INDIE Weekly

March 21, 2016

The INDIE Weekly is your source for news and creative ideas for independent artists and songwriters. This week we are providing tips for career musicians:

 

THE SCARY “S” WORD: Redefining Success as a Musician

BY RUSSELL SHEFFIELD: Too often, our first instinct when measuring “success” is by the amount of money that’s in your bank account. One year Joe Shmo is making 30K annually, and the next year he gets a raise to 45k. Now he’s more successful, right? However, in music you’ll notice that unlike most other professional fields, “success” is a far more intangible and complicated concept to measure. As with anything worth doing, huge risks must be taken. Sometimes that means that you might take a financial hit. But with an ethos of, first and foremost, cultivating real talent, success can be redefined. READ MORE

 

How To Book A Tour Without A Booking Agent

BY JOY IKE: One of the biggest challenges musicians face is booking tours. Many bands don’t have a booking agent, so booking a tour can seem like a daunting task the first time out. Don’t Be Overwhelmed. The first thing to remember is that you are only one person. If you’re trying to book a one month tour, break it off into pieces and do little sections at a time. Booking a long tour takes months of emailing and waiting, and emailing and waiting. You couldn’t do it in one sitting even if you tried. READ MORE

 

Lessons Learned From Noisetrade: Free and Legal Music Downloads

BY DAVID STROM: When it comes to downloading digital music, there is free and then there is legal, but seldom can you have both from the same site, and make money too. Noisetrade.com has been doing this for the past three years. Certainly, there are lots of other music download sites, and we have written most recently about Soundcloud, as one example. But it is worth looking at what Noisetrade is doing to see what could be the ideal small-business content download site. The site has more than 300,000 albums downloaded per month, covering mostly indie artists. Every track is free, once you enter your email address and zip code. You can pay via an online “tip jar” (the range of donation is from $1 to $100), but you don’t have to. You are emailed a link to a ZIP file of the album that expires in a few days, and that is about as easy as it gets. You can also recommend a particular album to your social network contacts too, but again, this is purely optional. READ MORE

 

We hope you find these articles helpful and informative! Please submit suggestions or contributions for this column to [email protected].

 

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About Christian Copyright Solutions: CCS’s quest is to help churches and Christian ministries “do music right.”  CCS is an expert on church music copyrights and our primary focus is providing licensing and clear educational resources to churches, as well as representation, administration and advocacy for copyright owners. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest. The information contained herein is for informational purposes only, and is not legal advice or a substitute for legal counsel.

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