I must admit that the music business has never been something I have taken much interest in. I have a lot of friends in the music business major, and when they talk about what they are learning in their classes, I really don’t find any of it compelling or exciting. Truthfully, I find it completely dull and I just generally wish that I never had to deal with it and could instead just focus on my craft. But I am hip enough to know that things don’t work that way, and I will eventually need to learn the basics of the industry.
Since I came to Berklee, I’ve either been hearing “the music industry is dying” or “the music industry is totally transforming,” both of which sound unpleasant to me (I obviously don’t want it to die, and I’m not a big fan of change.) I’m old-school; I can’t help it. I buy all of my music, and I still buy hard copy CDs because I love having them line my shelves and reading liner notes. I give my friends lectures about illegally torrenting and downloading their music (especially the ones that are musicians – what the heck?!) and I still have a regular CD player that I use every single day in my apartment to listen to new music, instead of using iPod speakers like everyone else. I’m not saying I want it to be 1950 again, but maybe just 1994, before NAPSTER was invented and people still had to choose which album they wanted to buy that week because they only had 5 bucks (as opposed to clicking a button and having a band’s entire discography in 30 seconds.) We take music for granted now, and it really bothers me!
Apart from my discontent with the way music is consumed these days, I also (secretly) really liked the concept of record labels. I certainly never planned on being signed to Capitol Records, but Blue Note would be nice, and I liked the idea of someone else having the do the work. I still do actually, but I think of it in a
slightly different way now. People have been saying for years how terrible labels can be - that they take all of an artist’s freedom and yada yada yada – and that going indie or making your own records is the way to go. I did not like the sounds of that for a few different reasons:
1) I have absolutely no interest in the technicalities of making an album. I want to write the music, I want to find a great band, I want to rehearse the tunes and make them great, I want to go to a nice studio with a nice man behind the glass who knows how to turn all of those dials, and I want to record some beautiful music that I can be proud of. That is what I want to concern myself with, and frankly, even that feels like a lot sometimes.
2) When I came to Berklee, I started to see a ton of 18 and 19 year old kids writing and recording up a storm, making full albums, posting them on iTunes, Facebook, Twitter, CD Baby, getting professional photo shoots done, and doing a ton of self-promoting - and that was all in the first week! This whole concept really started to bother me, and I know that many many people here at Berklee would disagree with me on this, but I started to wonder: why were people in such a hurry? I didn’t understand why it was becoming necessary to release your debut album (or maybe even your sophmore or junior album) at the age of 18. Do we really sound our best right now? Didn’t we come to Berklee to improve and to prepare ourselves for a career in music in 4 years? Why would you want to debut yourself when you are less than your best? Even listening back to myself 2 semesters ago, I have improved immensely, and although they are nice to have, I wouldn’t want those recordings to define my sound to music consumers. I’m still trying to find my sound! Just because we can do everything ourselves now doesn’t mean that we should.
3) Why does the music business major exist if we aren’t going to use these people for what they are trained for? I may not have an interest in booking or management, but these people do! I would much rather pay my classmates to do a superb job in booking my gigs or managing me than do a mediocre job at it myself to save a few bucks (and I’m pretty broke!) Again, many would argue with me on this.
These were the values I saw in record labels. They provided the artist with all of these things so that they didn’t have to worry about it. But now that I’ve done some reading and have spoken to some experienced people in the industry during my time at Berklee, I’m beginning to see that none of this was in the best interest of the artist; everything is for profit. The politics and internal tug-of-wars happening within these companies was fascinating to read about, and it was exactly the kind of thing I never want to be involved with. Being a jazz musician, I never expected any kind of huge record deal (except maybe when I was 12 and loved Britney Spears) but I always kind of hoped for something like Blue Note. Blue Note is as big as it gets for jazz musicians, and it would be incredible to be under their name with so many of the greats. But they too are a business, and as sad as it is, they are probably just as bad as the rest of them.
One thing that I truly fear is record labels becoming completely obsolete, as many people are predicting. If labels are gone, I’m going to have to assemble an entire team, which I may not be able to afford (money-wise or time-wise), or do everything myself. I think an ideal situation for me would be to sign with a very small label, one with only a few artists on it, so I would receive more attention and priority. I read about Gretchen Parlato (my favorite jazz singer whose career is as close to perfect as I could ever hope for mine to be) and her record deal with a fairly small label called Obliqsound. They only have a handful of artists, and they handle all of her shows, festival dates, and publicity. This sounds like the perfect situation to me! Also, when Esperanza Spalding came to Berklee last year for the Maggie Scott Tribute, she spoke to the business side of things as well, and to my delight she had the same opinion as I do about many things. She said that she doesn’t want to spend her time focusing on the business side of things when she can pay someone trained in that department to do an excellent job of it for her.
Although jazz isn’t exactly the most popular genre, there is work, and lots of it. In jazz, the number one concern is being excellent at what you do, any great jazz musician will tell you that. You have to sound good! If you don’t have the chops, you will not get the job, or at least not the quality job. I love music, I do not love the music business, but I understand that I need at least a basic understanding of it. While I am at Berklee, I plan to tap into the resources here and learn the basics while still making sure I am making connections with students in the music business major so that, when the time comes and I am ready to really debut my music to the world, I will have skilled people around me to make it successful. I do not seek fame or fortune, just a decent place to live, good food to eat, and gigs to play with other passionate musicians. I do not think this is too much to ask from the music industry!
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