Music Libraries and Film/TV
A big area of interest these days for independent and signed songwriters and artists alike is film and TV. The acquisition of music libraries is a current trend in the industry, and is of growing interest to those of us looking to gain exposure and increase our income from the music we create. I’d like [...]
Placing Songs and Creating Opportunities
The group I’ve helped develop has been together for a couple of years now and has been financed by a production studio in New York. The music is getting recognized by many important connects, but the image and sound of the group is not as successful. Since we have an abundance of songs, we [...]
How to Set Up a Songwriting Group
One of the most important things we can do to grow our songwriting careers is surround ourselves with a support system. Family and friends can be nice sounding boards when we’ve written a new tune, but we often don’t get the kind of feedback that is going to grow us as writers and push us [...]
Breaking Into Songwriting
I live in Philadelphia and I want to break into songwriting so bad – I am not sure if I can afford to take classes at the moment and wanted to know if you had an alternative or knew what I could do. I have been thinking about relocation to NYC to hone my skills, [...]
Baby, Baby, Where Did Our Craft Go?
I recently received an email from a fellow songwriter that raises some excellent questions about the relevance of what we write as artists to the commercial industry of songwriting, and I thought I’d share my response in a blog. The writer had read my book, Popular Lyric Writing: 10 Steps to Effective Storytelling, among other [...]
Great Songwriters: Reflections by a Legend
The first time I heard Thom Schuyler it was at the Bluebird Café. He was strumming along a little ditty in the round with songwriting greats Mike Reid and Don Schlitz. I was watching and listening from the ‘pew’ section of the café, the churchy benches in back where budding songwriters often go to catch [...]
Getting Songs Placed in Film and Television
If you’ve ever wondered about writing songs for the film and television markets, you might find this article answers a lot of your questions. Mike Todd, a wonderful resource and staff member in ASCAP’s Los Angeles office, shares some conversations he has had with several music supervisors about how to enter this exciting side of [...]
Demo Production and Song Sharking
A student of mine recently asked a question that many of us consider as we embark on a songwriting career. I’d like to share it with you, and offer some advice from my own experience. The question is:
“Is it common practice for (unknown) writers to contribute some money to the recording costs of a song? [...]
Silencing the Critic
Songwriting like any other art brings with it a fair share of critics. After all, anyone can listen to a song and form an emotional opinion. In fact, music is an art that anyone can make, whether novice or experienced. Anyone can call themselves a songwriter by writing a few tunes, effective or ineffective in [...]
From Amateur to Professional
The path to becoming a professional songwriter is never as clean-cut as we’d like it to be. If only there were ads in the classifieds “writer needed for top pop act,” with a phone number and an address to send a resume, it would be more obvious to know where to start. For me, the [...]
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