. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
The Findings and Revelations of the American Cancer Society
The ACS (American Cancer Society) denoted that relaxation music can help in reducing heart rate, breathing rates, and blood pressure. It can also lower the symptoms of insomnia, anxiety, and depression to a great extent. Patients who receive chemotherapy and anti-nausea drugs in high doses can ease vomiting and nausea by using music therapy. Relaxation music also helps relieve the short-term pain experienced by cancer patients.
The ACS indicated that hospice patients such as those suffering from cancer or AIDS improved their quality of life through the power of relaxation music. Music therapy has helped in improving their relaxation and comfort levels while also aiding in pain control. In some patients, relaxation music has dilated veins and relaxed muscles, which has significantly helped decrease the discomfort experienced during invasive procedures.
Impact of Meditative Music on People Suffering with Alzheimer's disease
People suffering from Alzheimer's disease can make the most of relaxation music to achieve assistance in daily life. Even during the latter stages of Alzheimer's disease, a patient's ability to engross in musical activities and interact with rhythmic cues remains intact. The cognitive functioning necessary for the processing of these cues is impaired during the late stages, so unfamiliar relaxation music can help in relaxing patients by inducing sleep and managing stress. Sedative or meditative music with no syncopation or percussion and slower tempos has the potential to help people suffering from Alzheimer's disease change the routines which cause agitation and go to bed with relative ease.
Relaxation music has the ability to put listeners into a calm state of mind. Whether it involves stimulating a patient affected by dementia, retrieving memories, relieving pain, or soothing an individual who has had a long day, week, a month, or a year, relaxation music possesses the kind of healing power that arguably goes beyond scientific reasoning.
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Is Music Therapy For You?
Some like it soothing while some prefer to dance to the tune; some resort to it to escape reality while others try to find the meaning of life in lyrics, but rarely would you come across anyone who does not like music. Often your heart rate speeds up and scientifically there has been proof of changes in blood pressure and hormone level due to music (the change in blood pressure depends upon the kind of music you listen to, while metal and rock would create a positive change, soothing music helps to regulate blood pressure). The foundation of music therapy is the instant connection and emotional relationship that one creates with music.
In a more theoretical sense, music therapy is the clinical use of music to therapeutically help in achieving individual goals. This alternative health care field has been around for centuries and was initially mainly used on infants and seniors with physical, emotional, and mental health issues.
Over the last few years, the practice of music therapy by credentialed professionals have increased the scope of the therapy by not limiting it to just a particular demography. Today, people from every walk of life can immensely benefit from music therapy.
Since the very basis of the therapy is something that most people are actively or passively involved in, chrisbitten music therapy could have more far-reaching benefits than other healing techniques since the participant will instantly feel a connection. While every therapists approach is different, music therapy largely makes use of composing tune or lyrics or simply listening to certain types of music.
So, who can benefit from music therapy?
Looking to de-stress or simply charge up your body for that workout, music therapy helps leaps and bounds. However, the scope is much wider panning to various psychological and physiological ailments.
Hearing Impairment- Considering that a very few percentage of hearing impaired people cannot hear at all. Others experience some amount of sensation, and music therapy can help such people as the tempo, wavelength, intonation, and rhythm help the hearing impaired to basically improve upon their speech. When hearing impaired children (note: Speech formation happens during the first five years of life, which is why music therapy will help hearing impaired children more) had been subjected to music therapy, they had shown quite an improvement in their speech formation in terms of vocabulary, syntax, and tone.
Autism- Several psychologists and authors have affirmed that children and adult with autism can immensely benefit by listening to certain types of music. Given their uncommon inclination towards music, music therapy will give the special people a chance to experience- without coming in direct human contact- outside stimuli. In a lot of cases when music therapy was applied along with the ongoing treatment, the participants had shown better improvement in terms of socio-economical factors. The experiment reported lesser isolation periods and social withdrawal. However, it should be kept in mind that owing to the sensitivity of their condition, it is best that they receive music therapy from an experienced and highly trained individual.
Chronic Pain- Pain and music are both sensory inputs, as such that in terms of pain when the signal is sent to the brain the person would feel pain as the output comes from the site of emotional synthesis in the brain or the limbic system. The main aim of using music therapy to alleviate pain is to work on the vibrations, and to merge the vibration of the music with that of the pain. The music diverts the patient's focus from all the physical symptoms, and which is why apart from pain music therapy also works in case of nausea.
Substance Abuse- For most people growing up and when they were introduced to their first pint of vodka or joint, it was almost always with friends or at a party. 80% of people have agreed that they like tripping with some sort of music playing in the background- generally Pink Floyd and the likes. Music has a profound influence on our mood so much so that in due time it can change our traits. For instance people who tend to listen to a lot of metal and rock music are often aggressive, which is evident by the 'wall of death' phenomenon at various metal concerts. The wall of death is basically the fans dividing into two groups and when the aggressive beats kick in, they charge at each other. This results in injuries and sometime death. Anyway, the purpose is to explain the degree of influence music has on our brain and hence on us. And just like it can turn people aggressive and lead to heavy substance abuse, it can work to help them kick the habit as well. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
Depression- The number of depressed people today would easily surpass the number of obese people in every country combined. Depression affects people of all ages and the musical stimulus directly has an effect on the emotional and mental changes. The therapists often combine theory-based techniques to increase the effectiveness of music for stress and depression.
Although the reception to this alternative health care technique has often been mixed, a lot of studies and experimentations are being conducted to establish the efficacy of music therapy. The easiest way is by listening to soothing music to meditate or calm your mind whenever you are depressed or stressed.
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World In Tune - The Power of Music in the Ancient World
Music has power. The power to move us to the heroic as in battle, to comfort in grief, to communicate with children too young for words, and to reach out in almost every religion to that which is sacred in us. chrisbitten This power was once in our history recognized and explored. In the ancient worlds of China, India, Egypt, Sumer and Greece before the Common Era, it was called Music which governed the heavenly bodies, it was called Music which brought creation into being, it was called Music which healed, it was called Music which formed the character. Ancient Man lived in a Musical Garden of Eden.
History was chanted in myth and poetry. We can translate most ancient languages but much of the feeling and meaning of what the chants conveyed are hidden from us. The emotional impact of hearing Gilgamesh sung could help reveal the mythological mind set behind it. Possibly it takes a Jung in the field of psychology or Joseph Campbell talking about myth to begin to open our minds to the questions of meaning. Or could we simply, like the imaginative enthusiast Schliemann, read Homer as fact and actually discover Troy?
Music was related to government and society. One of the first duties of a new emperor in ancient China was to discover the sound which permeated the world. This pitch became the fundamental to which all other notes were tuned. Even the weights and measurements of his reign were adjusted to correspond to the appropriate musical sounds. On this depended the prosperity of his reign and the contentment of his people. Music was viewed as the regulating factor between heaven and earth.
Music was intrinsic to religious belief, in ancient India it was said to be of divine origin. Before the creation of the world an all-pervading sound rang through space. For the ancient Chinese, the laws of music were part of the cosmic order and so affected the universe. And Plato states that "... In Egypt they have a tradition that their ancient chants which have been preserved for so many ages are the composition of the goddess Isis... " (Laws). Many of the gods and goddesses of antiquity played musical instruments. Hermes was credited with inventing the lyre, the instrument Apollo played.
Music relates to education "... Enough has been said to show that music has a power of forming the character, and should therefore be introduced into the education of the young... " from Aristotle, Politics.
Music relates to mathematics and the cosmic order of the universe. In China, India, Egypt, Sumer/Babylon and Greece, the exact tuning of musical intervals was of prime importance. The proportions for finding these intervals are well documented
The mathematical correspondence of musical proportions to the cosmos has intrigued great thinkers throughout the centuries. Johannes Kepler in his Harmonies of the World presents melodies representing the Earth, Moon, Mars, Saturn, Jupiter Venus and Mercury. More recently Einstein, in this same tradition, claimed that his discoveries came through music.
We could go on and on with other aspects of ancient life directly related to music but this paper is too short and history too long to do so. How far we've come from those values that placed the department of music in the royal palace in China.
But there is a wakeup call to a different evaluation of music today. Amazing scientific research is demonstrating how sound actually affects different states of consciousness. Many organizations sponsor studies on music's effects on the brain. This research has certainly come to the aid of music educators in the past decade. We see Music Therapy as a profession of growing importance. People who suffer from many ailments including dementia are being helped through music. Patients who have lost all memory can sing songs with lyrics intact. I am reminded of the place of the bard in antiquity, existing in parts of Asia and Africa to the present day. These incredible raconteurs memorized, with the aid of song and chant, stories and legends that fill our library shelves. Thanks to these story tellers we have the Vedas, the Mahabharata, the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Iliad and the Odyssey. We have no names for these bards except one: Homer.
Stories from Iamblichus, Cicero, Plutarch, Quintilian and others relate how Pythagoras cured mind and body through music. Luckily for us, there are people willing to investigate how this could be possible. The late Dr. Alfred Tomatis helped open the way to healing with the power of sound. In his book The Conscious Ear, he tells of how he helped to cure the monks in a Benedictine monastery. The order had decided to revamp their entire daily routine to make it more in tune with the modern world. One of the things they discarded was daily chanting. Soon the monks became ill, some very seriously so. Dr. Tomatis was asked to come to the monastery to find out what was wrong. After studying the situation he reinstated the practice of chanting, and the monks regained their health. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
One of the more wonderful phenomena popping up today is drumming circles. People from all walks of our high tech life are coming together to drum. There is an amusing side to this based on the common misconception about music in the timeframe of the history we are discussing â that ancients stood around in circles banging on drums, sticks and rocks to make music.
We've been speaking about new ideas and professions. But these views are very close to really ancient concepts. In some respects we are closer to ancient world views than we are to many ideas of a more recent past. I believe that kids should be told that many of their ancestors were knowledgeable about the how and why's of music and that their discoveries are part of a rich musical past. It's important that children feel that they are the heirs to a great treasure of knowledge and that this treasure is waiting for them to discover it.
Historically music had a vital part to play in education. Education could take a giant leap forward if the first concern was a balanced curriculum rather than a balanced budget.
Whether music is the art of sounding mathematics, whose laws on a grand scale mirror the harmony of the cosmos; or in a microcosmic view, reflect and influence the laws of society and the individual, is up for investigation. However, that music has the power to touch us is real and that reality was known a long time ago.
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Musical Warfare: How to Use Music As a Form of Torture and Assault
Introduction
Although I could easily make this article about the most horrible songs ever written and how they get stuck in our heads, this is not what our topic is about today. In this article, we will discuss torture, its anatomy, and the role music can play in it. We will differentiate between different types of torture, how our senses can be used against us to cause us pain, the after-effects of torture, military uses of music in psychological operations, sonic technologies developed specifically for sieges and law enforcement applications, and how artists are speaking out against the use of their music in these operations. So strap yourself in and continue reading because you're in for ride.
Pain and Perceptions of the Ear
The human ear is defenseless. chrisbitten It's unable to keep sound out, so it must take in all it hears. Without earplugs, anti-noise headphones or other defensive technologies the ear is helpless to protect itself. One of the great advantages of using music as an implement of torture is that it leaves no physical mark. At least, so it seems. Because sound moves particles in the air and pushes the vibrations into our ear, the effect has a potential for danger. With an increase in the volume of sound, the vibrations push particles ever more strongly into our ear, thereby causing harm over time or immediately according to conditions. Here's a brief description on how the ear can be damaged causing hearing loss and auditory malfunction.
Hair cells reside in the cochlea. Bundles of hair-like extensions, called stereo cilia, rest on top of them. When sound waves travel through the ears and reach the hair cells, the vibrations deflect off the stereo cilia, causing them to move according to the force and pitch of the vibration. Different forms of sound cause them to move in a variety of ways. For instance, a melodic piano tune would produce gentle movements, while heavy metal would generate faster, sharper motion. This motion triggers an electrochemical current that sends the information from the stereo cilia through the auditory nerves and eventually to the brain.
When you hear exceptionally loud noises, your stereo cilia can become damaged and mistakenly keep sending sound information to the auditory nerve cells. In the case of loud sound sources such as rock concerts and fireworks displays, ringing happens because the tips of some of your stereo cilia have actually broken off. You hear those false currents in the ringing in your ear (or head), called tinnitus. However, since you can grow these small tips back in about 24 hours, the ringing is often temporary.
So as you can see although music torture is classified along with other forms of psychological torture, the damage that high volume sound can really cause is actually physical. If music torture causes the loss of hearing, the remedy for this physical ailment is not months or years of counseling, but rather a hearing aid. Deafness is a physical malfunction, not a psychological or emotional issue.
The Differences between Physical and Psychological Torture
Torture is the practice or act of deliberately inflicting severe physical pain and possibly injury on a living being. Although psychological and animal tortures also exist, the forms of torture can vary greatly in duration from a few minutes to several days or even longer. Reasons for torture can also vary greatly and they can include punishment, revenge, political re-education, deterrence, interrogation, coercion, or a sadistic gratification of observing the tortured in agony and pain.
Physical torture methods have been used throughout recorded history and can range from a beating to the use of sophisticated custom designed devices such as the rack. Exceptional ingenuity has been shown in the invention of instruments and techniques for physical torture, which exploit medical knowledge of the vulnerabilities of the human body such as the sensitivity of nail beds to pressure, or of the soles of the feet to heat. Other types of torture can include sensory or sleep deprivation, restraint or being held in awkward or damaging positions, uncomfortable extremes of heat and cold, loud noises or any other means that inflicts severe physical or mental pain. Physical torture is plainly the inflicting of severe pain or suffering on a person.
Psychological torture, on the other hand, uses non-physical methods to cause emotional or mental suffering. Its effects are not immediately apparent unless they alter the behavior of the tortured person. Psychological torture is less well known than physical torture and tends to be subtle and much easier to conceal. In practice the distinctions between physical and psychological torture can often be blurred. In contrast to physical torture, psychological torture is directed at the psyche with calculated violations of psychological needs, along with deep damage to psychological structures and the breakage of beliefs underpinning normal sanity.
Music torture is clearly difficult to categorize. Physically, the ear can become damaged, although no blows were inflicted upon the victim. On the other hand, music torture can prevent a victim from maintaining a normally functioning consciousness. Psychological torture also includes deliberate use of extreme stressors and situations such as mock execution, shunning, violation of deep-seated social or sexual norms and taboos, or extended solitary confinement. Because psychological torture needs no physical violence to be effective, it is possible to induce severe psychological pain, suffering, and trauma with no externally visible effects. Torturers often inflict both types of torture in combination to compound the associated effects.
In fact, music torture is most effective when it is combined with other forms of torture such as mock executions, simulated drowning, sexual and religious humiliation, stress positions or sleep deprivation, the exploitation of prisoners' phobias, the use of mind-altering drugs, hooding, forced nakedness, the use of dogs to frighten detainees, exposing prisoners to extreme heat and cold, physical assault and threatening the use of such techniques against a prisoner or a prisoner's family.
In addition, music torture is sometimes used with medical, pharmacological, and even tickle torture. With medical torture, medical practitioners use torture to judge what victims can endure, to apply treatments that enhance torture, or act as torturers in their own right. Pharmacological torture is the use of drugs to produce psychological and physical pain or discomfort. Tickle torture is an unusual form of torture which can be both physically and psychologically painful. But more commonly, music torture is mixed with using
The Analysis and Effects of Music Torture
So what aspects of music make it possible to turn it into a weapon of torture? Three aspects come to mind and they are a) type of music, b) loudness, or volume, and c) the length of exposure. Often in military operations such as torture or interrogations, the music of choice is usually something which is extremely annoying or very stimulating. For example, several days after Paris Hilton announced that she would release an album, the Pentagon decided to buy 50,000 copies to use against insurgents in the Anbar province in Iraq. Other choices of music can range from various types of heavy metal such as Metallica to songs from children's T.V. shows such as Barney and Sesame Street.
The annoyance or stimulating factor of the music used is further intensified when the loudness or volume level is deafeningly high. In some cases, the volume levels have been reported to be as high as 120 - 150 dB, which equates to the sound range of a chainsaw, thunderclap and even a jet take-off. In addition, the length of exposure further exacerbates the effect of the music torture by causing the disorientation of the other senses. In psychological operations and during interrogations, it's quite common for a single song to be played at extremely loud volume levels for a 24 hour period. All of these factors combined are what give music torture its effectiveness as an assault weapon.
The consequences of music torture reach far beyond discomfort and immediate pain. Many victims suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which includes symptoms such as flashbacks (or intrusive thoughts), severe anxiety, insomnia, nightmares, depression and memory lapses. Torture victims often feel guilt and shame, triggered by the humiliation they have endured. Many feel that they have betrayed themselves or their friends and family. All such symptoms are normal human responses to abnormal and inhuman treatment.
For survivors, torture often leads to lasting mental and physical health problems. Music torture in particular is difficult to prove, especially when some time has passed between the event and a medical examination. Many torturers around the world use methods designed to have a maximum psychological impact while leaving no or only minimal physical traces. Typically deaths due to torture are shown in an autopsy as being due to "natural causes" like heart attack, inflammation, or embolism due to extreme stress.
Physical problems can be as wide-ranging as sexually transmitted diseases, muscular-skeletal problems, brain injury, post-traumatic epilepsy, dementia, and chronic pain syndromes. Mental health problems are equally wide-ranging, but the most common are post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety disorder. One of the most terrible psychological effects of torture is the killing of desire and curiosity, while the core feature of the post-traumatic landscape of torture is psychic deadness.
Gauntanamo captive Binyam Mohamed, who has since returned to England after years of imprisonment and torture, was interviewed on London's Mail on Sunday. In this interview, he talked about how his sonic torture started in a Kabul prison in 2002 where he was held for eighteen months in complete darkness before his transfer to Gauntanamo in 2004. His body conveys no direct physical markings of his claims of abuse, but he relates how, "There were loudspeakers in the cell, pumping out a deafening, non-stop volume, 24 hours a day. They played the same CD for a month, The Eminem Show. When it was finished it went back to the beginning and started again. I couldn't sleep. I had no idea whether it was day or night."
Military Uses of Music Assault
History's most infamous musical assault occurred against the Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas (1993). The story goes that the FBI wore down the compound dwellers over the seven week siege, exploiting the defenselessness of the ear, by broadcasting sleep-preventing decibel levels of massively distorted music.
A few years earlier, the U.S. tried to force out Manuel Noriega from Panama City with a non-stop bombardment of heavy metal music by the likes of Black Sabbath and Judas Priest. In December 1989, the United States invaded Panama. Noriega took refuge in the Holy See's embassy on December 24, which was immediately surrounded by U.S. troops. After being continually attacked with hard rock music, including Van Halen's hit song Panama and "The Howard Stern Show" for several days, Noriega surrendered on January 3, 1990.
In Guantanamo Bay and prisons in Afghanistan and Iraq reports have surfaced claiming that interrogation techniques involve the uses of extremely loud music to soften prisoners. Reports from Guantanamo Bay also indicate that disturbing chicken noises were played over a loud-speaker for more than 25 hours to induce sleep deprivation. Loudspeaker systems are also used to communicate with enemy soldiers by intimidating them with frightening voices. Apparently, this is form of sonic attack is an effective method for getting insurgents to surrender, along with intimidating phone calls made directly to the families of insurgents and enemy commanding officers.
Amnesty International has also received reports describing various kinds of humiliation and torture prisoners and detainees the world over has endured. The most common methods often reported include prolonged sleep deprivation, beatings, prolonged restraint in painful positions, hooding, exposure to loud music, and to bright lights. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
Music Torture Technologies in Bullet Points
On November 18, 1998, now-defunct Synetics Corporation was contracted to produce a tightly focused beam of infrasound intended to produce effects that range from disabling to killing a target.
In 1999, Maxwell Technologies patented a HyperSonic Sound System, which is a highly directional device designed to control hostile crowds or disable hostage takers.
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Music Career
There's no denying that everybody enjoys music. Whatever country you're from and anywhere you are at the moment, you simply appreciate what music has brought to this world. Some are talented enough to land music careers nationally or internationally and some are lucky enough to enjoy a fruitful music career after being discovered by agents from music industries. While carving out a music career can take up time and a whole new dimension of dedication to your craft, many musicians enjoyed the process and achieved significant results from it.
There are a few ways to go when you decide to take up a career in music. chrisbitten Independent musicians are currently exploiting all the possibilities they could find in order to get a shot of being signed by music companies. If you're a music artist, you should also explore all the angles so you can start carving out your own music career.
Quality work of music - You need to record your own craft with quality audio, instruments, background music, etc. Music companies are always on the lookout for the next great artist. They always look for professionals as striking a deal with them can be much easier than wannabe amateurs. You can start by investing your money, time and effort by creating quality music. Have somebody who's also musically inclined to listen to your recordings to gain an outsider's perspective.
Work ethic drive - Focusing solely on your craft can unveil a new dimension for your passion and creativity. Becoming a good musician doesn't happen overnight. It takes years of practice and it also takes a whole lot of time of dedication to your passion. A very good work ethic can usually boost and solidify the quality of music you create.
Be creative - Do not be afraid to experiment on different music styles. The music industry is very complex nowadays. New genres are on the rise and most of them have taken the mainstream music by storm. Do not put a limit on creativity and imagination. Also be flexible on covering multiple genres. Music licensing companies usually see that quality as a big plus before signing individual musicians.
Good studio recording skills - This skill could be learned by trial and error. It also takes years of practice to hone your studio recording skills. A good ear and a keen attention to detail will always guide you on how to produce great results. Have your track or playlist professionally recorded to attract music licensing companies.http://www.chrisbitten.com/
Branding and website - Always sound professional and stay away from old bad habits you used to have. The music industry is full of professionals. If you want to impress and get signed by them, be as professional as you can be. Also, you must invest in making your own website. In the technology driven world today, music agents will take a quick look at your website and decide if you have what it takes to get signed.
Get your music licensed - After following all the things above, it's about time to reach out to music licensing companies to get your music licensed. You can never start your music career if your music hadn't been licensed by music licensing companies. Monetize your work through music licensing and be discovered by influential people along the way.
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Developing a Musical Child
"Music has a power of forming the character, and should therefore be introduced into the education of the young." ~Socrates
Parents who put their children to musical learning at a young age must have known that they are putting in a very good investment. All the more enlightened are parents who enroll their young in MUSIC and MOVEMENT classes, where a musical child is developed before a child musician is made.
In a musical environment where foundational musical experiences involving the whole child - mind, body and spirit - form the basis of the developmental process, a solid musical foundation is laid that ensures much more sustainable musical development for the child in years to come. Such musical foundation includes developing a true passion and motivation for this art, musical discernment, auditory acuity, pitch and rhythmic competence, motor coordination, and expressiveness.
As an area of learning, music is a challenging topic that requires perseverance and inspirations. Many children had 'fallen out' with their musical pursuit within a short time because they were 'jump-started' in their musical development, going into learning to play an instrument before any of the above musical skills were in place. It is evident in children who were fortunate enough to be nurtured musically before being put to the rigors of formal music instructions, which they are much more likely to thrive and succeed in playing the instrument well.
The type of pre-instrumental music instructions that nurtures holistically a musical child should be started as early as infancy, but taken to a higher plane at 4 - 6 years of age. These are often weekly group sessions that engage children in a fun and developmentally appropriate manner. The following areas of development must be in place:
• Vocal development - the voice is the most important musical instrument that every child possesses. A musical child ought to be able to sing in pitch.
• Listening development - the human ear is able to process information and discriminate between sound sources and discern qualities of sounds. It also governs attention and focus. A musical child will have a high command of this important sensory faculty.
• Movement development - dexterity, and coordination are motor skills required to play instruments well. Children who have danced and moved and experienced use of their body in a variety of ways will be able to transfer the same skills onto instrumental playing with ease. Music, when played expressively on an instrument, needs to be supported by an equally expressive body movement. A musical child will be relaxed and uninhibited in expressing his music through the body. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
• Simple Instrumental Play that promotes eye-hand coordination and pitch association - the skill of reading music and playing at the same time is a challenge faced by many musicians. A young child can be prepared for this by working with simple melodic instruments like xylophones or glockenspiels.
• Musical ensemble works - music is a community art form that is most enjoyable when playing together with others. Different tasks requiring different levels of competence in a musical ensemble allow children of different abilities to enjoy playing together and making 'complex' music. Ensemble opportunities in music classes also promote focus and confidence - both important traits for musicians.
• Music Literacy - reading and writing and composing music can be as easy as ABC if the child starts learning musical notations and putting them in musical context. This can start at age 4.
• Learning about musical styles and genres, composers, musical instruments, and musical terminology - these are all knowledge that widens a musical child's horizon.
To accomplish all these, the weekly session should be at least 60 minutes long and preferably inclusive of parents or caregiver in a portion of the session. So that each child gets sufficient individual attention, the group should not be larger than 12 - 15.
If the child loves what he does in a music class, he will be much more likely to make music his life-long passion, whether or not he chooses the path of becoming a professional musician.
The Musical Classroom Experience:
• Vocal enhancement and singing - The use of musical language may sound odd to the average person, but it plays a vital role in preparing children for reading and writing easy rhythm patterns. You will hear tonal sounds like "do", "re" "mi" and combination of rhythm and pitch like "mi-mi", "ti-ti" and "fa-fa". This is the language of music.
• Moving - Children already love to dance, and this kind of musical program encourages moving and dancing to the rhythms of musical pieces. This exercise helps improve coordination and promotes musicianship.
• Musical reading and writing - Children learn about pitch, rhythmic notation, melodic notation and musical notes which will lead to their own compositions over the course of these classes.
• Attentive listening - Since young children love music already, they will be attentive and focused on learning the sounds of various instruments and develop the ability to identify them. Music classes like these also aid in learning more about the works of the master composers.
• Musical instrument exploration - The children will be given real instruments including percussion, stringed, keyboards and woodwind instruments in order to introduce them to all the choices they have in them. This opens up the opportunity for musical development before starting any kind of formal lessons.
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New Song Music
The Quest for music the way you like it, or should I say I like it has often been an uneventful, and often times disappointing task. As I am sure a lot of you reading this right now would agree. Please allow me to define "music the way you like it".
This applies to music which rejuvenates you, that allows you to see the brighter side of things or situations (That light at the end of the tunnel). This is the stuff that changes moods (from bad to good or vice verse), that may make an insurmountable task surmountable. Music is deeply Emotional, Music is Compassionate, and Music compliments our lives.
Have you ever found yourself tapping your hand or foot to an unfamiliar melody or beat, but then you realized that you were doing it and kept tapping just the same. During those rare occasions when we hear a piece of music that we like and have not heard before, and you wonder what the name is of that particular piece, and or the artist/artists name or album. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
This can be a difficult task depending on the medium in which the New Song Music passed through your ear cavity. If it was the radio (airwaves, Internet or otherwise), in a passing car, restaurant, lounge, Gym, etc...Etc. There are so many ways you can luck up on good new music, or simply new music to you. Honestly if you have not heard it before it is new to you. Just like a new used car is new to you, you love it just the same.
Well...let us discuss this process, and also remove dumb luck from the equation. Honestly how often do you blindly stumble across great music you absolutely love, during your daily travels. Unless you live in a college dorm, or frequent clubs and happy hours daily ("ahhhh the good ole days"), most do not have that kind of time. Although there are some of us that have the luxury to work in the entertainment industry, or have jobs with great schedules which allot for a great deal of free time.
Unfortunately the rest of us have limited time and moderate or a great deal of responsibility. So finding new music may have to be a bit more deliberate, and premeditated in purpose. In other words an easy and convenient way to find New Song Music frequently!
As you are aware most of the New music you hear on main stream radio is less than appealing. Then those same unappealing songs are played repeatedly. If you happen to hear a song by an artist you do like, it gets played so many times that you lose interest. I often wonder with all this repeat business going on, how do new good artist even get introduced? I call this the radio loop.
So here are a few ways you can acquire good New Song Music. Music Blogs, Social Music Sites, and Music Portal Sites that identify similar artists by genre or category based on your current favorites.
Music Blogs...
Otherwise known as Mp3 blogs, that allow you to download new music. Once you have downloaded the track simply listen and give your opinion (your opinion is not required); the great thing about this medium is that it gives you access to safe music downloads for free. The artists featured usually are new unknown, lesser known, or underground.
Along with the music download a blog post will accompany the file giving you some background and bio information about the artist. In most cases you will be able to view how others have rated it, depending on how new it is. This can be a good indicator whether or not it is worth your time to even engage your ears.
The mp3 downloads are provided by record labels and promotion firms so that is why the music is legal and free for distribution. Most come from the artists promoting music themselves, so it is a great way to find some real musical treasures.
Some of the Music Blogs I like are One Track Mind, and The Hype Machine, so go check them out. Remember your opinion is strongly encouraged; this is how the sites are able to supply you with new music daily. So remember to vote/rate the songs you like and the ones you do not it only takes seconds. In an effort to give back when we can, here is an opportunity to do just that.
Social Music Sites...
These Musical Communities give the power to the listeners, the Incumbent Independent artist/artists submits there musical works to the communities for review. The listeners, in some cases soon to become fans recommend the music they like to others in the community. The advantage of this type of social circle is that you can see what other music listeners have liked at a glance. Thus adding to your own musical Internet jukebox.
My favorite Social Music sites are The Sixty One, and Our Stage.
Music Portal Sites...
The main focus for most of these Sites is to promote unsigned artists, and allow their music to be heard and fan a base to be acquired. The new music found here are often times unique and original, so listen closely. The premise is for listeners to invest in the artists they really like. Once the artist reaches their budget goal, they will be able to record an album professionally. This gives the artist the leverage to create their own deals with record labels, the way they want. Without the limitations that are put in place when advances for recording and marketing are made. This in turn allows the artist/artists to retain creative control, and maintain musical message with direction. Free from Record Label main stream constraints. In essence you get to hear new music songs before they go main stream, and before they top musical chart.
Please check out Sella band and Africa Unsigned, great untapped resources.
There are literally dozens of ways to find new music...
There are so many ways to discover new music I have just outlined just a handful here. So please take on your own initiatives to discover New Music and share with others as frequently and as often as you can.
Khari Harrigan is a long time music connoisseur, and DJ specializing in music that withstands the test the test of time. Music with heart, which never goes out of style, is his the mission, and he has accepted it!
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Jewish Music
What Is Jewish Music?
Jewish music can be studied from many diversified points of view. Among them historical, liturgical and non-liturgical music of the Hebrews dating from the pre-Biblical times (Pharaonic Egypt); religious music at the first and second Solomon's Temples; musical activities immediately following the Exodus; the seemingly impoverished religious musical activities during the early middle ages; the emergence of the concept of Jewish Music in the mid-19th century; its nation-oriented sense as coined by the landmark book Jewish Music in its Historical Development (1929) by A. Z. Idelsohn (1882-1938) and finally as the art and popular music of Israel.
Early emergences of Jewish musical themes and of what may be called "the idea of being Jew" in European music can be first seen in the works of Salamone Rossi (1570-1630). Following that they appear somewhat shaded in the works of the grandson of the well known Jewish philosopher Moses Mendelssohn(1729-1786): Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847).
Fromental Halevy's (1799-1862) opera La Juive and its occasional use of some Jewish themes is opposed to the lack of "anything Jew" in his almost contemporary fellow composer Jacques Offenbach (1819-1880) who was actually Jew and grew up in straight Jewish tradition.
Interestingly the St. Petersburg Society for Jewish Music led by the composer-critic Joel Engel (1868-1927) reports on how they discovered their Jewish roots. They were inspired by the Nationalistic movement in the Russian Music personified by Rimsky-Korsakov, Cesar Cui and others, and records how set out to the Shtetls and meticulously recorded and transcribed thousands of Yiddish folksongs.
Ernst Bloch's (1880-1959) Schelomo for cello and orchestra and specially the Sacred Service for orchestra, choir and soloists are attempts to create a "Jewish Requiem".
Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco (1895-1968)'s Sephardic upbringings and their influences on his music as they appear in his Second Violin Concerto and in many of his songs and choral works; cantatas Naomi and Ruth, Queen of Shiba and in the oratorio The Book of Jonah among others are worth noting as well.
Many scholars did not missed the Synagogue motives and melodies borrowed by George Gershwin in his Porgy and Bess. Gershwin biographer Edward Jablonski has claimed that the melody to "It Ain't Necessarily So" was taken from the Haftarah blessing and others have attributed it to the Torah blessing.
In Gershwin's some 800 songs, allusions to Jewish music have been detected by other observers as well. One musicologist detected "an uncanny resemblance" between the folk tune "Havenu Shalom Aleichem" and the spiritual "It Take a Long Pull to Get There".
Most notcied contemporary Israeli composers are Chaya Czernowin, Betty Olivera, Tsippi Fleisher, Mark Kopytman, Yitzhak Yedid.
There are also very important works by non-Jew composers in the Jewish music. chrisbitten Maurice Ravel with his Kaddish for violin and piano based on a traditional liturgical melody and Max Bruch's famous arrangement of the Yom Kippur prayer Kol Nidrei for cello and orchestra are among the best known.
Sergei Prokofieff's Overture sur des Themes Juives for string quartet, piano and clarinet clearly displays its inspirational sources in non-religious Jewish music. The melodic, modal, rhythmical materials and the use of the clarinet as a leading melodic instrument is a very typical sound in folk and non-religious Jewish music.
Dmitri Shostakovich was deeply influenced by Jewish music as well. This can be seen in many of his compositions, most notably in the song cycle From Jewish Folk Poetry, and in the Second Piano Trio. However his most outstanding contribution to the Jewish culture is without doubt the 13th. Symphony "Babi Yar".
How Many Jewish Musics?
The world-wide dispersion of the Jews following the Exodus and its three main communities create the basic kayout of the world-wide Jewish music. Those communities in their geographical dispersion covering all continents and their unique relations with local communities have given birth to various kinds of music as well as languages and customs.
Following the exile, according to geographical settlements, Jews formed three main branches: Ashkenazi, Sephardi and Mizrahi.
Roughly they are located as follows: Ashkenazi in Eastern and Western Europe, the Balkans, (to a lesser extend) in Turkey and Greece; Sephardi in Spain, Maroc, North Africa and later in the Ottoman Empire (Turkey); Mizrahi in Lebanon, Syria, East Asia, Iraq, Yemen, Egypt.
The music of those communities naturally entered into contact with local traditions and evolved accordingly.
Ashkenazi and the Klezmer
"Ashkenazi" refers to Jews who in the 9.th century started to settle on the banks of the Rhine.
Today the term "Ashkenazi" designate most of the European and Western Jews.
Besides the Hebrew, Yiddish is commonly used in speech and songs.
The traditional Ashkenazi music, originated in Eastern Europe, moved to all directions from there and created the main branch of Jewish Music in North America. It includes the famous Klezmer music. Klezmer means "instruments of song", from the Hebrew word klei zemer. The word come to designate the musician himself and it is somehow analogous to the European troubadour.
Klezmer is a very popular genre which can be seen in Hasidic and Ashkenazic Judaism, it is however deeply connected with the Ashkenazi tradition.
Around the 15th century, a tradition of secular Jewish music was developed by musicians called kleyzmorim or kleyzmerim. They draw on devotional traditions extending back into Biblical times, and their musical legacy of klezmer continues to evolve today. The repertoire is largely dance songs for weddings and other celebrations. Due to the Ashkenazi lineage of this music, the lyrics, terminology and song titles are typically in Yiddish.
Originally naming the musicians themselves in mid-20th Century the word started to identify a musical genre, it is also sometimes referred to as "Yiddish" music.
Sephardi
"Sephardi" literally means Spanish, and designate Jews from mainly Spain but also North Africa, Greece and Egypt.
Following the expulsion of all non-Christians, forced to convert to Christianism or to the exile in 1492, the very rich, cultivated and fruitful Jewish culture existing in Spain has migrated massively into the Ottoman Empire formed the main brach of Jews living currently in Turkey.
Their language besides the Hebrew is called Ladino. Ladino is a 15th. century of Spanish. Much of their musical repertoire is in that language. The Sephardi music mixes many elements from traditional Arab, North African, Turkish idioms.
In medieval Spain, "canciones" being performed at the royal courts constitued the basis of the Sephardic music.
Spiritual, ceremonial and entertainment songs all coexists in Sephardic music. Lyrics are generally Hebrew for religious songs and Ladino for others.
The genre in its spread to North Africa, Turkey, Greece, the Balkans and Egypt assimilated many musical elements. Including the North African high-pitched, extended ululations; Balkan rhythms, for instance in 9/8 time; and the Turkish maqam modes.
Woman voice is often preferred while the instruments included the "oud" and "qanun" which are not traditionally Jewish instruments.
Some popular Sephardic music has been released as commercial recordings in the early 20th Century. Among the first popular singers of the genre were men and included the Turks Jack Mayesh, Haim Efendi and Yitzhak Algazi. Later, a new generation of singers arose, many of whom were not themselves Sephardic. Gloria Levy, Pasharos Sefardíes and Flory Jagoda.
Mizrahi
"Mizrahi" means Eastern and refers to Jews of Eastern Mediterranean and further to the East.
The music also mixes local traditions. Actually a very "eastern flavored" musical tradition which encompasses Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq and as east as India.
Middle Eastern percussion instruments share an important part with the violin in typical Mizrahi songs. The music is usually high pitched in general.
In Israel today Mizrahi music is very popular.
A "Muzika Mizrahit" movement emerged in the 1950s. Mostly with with performers from the ethnic neighborhoods of Israel: the Yemenite "Kerem HaTemanim" neighborhood of Tel Aviv, Moroccan, Iranian and Iraqi immigrants - who played at weddings and other events.
Songs were performed in Hebrew but with a clear Arabic style on traditional Arabic instruments: the "Oud", the "Kanun", and the "darbuka".
Classic Hebrew literature, including liturgical texts and poems by medieval Hebrew poets constitued the main source of lyrics.
Music in Jewish Liturgy
There are a wide collection of, sometimes conflicting, writings on all aspects of using music in the Judaic liturgy. The most agreed-upon facts are that the women voice should be excluded from religious ceremony and the usage of musical instruments should be banned in Synagogue service.
However some Rabbinical authorities soften those straight positions but not regarding the exclusion of the female voice. In weddings, for instance, the Talmudic statement "to gladden the groom and bride with music" can be seen as a way to allow making instrumental and non-religious music at the weddings but this was probably to be done outside the Synagogue.
The very influential writings of the Spanish Rabbi, also a physician and philosopher, Maimonides (1135-1204) on one hand opposed harshly against all form of music not totally at the service of religious worship and on the other hand recommended instrumental music for its healing powers.
Healing powers and mysterious formul hidden inside musical scores was commonly sought after in music scores during middle-ages, renaissance and pre-Baroque epochs. Interestingly, in a recently published fiction novel "Imprimatur" by the musicologist Rita Monaldi and co-author Francesco Solti the whole plot is built-up around a composition of Salomone Rossi (1570-1630), an important Jewish composer.
Jewish mystical treatises, like the Kabbala, particularly since the 13th. century often deal with ethical, magical and therapeutic powers of music. The enhancement of the religious experience with music, particularly with singing is expressed in many places.
Even though there is no unified position concerning music in the Jewish thought a common main ideas seems to emerge: that the music is the authentic expression of human feelings in religious and secular life.
Mehmet Okonsar is a pianist-composer-conductor and musicologist. He is educated in the Brussels Royal Conservatory. He currently lives in Ankara, Turkey. Mehmet Okonsar is an internationally acknowned concert pianist and composer.He is offering highly eclectic concert programs but refuses all the so-called "specializations." He manages his career and runs his own publishing and CD companies.
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Evolution of Music
Music has been evolving since its creation. This evolution of music has led to a vast variety of music that all people can enjoy. Artists who make good music, are praised and revered for their talents, and recently this has lead to many aspiring musicians who want to acquire fame and fortune through their music. In the United States music in constantly evolving, and in recent years this evolution of music has sped up to a very fast rate. Music has evolved for many reasons including, improved technology, and change in culture, and a desire to create something new.
Primarily change in music has been related to the culture. During the Middle Ages music everyday music was located in two places, the church and the tavern. This was not a good atmosphere for good music to bloom. However during the Baroque period, 1600-1750, wealthy people began to hire musicians to compose music for them. These patrons would pay the musicians to compose and play music for the patrons enjoyment, and for entertainment at his or her parties. Music did not change very much in Europe for a long time. In America music was began to evolve in its own way. This new country had a culture of its own and this was reflected in its music and dancing. One of the main styles of music originated in Detroit, and it is called big band. It is called big band, because a large band was used to create snappy, catchy tunes. This style of music soon became popular in Europe as well as America in the 1920s. Big band music was very positive for America as a means of enjoyment and entertainment.
Adolf Rickenbacker invented the electric guitar in the later 1920s and in doing so he changed music forever. This was the first time that people began to use electricity to amplify their instruments. Furthermore with the invention of the electric guitar came the birth of Jazz music. Before the electric guitar came onto the scene it was nearly impossible to incorporate a guitar into band music because it was not loud enough, but the electric guitar solved the volume issue. African Americans strongly connect rhythm with their music. This can be seen in the tribal music of Africa which consists of drumming and singing. African Americans took hold of the electric guitar and used it to throw poppy grooves over the brass instruments and Jazz was born. Jazz was a type of music that spoke out as a bit of a rebellion against the culture. It was nothing like the music that was played in church, and it was perfect for dancing to. African Americans took hold of Jazz and made it a part of their culture. However racism still ran deep in the American culture and many whites dislike jazz music simply because it was generally performed by black musicians. However white musicians began to play the songs originally written and performed by African Americans, once this began to occur more whites began to appreciate Jazz. Somehow certain whites thought it was OK to listen to Jazz as long as it was performed by other whites. Overall Jazz music was very positive for the American culture because it helped give pride to the African Americans.
As long as the culture continues to change their will be a reflection of this in the music that is composed. America in particular has a culture that is always changing and growing, and this will, and has, lead to a continuing change in music. Rock n Roll came onto the scene in the late 40s and from its start it was about rebellion. The word "rock," as used in Rock n Roll, means to shake things up, and the word "roll" is slang for sexual intercourse. Rolling Stone argued that Elvis Presley's hit "That's alright mama" 1954, was the first Rock n Roll song, but this is very debatable. In the 1950s the youth were moving out from the post war era, and moving into a culture of fun loving freedom. Elvis Presley hit the scene wielding his electric guitar and rocking to catchy tunes. Although by today's standards Presley's music is considered tame, in the 1950s he was on the cutting edge of adolescent rebellion. Presley was criticized for gyrating his pelvis during performances, this and his "dirty" lyrics led to a few of his songs being banned from certain radio stations. Elvis could not be stopped and his popularity continued to grow wildly. The culture continued to change with the introduction of birth control during the 60s and this led to hippie era which was deeply rooted in music, particularly folk and rock n roll. Hippies were all about having "free love" which meant that you should be able to have sex with whomever, wherever, and whenever you wanted, as long as you were not hurting anyone else. The Hippie movement has had very negative effects on society, and it was fueled by rock n roll music. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
New Technology was introduced in the 1960s-70s that paved the way for many new styles. This technology was the use of digital effects that were placed into songs. This technology was brought into the center of pop culture with disco music. Disco Music has a strong melody with deep beats that are perfect for dancing. This type of dancing isn't technical in nature people of all different skill levels could participate. However the adolescent culture of the time was split between the pop sound of the disco, and the cool rebellion of rock n roll. Most of these changes in music have been due to the culture, and more directly the culture of the youth. Although people of all ages enjoy the music it is primarily the adolescents that were and are shaping the music in the 20th century and beyond.
The effect of the music on the cultures is hard to place in a strictly positive or negative light. Of the examples of music trends given earlier, some were positive and some were negative. However it cannot be said that they are wholly good or wholly bad. These changes in music reflected the culture that they were brought into, and often these changes brought about good and bad reform. There are some fads in music that many would argue are completely negative, such as rap. The vast majority of rap music that is played on the radio is full of explicit content, and because of this is receives a bad wrap. Rap music is often inspired by gangster life, but people do not consider that when these people are writing music instead of starting fights on the street. Although rap music is often inappropriate it has given people the African American youth something constructive to do with their time, that will not lead them to being perceived as losers by the other gangsters. Therefore rap has both positive and negative aspects as do must trends in music.
America has started several trends and fads in regards to music, and they will continue to do so. Since America is a melting pot of cultures there is a huge wealth of new music that will become apparent as more time passes. If there was to be a standstill in the music industry, there would need to be a standstill in the culture. However the culture of the American youth has been constantly changing at an increasing pace. With all of this change there is no sign that the music industry is going to slow down. New songs are always going to be composed, and new styles of music will always be coming to the surface of the musical world. The study of the popular music in a culture gives a person deep insight on the values of the culture, because a populations culture is directly linked to their music.
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Here Comes The Bride - Music for Wedding Ceremonies
The formalities and legalities of a wedding can be regarded as the "bone structure" of the ceremony. Without those legalities, without the correct words, documentation, certificates and authorities, the ceremony cannot be a legal one.
But the bare bones of such a ceremony can be - and ought to be - beautifully "dressed" with things that add to the meaningfulness and fascination of the ceremony. The very word "ceremony" reminds us that a wedding is one of the important occasions of one's life, that it is something deserving all the pageantry and ritual that the couple may wish to include. This sense of something more than simply an official procedure can be expressed more informally, too - in which case the "ritual" is quite relaxed and with simplicity and charm.
Whether the marriage ceremony is formal or informal, whether it is traditional or modern, there is no doubt that beautifully chosen music adds to the atmosphere and character of the ceremony - and a first-class celebrant can help the couple to choose the music that best fits their occasion.
How Much Music Should We Have?
A marriage ceremony is not restricted to use only a set number of musical pieces. In fact, some weddings - usually elaborate ones - can include a quite astonishing amount of music. Some - very simple ones - might opt to include virtually no music. But my recommendation as an Authorised Marriage Celebrant is that the couple include a minimum of one piece, to be performed or played during the Signing of the Register.
Many wedding ceremonies also have music played as the bride walks down the aisle; this is called the Bride's Processional. Equally many wedding ceremonies include music to be played as the bride and groom walk out together once the final words of the ceremony have been spoken; this is known as the Recessional.
These are not the only places in the ceremony where music may be played or performed. Before the ceremony begins, there may be music quietly played to set the mood or keep the guests entertained; hymns may be part of a religious marriage ceremony; more music may be included before the vows or after the vows; and so on. There really are no bars to having as much music as one wants, or as little music as one wants. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
The most frequently used musical layout in a wedding ceremony is thus as follows:
Processional music
Signing of the Register music
Recessional music
What Traditional Music Is Played At Weddings?
Both the Processional and the Recessional tend to be Wedding Marches - that is, pieces which have a graceful beat and ceremonial quality that adds to the atmosphere of a traditional wedding. A wide variety of pieces fall into this category; for example, the Wedding March from Wagner's Lohengrin, pieces from Handel's Water Music, the Pachelbel Canon in D, the Wedding March from Mendelssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream, virtually all Trumpet Voluntaries, to name but a few.
During the Signing of the Register, music by Mozart, Handel, Bach, Beethoven, Purcell, Monteverdi and many more can be used. The duration of this music should be at least 5 minutes.
Can Non-Classical Music Be Used In Weddings?
Couples may choose to include music from other cultures - Indian music, music from China or Japan, pop music from Italy or Volksmusik from Germany, for example. So much music can add quite a fascinating quality to the ceremony, and the sense of ceremony will not be diminished if the music is chosen for its meaningfulness to the couple.
Equally, the use of music not usually associated with weddings - rock and roll, country music, medieval music, any sort of music - can be used if the couple wishes. A first-class celebrant will be happy to explore whatever genre of music will be appropriate for the bridal couple, and can offer a multitude of suggestions.
Live Music Or Recorded Music?
Of course, the easiest (and least costly) method of including music in the ceremony is with the use of CDs. The Authorised Marriage Celebrant is able to use specially compiled CDs of music for the ceremony without breaching copyright, and of course will provide the audio equipment to enable the music CD to be heard by all the guests.
It is the celebrant's responsibility to organise the CD in the case of recorded music being used in the ceremony.
If the couple wishes to have musicians performing live and/or a singer performing live during the ceremony, it can add a very special quality to the wedding. The music choices would usually be decided upon by the couple with the help and advice of the Authorised Marriage Celebrant, and the celebrant may liaise with the performers on behalf of the couple. Alternatively, the couple may wish to speak directly with the performers.
The responsibility of hiring performers is the couple's. A first-class marriage celebrant will frequently have some excellent contacts with wonderful musicians who can do justice to the ceremony's musical requirements, and may be able to offer recommendations or suggestions to help the couple make their decision.
Is Music Necessary For The Wedding Rehearsal?
Because a wedding rehearsal is designed to sort out any potential problems beforehand, usually with a complete run-through, it is highly recommended for the music to be part of the ceremony. If a CD is being used, the celebrant will arrive for the rehearsal with the CD and the PA system, to make sure about volume, placement of the speaker, time length of the pieces, and so on.
If live music is to be played during the ceremony, it's strongly recommended that the musicians and singers be present at the rehearsal. They will need to know where they are placed for the ceremony, whether they are playing or singing loudly enough, at what points exactly they will be performing, and so on. To ensure that the ceremony runs as smoothly as possible, it is definitely worth having a complete run-through. The musicians and singers may charge an additional fee for this rehearsal, or it may be included in their fee; this is the responsibility of the couple.
Why Have Music?
The poet Longfellow said of music that it "is the universal language of mankind". Robert Browning described music as something that banishes aloneness: "He who hears music, feels his solitude peopled at once." Victor Hugo, the author of Les Misérables, said, "Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent." Tolstoy described it as "the shorthand of emotion". Anaïs Nin wrote that "Music melts all the separate parts of our bodies together". And Beethoven - well, for him it was an incredible intoxication that gave meaning to life: "Music is the wine which inspires one to new generative processes, and I am Bacchus who presses out this glorious wine for mankind and makes them spiritually drunken."
Because of this sense of marriage between great truth and music, and our emotions and music, music plays an incontrovertible part in the lives of virtually every human being. It is especially important during ceremonies that define us; it heightens our emotions gives meaning to the moment.
A wedding ceremony is unquestionably made more momentous and lovely if music plays upon the strings of silence, enhancing the words that make each marriage real and unique. A first-class marriage celebrant will be aware not only of the music pieces that can be perfectly added to your ceremony, but also of the greatest performances of those music pieces, so that you will be left with a sense of something almost beyond feeling - where the vows of your marriage are clarified and distilled to the very essence of meaning, to be remembered for the rest of your lives together.
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Electronic Music History and Today's Best Modern Proponents!
lectronic music history pre-dates the rock and roll era by decades. Most of us were not even on this planet when it began its often obscure, under-appreciated and misunderstood development. Today, this 'other worldly' body of sound which began close to a century ago, may no longer appear strange and unique as new generations have accepted much of it as mainstream, but it's had a bumpy road and, in finding mass audience acceptance, a slow one.
Many musicians - the modern proponents of electronic music - developed a passion for analogue synthesizers in the late 1970's and early 1980's with signature songs like Gary Numan's breakthrough, 'Are Friends Electric?'. It was in this era that these devices became smaller, more accessible, more user friendly and more affordable for many of us. In this article I will attempt to trace this history in easily digestible chapters and offer examples of today's best modern proponents.
To my mind, this was the beginning of a new epoch. To create electronic music, it was no longer necessary to have access to a roomful of technology in a studio or live. Hitherto, this was solely the domain of artists the likes of Kraftwerk, whose arsenal of electronic instruments and custom built gadgetry the rest of us could only have dreamed of, even if we could understand the logistics of their functioning. Having said this, at the time I was growing up in the 60's & 70's, I nevertheless had little knowledge of the complexity of work that had set a standard in previous decades to arrive at this point.
The history of electronic music owes much to Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928-2007). Stockhausen was a German Avante Garde composer and a pioneering figurehead in electronic music from the 1950's onwards, influencing a movement that would eventually have a powerful impact upon names such as Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream, Brain Eno, Cabaret Voltaire, Depeche Mode, not to mention the experimental work of the Beatles' and others in the 1960's. His face is seen on the cover of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", the Beatles' 1967 master Opus. Let's start, however, by traveling a little further back in time.
The Turn of the 20th Century
Time stood still for this stargazer when I originally discovered that the first documented, exclusively electronic, concerts were not in the 1970's or 1980's but in the 1920's!
The first purely electronic instrument, the Theremin, which is played without touch, was invented by Russian scientist and cellist, Lev Termen (1896-1993), circa 1919.
In 1924, the Theremin made its concert debut with the Leningrad Philharmonic. Interest generated by the theremin drew audiences to concerts staged across Europe and Britain. In 1930, the prestigious Carnegie Hall in New York, experienced a performance of classical music using nothing but a series of ten theremins. Watching a number of skilled musicians playing this eerie sounding instrument by waving their hands around its antennae must have been so exhilarating, surreal and alien for a pre-tech audience!
For those interested, check out the recordings of Theremin virtuoso Clara Rockmore (1911-1998). Lithuanian born Rockmore (Reisenberg) worked with its inventor in New York to perfect the instrument during its early years and became its most acclaimed, brilliant and recognized performer and representative throughout her life.
In retrospect Clara, was the first celebrated 'star' of genuine electronic music. You are unlikely to find more eerie, yet beautiful performances of classical music on the Theremin. She's definitely a favorite of mine!
Electronic Music in Sci-Fi, Cinema and Television
Unfortunately, and due mainly to difficulty in skill mastering, the Theremin's future as a musical instrument was short lived. Eventually, it found a niche in 1950's Sci-Fi films. The 1951 cinema classic "The Day the Earth Stood Still", with a soundtrack by influential American film music composer Bernard Hermann (known for Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho", etc.), is rich with an 'extraterrestrial' score using two Theremins and other electronic devices melded with acoustic instrumentation.
Using the vacuum-tube oscillator technology of the Theremin, French cellist and radio telegraphist, Maurice Martenot (1898-1980), began developing the Ondes Martenot (in French, known as the Martenot Wave) in 1928.
Employing a standard and familiar keyboard which could be more easily mastered by a musician, Martenot's instrument succeeded where the Theremin failed in being user-friendly. In fact, it became the first successful electronic instrument to be used by composers and orchestras of its period until the present day. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
It is featured on the theme to the original 1960's TV series "Star Trek", and can be heard on contemporary recordings by the likes of Radiohead and Brian Ferry.
The expressive multi-timbral Ondes Martenot, although monophonic, is the closest instrument of its generation I have heard which approaches the sound of modern synthesis.
"Forbidden Planet", released in 1956, was the first major commercial studio film to feature an exclusively electronic soundtrack... aside from introducing Robbie the Robot and the stunning Anne Francis! The ground-breaking score was produced by husband and wife team Louis and Bebe Barron who, in the late 1940's, established the first privately owned recording studio in the USA recording electronic experimental artists such as the iconic John Cage (whose own Avante Garde work challenged the definition of music itself!).
The Barrons are generally credited for having widening the application of electronic music in cinema. A soldering iron in one hand, Louis built circuitry which he manipulated to create a plethora of bizarre, 'unearthly' effects and motifs for the movie. Once performed, these sounds could not be replicated as the circuit would purposely overload, smoke and burn out to produce the desired sound result.
Consequently, they were all recorded to tape and Bebe sifted through hours of reels edited what was deemed usable, then re-manipulated these with delay and reverberation and creatively dubbed the end product using multiple tape decks.
In addition to this laborious work method, I feel compelled to include that which is, arguably, the most enduring and influential electronic Television signature ever: the theme to the long running 1963 British Sci-Fi adventure series, "Dr. Who". It was the first time a Television series featured a solely electronic theme. The theme to "Dr. Who" was created at the legendary BBC Radiophonic Workshop using tape loops and test oscillators to run through effects, record these to tape, then were re-manipulated and edited by another Electro pioneer, Delia Derbyshire, interpreting the composition of Ron Grainer.
As you can see, electronic music's prevalent usage in vintage Sci-Fi was the principle source of the general public's perception of this music as being 'other worldly' and 'alien-bizarre sounding'. This remained the case till at least 1968 with the release of the hit album "Switched-On Bach" performed entirely on a Moog modular synthesizer by Walter Carlos (who, with a few surgical nips and tucks, subsequently became Wendy Carlos).
The 1970's expanded electronic music's profile with the break through of bands like Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream, and especially the 1980's when it found more mainstream acceptance.
The Mid 1900's: Musique Concrete
In its development through the 1900's, electronic music was not solely confined to electronic circuitry being manipulated to produce sound. Back in the 1940's, a relatively new German invention - the reel-to-reel tape recorder developed in the 1930's - became the subject of interest to a number of Avante Garde European composers, most notably the French radio broadcaster and composer Pierre Schaeffer (1910-1995) who developed a montage technique he called Musique Concrete.
Musique Concrete (meaning 'real world' existing sounds as opposed to artificial or acoustic ones produced by musical instruments) broadly involved the splicing together of recorded segments of tape containing 'found' sounds - natural, environmental, industrial and human - and manipulating these with effects such as delay, reverb, distortion, speeding up or slowing down of tape-speed (varispeed), reversing, etc.
Stockhausen actually held concerts utilizing his Musique Concrete works as backing tapes (by this stage electronic as well as 'real world' sounds were used on the recordings) on top of which live instruments would be performed by classical players responding to the mood and motifs they were hearing!
Musique Concrete had a wide impact not only on Avante Garde and effects libraries, but also on the contemporary music of the 1960's and 1970's. Important works to check are the Beatles' use of this method in ground-breaking tracks like 'Tomorrow Never Knows', 'Revolution No. 9' and 'Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite', as well as Pink Floyd albums "Umma Gumma", "Dark Side of the Moon" and Frank Zappa's "Lumpy Gravy". All used tape cut-ups and home-made tape loops often fed live into the main mixdown.
Today this can be performed with simplicity using digital sampling, but yesterday's heroes labored hours, days and even weeks to perhaps complete a four minute piece! For those of us who are contemporary musicians, understanding the history of electronic music helps in appreciating the quantum leap technology has taken in the recent period. But these early innovators, these pioneers - of which there are many more down the line - and the important figures they influenced that came before us, created the revolutionary groundwork that has become our electronic musical heritage today and for this I pay them homage!
1950's: The First Computer and Synth Play Music
Moving forward a few years to 1957 and enter the first computer into the electronic mix. As you can imagine, it wasn't exactly a portable laptop device but consumed a whole room and user friendly wasn't even a concept. Nonetheless creative people kept pushing the boundaries. One of these was Max Mathews (1926 -) from Bell Telephone Laboratories, New Jersey, who developed Music 1, the original music program for computers upon which all subsequent digital synthesis has its roots based. Mathews, dubbed the 'Father of Computer Music', using a digital IBM Mainframe, was the first to synthesize music on a computer.
In the climax of Stanley Kubrik's 1968 movie '2001: A Space Odyssey', use is made of a 1961 Mathews' electronic rendition of the late 1800's song 'Daisy Bell'. Here the musical accompaniment is performed by his programmed mainframe together with a computer-synthesized human 'singing' voice technique pioneered in the early 60's. In the movie, as HAL the computer regresses, 'he' reverts to this song, an homage to 'his' own origins.
1957 also witnessed the first advanced synth, the RCA Mk II Sound Synthesizer (an improvement on the 1955 original). It also featured an electronic sequencer to program music performance playback. This massive RCA Synth was installed, and still remains, at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center, New York, where the legendary Robert Moog worked for a while. Universities and Tech laboratories were the main home for synth and computer music experimentation in that early era.
1960's: The Dawning of The Age of Moog
The logistics and complexity of composing and even having access to what were, until then, musician unfriendly synthesizers, led to a demand for more portable playable instruments. One of the first to respond, and definitely the most successful, was Robert Moog (1934-2005). His playable synth employed the familiar piano style keyboard.
Moog's bulky telephone-operators' cable plug-in type of modular synth was not one to be transported and set up with any amount of ease or speed! But it received an enormous boost in popularity with the success of Walter Carlos, as previously mentioned, in 1968. His LP (Long Player) best seller record "Switched-On Bach" was unprecedented because it was the first time an album appeared of fully synthesized music, as opposed to experimental sound pieces.
The album was a complex classical music performance with various multi-tracks and overdubs necessary, as the synthesizer was only monophonic! Carlos also created the electronic score for "A Clockwork Orange", Stanley Kubrik's disturbing 1972 futuristic film.
From this point, the Moog synth is prevalent on a number of late 1960's contemporary albums. In 1967 the Monkees' "Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd" became the first commercial pop album release to feature the modular Moog. In fact, singer/drummer Mickey Dolenz purchased one of the very first units sold.
It wasn't until the early 1970's, however, when the first Minimoog appeared that interest seriously developed amongst musicians. This portable little unit with a fat sound had a significant impact becoming part of live music kit for many touring musicians for years to come. Other companies such as Sequential Circuits, Roland and Korg began producing their own synths, giving birth to a music subculture.
I cannot close the chapter on the 1960's, however, without reference to the Mellotron. This electronic-mechanical instrument is often viewed as the primitive precursor to the modern digital sampler.
Developed in early 1960's Britain and based on the Chamberlin (a cumbersome US-designed instrument from the previous decade), the Mellotron keyboard triggered pre-recorded tapes, each key corresponding to the equivalent note and pitch of the pre-loaded acoustic instrument.
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Earn BIG Money In Your Music Career By Avoiding These Common Mistakes
If you think that making a good living in the music business by finding the most efficient ways of earning money is 'unethical'...go ahead and exit this page right now.
However, if you have a strong desire for music and want to pursue it as a career...you've come to the right place. Fact is, most musicians do NOT know how to earn good money in the music business. As a result, they end up working outside of the music industry in a job that they aren't satisfied with. In this article I will help you to avoid the pitfalls that prevent most musicians from making a living in their music career, so that you can realize your potential with music.
In reality, making A LOT of money in the music business is not as hard as it might seem (and is NOT something reserved for rock stars only), however, if you want to achieve this for yourself you will need to think with an alternate mindset than most musicians.
The reason why so many musicians do not make much money with music is because they are not aware that music is a business (and needs to be treated as such). These people fail because they are not mentally ready to achieve great things in the music industry.
Besides not approaching their music careers with an understanding of the business side of things, the majority of musicians do not earn a lot of money in the music industry due to making the following mistakes:
Thinking That Popularity = Making A Lot Of Money In The Music Industry
Fact is, the majority of musicians who are 'making it' in the music industry are NOT rock stars. chrisbitten Being part of a popular band does not mean that you will be earning a great living. The truth is that some musicians (who are very popular) still work side jobs just to get by. By understanding this, you will be able to push 'fame' aside in order to focus on the most effective ways to work toward your goal of making a good living in music. Of course it is possible to both be famous AND make a lot of money in the music industry, however it is most important at this point to focus your efforts on the appropriate aspects of your goal.
Not Working To Continually Add Value To Others In The Music Business
There is one very important concept to understand if you are going to pursue a career in music. Whether you are a touring musician, music teacher, producer, session player, songwriter, or are involved in any other occupation, the people who will pay you money to work with you will need to have a reason to pick you from the thousands of other musicians following the same path. At first, this may seem pretty hopeless, but in reality the amount of competition you face is not a major factor. Why is this? Fact is, most musicians are too busy focusing on their musical skills while not focusing on building as much "value" around themselves as possible. Your musical skills (no matter how great they may be) are only ONE element of "value". The other elements (that most musicians do not focus on) include your work ethic, temperament, business savvy and reliability just to name a few. To make yourself the absolute best choice to work together with a music company, you must work to build up a massive amount of value so that any of the musicians competing against you will pale in comparison. This means that when a music company considers working with you, it must be OBVIOUS that there is no other choice.
Right now you may be thinking that this is a simple concept to understand (and you are right!). However, in spite of this, the overwhelming majority of musicians do not take action to do this in their music careers on a daily basis. As long as you have the ability to continually add high amounts of value for anyone in the music business, you will have great potential to make a lot of money. It is for this reason that I train all of the musicians in my music industry mentoring program to develop a mindset for adding value within everything they do.
Not Establishing Multiple Sources Of Music Related Income
Almost all musicians enter into the music business with the same mindset they have used while looking for a regular job. This means they only expect to make a single source of income from touring or releasing music albums.
Of course, there is nothing wrong with this approach to making money. However, relying "only" on these avenues is very limiting and makes it difficult to continually make a comfortable living as a musician. Fortunately, it is quite simple to create many different sources of income for yourself that add up to give you a very stable and sustainable career in the music business. No matter what your main goal is in the music industry, whether it be touring in a band, selling albums, producing records, etc...you will need to have various sources that are bringing in money for you in both passive and active ways. By having multiple sources of income, you will gain a lot of security and won't need to rely on a single income stream to make a living. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
Not Knowing Your Goals And Not Having A Plan To Reach Them
To earn more money in your music career, you must set specific goals and have a strategy in place for reaching them. Don't simply have vague ideas of wanting to be a professional musician. Instead, you must focus on what you want out of music. To get started, answer the questions below:
What do you want your annual music career income to be?
What are the various sources of income that will allow you to reach your goal in question #1?
What action must you take in order to set up these sources of income?
What is every possible way that you can add high levels of value to each interaction you have in the music business?
What is every possible way that you can eliminate risk for other people in the music business?
Once you have answered each of the questions above, you must make every step in your music career go toward the specific goals you have determined for yourself.
The majority of musicians struggle to identify exactly 'what' they must do to get their desired results in the music industry. Additionally, once they know 'what' to do, they struggle to understand 'how' to use this knowledge effectively. If you are in this same situation, the best action that you can take is to find a great mentor who can train you to achieve success in your music career and make a lot of money in the music industry. By doing this, you will avoid wasting your time and effort on the same frustrating mistakes that other musicians make.
Not Properly Identifying Who You Are Marketing To
After you understand the value you are ready to offer in the music business, you must know WHO you are going to give it to. For instance, if you are ready to put out your new album, or create a new instructional service or product on your website, who are the people that are going to purchase it? Do you have a way to get in touch with these people? If not, what steps are you taking now to build a database of your fans/customers? If your goal is to work as a session musician, have you already spent time to write down all the musicians, studios, and bands that might be looking for someone to work with? What are you going to do today to get the attention of your potential customers?
If you are at all like the majority of musicians, you likely have not invested much time into determining who your market is. As a result, here is what is likely to happen: you spend a lot of time and energy to create music or instructional products, but don't make much money from your musical efforts since you don't already have a database of customers who are willing to buy what you have to offer.
Since this is such a major factor for success in music business careers, I spend a great deal of time showing musicians in my music business mentoring program how to build a database and use it to make a good living in music.
You might believe that being signed with a music company means that you do not need to work to promote yourself, build a list of fans, or find ways to earn money. However, in reality these companies are not responsible for your music career, and will not do this for you. The key to achieving success and earning a lot of money in the music industry is for YOU to take action and build your database. This way all your customers/fans are controlled by you.
Ending Thoughts
There are many musicians who view the music business as 'deceptive' or 'wrong' because it involves making money from one's passion rather than giving it away for free. These people likely spend their time focusing on songwriting skills or improving their abilities on their instrument. Although these are important things to work on, it is also critical to focus on improving your 'music business skills' if you want to earn enough money from music without needing a day job just to get by.
Even though there is no way to predict (in a single article) the specific path you must take to make a great living in the music industry, if you avoid the mistakes mentioned here you will be much more likely to achieve financial freedom in your music career. The good news is that when you do start making a stable living as a professional musician, you will be able to spend more time on that which drew you to the music industry in the first place: making music.
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The Seven Different Types of Written Music
As a bassist, bandleader, teacher, and music copyist, I've worked with hundreds of singers throughout the years. Though working musicians know hundreds of tunes, singers need to have good charts in order to have their music played the way they want. I define a "good chart" as a piece of written music that effectively tells the musicians what they should play.
Written music comes in seven basic forms: chord charts, sheet music, songbooks, lead sheets, fake books, master rhythm charts and fully notated parts.
As a musician has a responsibility to play the chart before him correctly, the supplier of the chart has the responsibility of providing the right kind of chart. Knowing what type of chart to use for what kind of tune or gig is very important.
This article explains what the different types of charts are, and under what circumstances to use them. I hope you find it useful.
TYPES OF CHARTS
Charts can be simple or elaborate according to the style of music and type of gig. Cover tunes are traditionally learned from recordings; classical and choral music can be found in sheet music stores as well as in various music catalogs; numerous tunes will be found in music books of all kinds; and many public libraries carry recordings and written music for your use.
The word "chart" refers to any piece of written music or any arrangement (music that has been adapted in a unique manner) of a tune. Decades ago it was strictly a "cool" slang term for a tune, but any piece of music could be called a chart these days, though a classical buff might not refer to a Mozart work as a "chart."
Knowing what type of chart to use for what kind of tune is very important. When you're playing a gig and someone hands you a chart -- it is what it is and you either read it well or not. But, if you buy charts, have them made for you or provide them yourself, you need to know which kinds to use for which situations. Years back, while doing singer showcases, singers brought in all kinds of charts: good ones, bad ones, incorrect ones, inappropriate ones, and it was a real pain. The singers who provided the right kinds of charts got their music played the way they wanted. The singers who had the wrong kinds of charts didn't, and weren't very happy about it. Unless a musician already knows the specific parts, he can only play according to what's on the chart before him. Though a good musician can improvise a good part in any style, if a specific musical line needs to be played, it needs to be written out.
As a musician has a responsibility to correctly play the chart before him, the supplier of the chart has the responsibility of providing an appropriate one.
Without getting into too many music notation specifics, here are the different kinds of charts and when they are used:
1. CHORD CHARTS
A chord chart contains the chords, meter (how the song is counted, e.g., in 4 or in 3 (like a waltz), and the form of the song (the exact order of the sections). This type of chart is primarily used when: 1. the specific musical parts are improvised or already known, but the form and chords need to be referred to, 2. to provide chords to improvise over, or 3. when a last-minute chart needs to be written, and there isn't time for anything more elaborate.
A chord chart does not contain the melody or any specific instrumental parts to be played. To play from simple chord charts a musician basically needs to have steady time, know the chords, and improvise his part in whatever style the tune is in.
2. SHEET MUSIC
Sheet music is a store-bought version of a song printed by a publisher, which contains the instrumental part, chords, lyrics, melody and form. An instrumental piece will, of course, have just the music. Sheet music is written for both piano and guitar. Guitar sheet music is in standard notation (often classical), as well as in TAB. A good piece of sheet music will always say whether it's for piano or guitar. Most sheet music is not meant to be completely representative of the actual recording, and the actual arrangement that you've heard on a recording is seldom present.
Many people have experienced the frustration of getting the sheet music to a song they like, playing it, and discovering that the chords are different from the recording, and sometimes the form is too. Unfortunately that's the way it is a lot, and it could be for a number of different reasons. To get the exact arrangement and chords, you need to do a "takedown" of the song: learn it by ear. A takedown is when you listen to a piece of music and write it down. Takedowns can range from simple chord charts to elaborate orchestral parts or anything in between. In order to do good takedowns, you need to have good ears, understand and be fluid with music notation to the complexity of the type of music you're working with, and preferably understand music (the more the better). Having "good ears" consists of recognizing and understanding the music, whether heard on the radio, played by another musician, or heard in your head.
3. SONGBOOKS
Songbooks are compilations of many tunes and often contain the same information that sheet music does, along with the chords and arrangement being different from the recording most of the time. Sheet music commonly has full introductions and endings, whereas songbook tunes are generally shortened to create space in the book for more tunes. Sheet music is generally written to be played on a keyboard, but songbooks come in different styles and for different instruments. They are compiled by artist, style, decade, and in various collections including movie themes, Broadway hits, etc.
Songbooks are a good reference source when other, more exact charts are unavailable. For example: I needed two movie themes for a gig once (client request). Instead of spending $8 for two tunes of sheet music, I bought a book of movie themes for $16 that contained over a hundred tunes. Sheet music and songbooks are pretty unusable at gigs because of cumbersome page turns and bulkiness; but in an emergency you use them and do what you can. If having to use sheet music or songbooks for live performance, either: 1. recopy the tune onto 1-3 pages or 2. photocopy it and tape the pages together (although, strictly speaking, this may be considered copyright infringement). Make sure to always provide a copy for each musician.
To play from songbooks and sheet music, a musician needs to be able to read the music notation, or at least improvise a part from the chord symbols, i.e., a guitar strum, bass groove, piano groove, etc., or better yet, both. A vocalist can sing the words if they know the melody, or be able to read the notated melody if they don't know it.
4. LEAD SHEETS
Lead sheets contain the chords, lyrics and melody line of the song and are mainly used by singers, accompanists and arrangers, though they appear on the bandstand now and again. Songwriters use lead sheets to copyright their songs, and very often sheet music includes a lead sheet of the tune as a condensed version to use. Instead of having three to six pages of sheet music to turn, a lead sheet is usually one or two pages long. Lead sheets do not contain any music notation except the melody and chords, so a musician needs to know how to improvise when reading from one. A lead sheet is generally written out by a music copyist, who is someone who specializes in preparing written music. Playing from lead sheets minimally requires playing an accompaniment from the chords and understanding the form directions and symbols (the markings telling you to go to the verse or the chorus or the end, etc.) and maximally having excellent accompaniment skills and reading notation fluidly.
5. FAKE BOOKS
A fake book is a large book of tunes that contain only the melody line, lyrics and chords. There's no piano part, guitar part or bass part. That's why they call it a fake book. You have to already know your parts, or improvise them in the style of the tune. Some people call that "faking it." Faking it means to be musically adept enough to be able to follow along by ear and figure it out as you go: that's one of the reasons for ear training. When a person's ears "get trained", they learn to recognize and understand the relationship of pitches and musical elements. With this understanding you can "hear" your way through tunes, even if you haven't heard them before, you fake it. However, when you don't hear so well, you're really faking it!
Before there was an abundance of legal fake books on the market, there was an abundance of illegal fake books on the streets. (As of this writing, I've only seen a few at gigs.) Since a working musician needs to have access to a large number of tunes at gigs, musicians compiled books of hundreds of useful tunes containing only melody lines and chords. A working player doesn't need all the notes written out, because he can improvise, so large books were made with choice tunes. Some fake books are hand copied, either by a pro copyist or casually done with pen or pencil, while others consist of cut up sheet music where all the piano parts are removed, leaving the melody and chords, all for the purpose of condensing space.
Rather than take stacks of songbooks to gigs, you pop a fake book of hundreds of choice tunes into your gig bag and off you go. A tune taking up five or six pages in songbook/sheet music form can take up a page or less when rewritten by hand or cut up, leaving only the chords and melody. Fake books are often used and I've seldom been at a casual where someone hasn't had at least one.
The reason the illegal books are illegal is copyright laws. With the homemade books, nothing goes through the publishing houses that own the rights to the tunes, so neither the publishers nor the composers get paid for their use. The Catch-22 over the years has been the fact that there weren't any good legal fake books that pro musicians could use at a gig. In a songbook of 200 tunes, maybe ten were usable. So, the players made their own, and gigging musicians lived happily ever after. But since making these books is illegal, some decades ago a few nationwide distributors were arrested and fined for copyright infringement. But you still see the illegal books on the bandstands, nonetheless.
Over the years many legal fake books have been published and are very good. There are music books for: pop, jazz, rock, country, specific artists and movie themes, and there are special wedding books with all the key music that brides like. Big sheet music stores should have them all. And recently, some of the most popular illegal fake books have been made legal. (Hooray!) The 5th Edition Real Book is an example. Filled largely with jazz tunes, the book is in the original format, but published legally as the 6th Edition Real Book.
Legal fake books are plentiful at sheet music stores, and illegal books... well, you're on your own. Trade magazines and music union papers often advertise a wide variety of music books as well as joke books, ethnic music and other related entertainment materials. Sometimes instrument stores carry fake books as well.
Fake books are good to have, but the more tunes a musician knows, the better.
6. MASTER RHYTHM CHARTS
Master rhythm charts are charts designed for the rhythm section (piano, bass, guitar and drums). It is one chart that contains the general idea for everybody to play from: a sketch of the tune, a master copy of it all for each player. These charts are like elaborate chord charts with just enough specifics on them to make the music either feel and sound more like the original recording, or to provide just enough specifics to make it interesting and recognizable, leaving the rest to improvising.
Unless a tune is composed or arranged in this style to begin with, which many are, these charts are written by someone doing a takedown from a recording, or created from lead sheets or songbooks. Whereas lead sheets are primarily for the singer, master rhythm charts are primarily for the musicians. When a singer provides charts to the musicians in the band, these are the usual ones to use.
A master rhythm chart contains:
• All the chords
• Key rhythms (the main rhythms)
• Key melodic parts for the instruments
• Key lyrics for reference if desired
• Key background vocals if present
• Dynamics-how loud, how soft, etc.
• Any form, clarifying instructions and symbols needed to ensure a good performance of the tune.
All styles of popular music use master rhythm charts, and it's common to have one along with a lead sheet for each tune when a singer is involved. Master rhythm chart reading, and writing, entails improvising fluidly in the style of the tune, and requires fluid notation reading abilities.
7. NOTATED PARTS
When the music needs to be extremely specific it will be fully notated. Everything that needs to be played is written on the page. What to play, when to play it and how to play it: the notes, rhythms, dynamics, and any and all notational expressions, such as tempos (how fast or slow), who cues what, etc. Most professional recording sessions and shows require fluid note reading and provide individual parts for each instrument.
LYRIC SHEETS WITH CHORDS
Though they are not written music, lyric sheets with chords deserve a mention.
Singers who play an instrument often use lyric sheets with chord symbols written above the words. For a singer/musician these are very useful, and are often used. I've used them myself.
Musicians reading these charts, however, can do well if they are familiar with the song, but this leaves a very large margin for error. Very often the chords are over the wrong words, or the chords are wrong or incomplete: very dicey business. Musicians like specifics. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
My students use these all the time, and there are a number of Internet sites with thousands of lyric sheets you can download. For certain situations they are very handy!
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How To Gain Music Fans And Build Promoting Skills
Would you like to know how to gain more music fans? Do you wish you knew the secret to building a huge following? Would you like to know the best way to promote yourself as a musician? If you want to achieve long lasting success in the music industry, it is absolutely essential that you have a lot of dedicated fans who are interested in what you do as a musician. In order to do this, you must learn the most effective methods for promoting both yourself and your music.
However, the answer to "How do I get more fans and promote my music career?" is not easily found by taking a highly generalized approach that 'seems' to work for other musicians. At any given moment, you (or the band you play in) may be struggling with various unique challenges that would require that you take specific actions in order to get more fans or strengthen your promotional efforts. That said, no matter where you are in your music career and what challenges you face, you have 3 goals to achieve if you want to both gain more music fans and promote your music:
You have to get more people to check out your music.
Once someone listens to your music, you need them to help support you in some manner (buying your albums, watching you live, purchasing any merchandise, etc.)
You need to transform your fans into totally fanatics who will use word of mouth to tell all their friends about you and your music.
No matter what it is that you are trying to achieve in the music business, the three goals mentioned above will apply to anything you do as long as you are trying to develop a strong relationship with your fans.
These goals may all seem to be separate from one another; however, they are in fact all connected. Once you are able to achieve success with any single one of them, you will greatly improve your chances for success with any of the others. As soon as you truly 'get' this basic truth, you will find it much easier to be productive in your efforts. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
In order to achieve great success as you promote you music to your fans, you must learn how to think in a strategic manner rather than just taking inconsistent and isolated actions (a mistake that most musicians and bands make). Instead of trying to find a general formula that you can apply to help you get more fans for your music, you need to begin thinking in the same manner as most professional musicians. While training other musicians to succeed in their music careers, I help them understand how to find creative ideas that they can apply in their own music career in order to quickly gain more music fans. Once you gain the ability to think this way in your own music career, it will become much easier for you to overcome any obstacles that stand in the way of your promotional efforts.
To illustrate what I mean and give you various steps (that you can take right now to get more music fans), here are some quick and easy things you can do to accomplish all three of the music promotion goals mentioned above.
To get you on the path to gaining more music fans and expanding upon your current music promotion efforts, I will now show you various things that you can do yourself to accomplish the three goals mentioned above.
OK, now that you have finished the assessment above, continue reading to find several actionable steps below that you can use to promote your music. While you are reading through them, do not focus as much on the actions themselves; instead think creatively to see the ideas and thinking 'behind' the actions to understand why they are so effective. This will keep you from simply 'copying' them and will lead you to come up with ideas that you can benefit from in your specific music career situation.
Music Promotion Action Step: Get more people to listen to your music.
Solution #1: Join other musicians in participating in a compilation CD. After you have released a compilation album, you have achieved a couple of important things. First, you have successfully produced a record that contains your own music. Second, not only have you gained a tool to promote yourself to your fans, but you have gained a tool that potentially promotes you to every other musician's fans on the album (with no additional effort on your part). Remember, the goal of this is not to make money directly, but rather to use the album as a very inexpensive tool to promote your music (and the music of the other musicians) to more people on a larger scale. You can also apply this idea as a way to leverage your own album releases and products to a bigger list of fans. The idea of "leverage" (using one action to gain multiple benefits) is absolutely critical if you want to achieve a high level of success in your music career. This is something I help members in my Music Careers Mentoring Program develop and refine.
Solution #2: Work together with other musicians locally. Instead of considering other local musicians to be your competition (for gaining more fans), work together with local musical artists of a similar genre to help you gain access to larger amount of fans who are interested in hearing and seeing you play music. One method for achieving this is to work with another band to perform at the same venue in an effort to bring together the fan base of both bands. By doing this, you will not only improve your relationship with the owner of the venue (because you are bringing in more people), but you will have the opportunity to advertise your music to the other band's fan base (and them to yours). This idea is very fundamental, but in reality not many bands take initiative to actually go out and do it. On top of that, many bands make the mistake of sharing the venue with other bands who are not in their target market, or with bands who do not make a strong effort to attract their fans to the venue (thus taking away the mutual benefit). One example of pulling this idea off (which is fairly common in the music business) is when a band with a small following becomes and opening act for a much larger band. However, if you cannot find a highly successful band to open for you can still achieve this; you will need to simply find a band that contains musicians who have enough ambition to take ACTION and implement this strategy.
Music Promotion Action Step: Get your fans to take specific actions.
Solution #1: Make sure that people have incentive to both be a fan of your music AND purchase your music. Those who have mastered the ability to successfully promote music find ways to get their fan base to buy their music as opposed to downloading it online for free. Additionally, they are able to take an average listener and turn him/her into a loyal fan. A great way to do this is to offer something special to people who actually BUY your music (that cannot be obtained by simply downloading it for free). To effectively do this, it is important that whatever you are offering cannot be easily reproduced through digital media. This could include things such as VIP passes to your concerts, merchandise or other creative and unique items. The main thing to get out this idea is that you can implement a single strategy to achieve good music promotion while also developing a stronger relationship between you and your fans.
Solution #2: Become familiar with your current fan base. It is easy to successfully promote yourself as a musician when you can put yourself out there to those who already give you their support whenever you pursue new projects in your musical career. Most musicians think that their biggest problem is a lack of music fans, when in fact, they simply do not know who their real fans are and how to get in touch with them. Instead of contacting these specific fans, a lot of musicians focus their efforts on the general public. The truth is, this approach can work; however, promoting your music in this manner will cost a great deal of money and time. To dramatically cut down on your costs with regards to money, energy and time; make your musical promotion more effective by finding an easy way to stay in touch with your fan base at all times.
Music Promotion Action Step: Transform your current fans into FANATICS
Solution #1: Put together special gatherings or events that immerse your fans in your music and engage them on a whole new level (in contrast to merely listening to your music or watching you live). There a nearly endless ways for you to do this - limited only by your own willingness to be creative. However, remember the key is to develop your relationship with your music fans.
Solution #2: Focus on rewarding your most loyal fans with unique gifts that casual listeners don't have access to. This concept can be used together with the first point described above or as an idea by itself. If you'd like for your music fans to take a particular action (for example bringing more people to your performances or to purchase your albums), focus on finding something of high value that you can offer them that goes beyond the scope of music. (Remember: Your music fans do not necessarily want free money or t-shirts... think of something specific to offer them)
As you have read, once you take a more detailed approach to understanding specifically what it is that you want to do when it comes to "gaining more music fans", it's a lot easier to understand specifically which action steps you must perform to make this happen. The majority of musicians only think about improving their music while trying to appeal to the general public, but doing this is only one aspect of musical promotion. Of course, your music is important; however there are aspects of your music career that you must work on in order to effectively get more fans for your music. As soon as you begin focusing on these aspects, you will start to gain much greater results in your music promotion efforts.
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The Top 5 Myths About Making It In The Music Business
Are you searching for ways to make it in the music industry? In order to break into the music business and develop a long-lasting, successful career, it is important to (first) eliminate all of the misinformation you have heard about becoming a pro musician. Truth is, believing in music industry 'myths' will cause you to waste time, energy and money while never getting any closer to your music career goals.
People in the music industry are sent tons of mail each day containing recordings and other materials from talented musicians. Most of these musicians have spent their whole life working on their musical skills in order to get signed to a recording contract. Unfortunately, 99% of these musicians will not get signed, nor will they even hear back from the companies they send their music to. In many cases, music companies throw away a lot of the materials they receive from random musicians. chrisbitten This results in a lot of frustration for most musicians and leaves them wondering why they work hard on their musical skills but can't seem to break into the music industry.
On the other hand, there are plenty of musicians who DO become successful in the music industry. Building a fulfilling and profitable music career is actually not as difficult as it may seem. However, the majority of musicians do not succeed because they believe in false 'conventional wisdom' about the music industry that ruins their chances of achieving their musical dreams. To break into the music industry and become successful, you must avoid the following music career building approaches that most people consider 'common sense':
1. Pursuing A Music Degree In Order To Become Successful In The Music Business
One of the most common music career myths is thinking that a music degree is the key to becoming a successful professional musician. It's true that you can learn a lot about 'music' by going to university to get a music degree. However, if you go to college to get a music degree for the sole purpose of making it in the music industry, you are almost guaranteed to fail because:
Most music courses do not cover the specific topic of 'how to build a music career'. Even if you take classes about music business, they will only present you with a general model of how the music business works. They will NOT show you exactly how to build a successful career for yourself (by keeping your personal goals in mind). In fact, there are tons of musicians who graduate from big music universities only to realize that they are still clueless when it comes to actually earning a living through music. If you go to university with the intention of getting into the music business with a degree, you will 'at best' learn a lot about music - but end up back at square one in terms of building a music career. At worst, you will also have enormous amounts of fees and debts to pay back.
People who work in the music industry are not concerned with whether you have a music degree or not. To them, it is MUCH more important that you know how to help them build their music careers, earn more money and become more successful (this requires a lot more than just musical talent).
In reality, very few professional musicians have music degrees because they simply never needed them. They made it in the music business by working together with a mentor who trained them in all the skills they needed to build value for others and earn a great living in music.
2. Taking Music Career Advice From Others Who Have Never Succeeded In The Music Industry
Chances are, you have already received a lot of advice from the people in your life about what you should do to become successful in your music career. Most people will be happy to give out 'expert' tips or conventional wisdom even when they really have no authority to do so. Generally speaking, these people are sincere in wanting to help you, but since they have never achieved anything significant in the music industry, their advice is more likely to send you down the wrong path than to lead you toward success.
Consider this: Asking people for music career advice (when they have never actually succeeded in the music business) is like training for a marathon with a trainer who hasn't run a mile in his life or asking your dentist for legal advice. Additionally, asking advice from musicians who attempted to succeed in music (and failed) is equally as dangerous for your music career. Although these people are perfectly willing to tell you how you should build your music career, they do not really have the authority to do so - they will only lead you down the same path they took (which ended in failure).
Truly successful musicians do not build their careers from the 'conventional wisdom' of people they know or amateur musicians who never made it. They work together with a mentor who has already achieved great success and can use his experience to help them effectively reach their music career goals.
3. 'Playing It Safe' By Working A Full Time Job And Doing Music On The Side
Most musicians think that the only way to break into the music industry is to work at a safe and secure job while pursuing music on the side. In many cases, they are lead to believe that they can only attempt to get into the music industry once they have saved up enough money (many years down the road). Unfortunately, when people use this approach they end up getting stuck working 40 hours per week and never find the time to work on music. After training many musicians around the world to succeed in the music industry, I have seen this happen countless times. The reality is, you only have a finite amount of energy to spend during your day. When you spend it primarily working at a job that is unrelated to music, you will not have any left to go toward making progress to become a successful professional musician. The worst part is, musicians who take this approach fail to become successful in music and feel a lot of regret and resentment later on in life. There is nothing worse than this.
To build a successful long-term career in the music industry, you make your music career your #1 focus and plan for it accordingly. If you work a lot of hours at your job and have little time to pursue your musical goals, there is a problem. In fact, many musicians have been in this same situation and gone on to become professional musicians. You too, can overcome this. The best way to break into the music industry while working a full time job is to create a backup plan centered around your main music career goals. This plan should gradually help you transition away from your job in a safe and secure manner while giving you more time to work on music AND keeping you financially stable along the way.
4. Trying To Make It In Music On Your Own
One of the biggest mistakes you can make when trying to make it in the music industry is attempting to build your music career by yourself. This is the approach that leads countless musicians to failure. Why? Because when you try to build your music career alone you are forced to either 'guess' about which actions you should take next or copy what someone else is doing (and 'hope' that it works). Without the expert guidance of a mentor who has already gained many years of experience as a highly successful musician, it is nearly impossible to 'guess' the correct course of action you must take to further your music career. In addition, it will not help you to copy what 'seems to be working' for others because their situation is different from yours - what works for them will not necessarily work for you. If you use these approaches, you will eventually:
Stop trying to break into the music industry and continue working at a full time day job for the rest of your life. OR...
Spend many years trying to succeed in the music business while becoming increasingly frustrated because you can't seem to make any progress.
5. Hoping To 'Get Discovered' By Uploading Your Music Online
When it comes to breaking into the music industry, most musicians immediately wonder how they can put themselves out there to new fans, record labels and music companies. In an effort to do this, they upload their music to as many websites as possible thinking that this is what you are supposed to do to get noticed. The truth is, this approach will rarely get you even a handful of listeners, will not help you earn a good living as a musician and will 'never' get you heard by the right people in the music industry (who can help you move your career forward). Here are the reasons why most people who take this approach will fail:
They do not understand how to effectively promote themselves and their music.
They don't have thousands of enthusiastic fans waiting for the release of their new album.
They have no strategy for attracting new fans while simultaneously transforming their current fans into true FANATICS.
They do not have a strategy to help them earn a living through multiple sources of income at once.
Musicians who achieve the greatest success in their music careers do NOT merely upload their music online and wait around to get discovered. They create a strategy for working toward their musical goals while raising their personal value in the eyes of other in the music industry (by expanding their fan base and building other important music business skills). After doing this, they simply approach the companies they want to do business with and negotiate a partnership that will bring the most benefit to both sides of the deal.
If you are serious about breaking into the music industry and becoming a successful professional musician, it is imperative that you work together with a mentor as soon as possible. By doing this, you will reach your musical goals in much less time and finally be able to make a good living as a musician. http://www.chrisbitten.com/
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