Blog posts and interviews on the music industry
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Music Specialist
Ruth has a Ph.D. in Management and Organizations from the University of Michigan and taught Entrepreneurship to MBAs at the University of Illinois in Chicago. She has written for TheAtlantic.com, Psychology Today and Wired.com.She currently writing a book about the history and production of rock concerts.
I recently had a great conversation with David Dufresne, CEO of Bandzoogle, an amazing company that probably a lot of you already use to build your websites. Bandzoogle is based in Quebec and have made a major impact on the independent music scene giving tools to musicians to help build their career. In our conversation we discussed ways you can ensure visitors to your website are converting into fans and spending their time and money where you want them to, website dos and don'ts, apps and responsive websites as well as knowing your audience and who consumes your content. With David's background as a venture capitalist he shares his unique perspective on this new music industry.
Mark Maryanovich is a Canadian photographer based in Santa Monica, CA, born in Windsor, Ontario and raised on Canada’s rainy west coast. He has won a number of awards for photography and is a referenced source of inspiration by many in the industry. His clients have included Chris Cornel, Randy Bachman, Gibson Guitars, Bob Rock, Chad Kroeger and Henry Rollins to name a few. His work has appeared on the cover of books, in Rolling Stone, Billboard, and Canadian Musician and that’s just skimming the surface.
A while back I interviewed radio host, author and music marketer David Hooper about his book Six Figure Musician. We did the interview in Nashville about a week prior to the launch. At the time he told me about his plans for the book and how he intended to market it. I thought it would be interesting to follow up with him and find out how his marketing strategies were working and what he had learned about his audience.
Finding success in music or business is all about the accumulated experience and knowledge that allows us to recognize and seize the opportunity that ultimately results in what the general public observe to be "overnight success." I was curious as to what those opportunities had been for Jeff. With his experience and first hand stories to tell about artists and their careers I was curious as to what advice he could offer for those looking for a career in music.
Martin is a guy that has "been there, done that..." he has played with everyone from Johnny Rotten in his band Public Image, Ltd to Pig Face, Killing Joke, Nine Inch Nails, Ministry, Flea, Danny Carey from Tool, and many others... He owns a record label and is an in demand speaker at music conferences around the world as well as a professor at Columbia College in Chicago. He is the author of many books including most recently Tour Smart.
While meeting with a songplugger friend in Nashville, he asked me if I would interview some clients of his that were in town. The truth be told I was not really interested. I have always tried to keep my personal interviews (unlike when I am being hired...) to be with people that I have actively searched out. This situation was a little different and also a perfect example of how the industry really is based on relationships. I didn't want to offend my friend and I understand in this biz that if you scratch my back I'll scratch yours. So I said "sure."
Ditto Music is a digital music distribution company with offices in Liverpool and Nashville. As CEO of Ditto Music Lee Parsons overseas distribution and marketing campaigns for over 20,000 worldwide artists including Suzi Quatro, Finch, Lil Wayne, Prince, Sir Paul McCartney and Kid British. Starting from their bedrooms in 2007 Lee and His brother Matt launched the first ever unsigned artist into the UK Top 40 singles chart which got them into the Guinness Book Of World Records. Ditto Music have now had 11 UK top 40 singles, all with unsigned artists.
Today's Interview is with vocal coach extraordinaire, Brett Manning. Brett has worked with many well known artists including Taylor Swift, Hayley Williams, Keith Urban, Wes Hampton and has also coached several Grammy and CMA Award winners, as well as recent Broadway casts of Les Miserables, Jekyll & Hyde and Elton John's Aida.
DAVE DOUGLAS is a prolific trumpeter, composer and educator from New York City. His unique contributions to improvised music have garnered distinguished recognition some of which includes a Guggenheim Fellowship, Aaron Copland award and Grammy-nominations. Douglas has developed his work for several unique ensembles with whom he’s currently active including his quintet, electric sextet Keystone, Brass Ecstasy, Sound Prints Quintet, co-led with Joe Lovano. His new Quintet released their debut recording, Be Still, in September 2012 with singer Aoife O’Donovan, the first time Douglas has featured a vocalist on a recording. Since 2005, Douglas has operated his own record label, Greenleaf Music, releasing his own recordings, albums by other artists in the jazz idiom, and continues to prove himself as a forward-thinking leader in the realm of digital music distribution. He served as artistic director of the Workshop in Jazz and Creative Music at The Banff Centre in Canada 2002 through 2012 and is co-founder and director of the Festival of New Trumpet Music, which celebrates its tenth anniversary in 2013.
In 2005 Doug Grean appeared on the 47 th annual Gammy awards with Velvet Revolver as keyboardist performing with an allstar cast including Stevie Wonder, Norah Jones, Bono, Steven Tyler, Brian Wilson and Allison Kraus.
Doug Grean has worked or performed with many talented artist including. Sheryl Crow, Riki Lee Jones, Glen Campbell, Stone Temple Pilots, Scott Weiland, Slash, Velvet Revolver, Tim Mcgraw, Cindi Lauper, Annabella Lwin (Bow Wow Wow), Corey Glover (Living Color), The Crystal Method, Camp Freddy, DJ Hurricane and John Taylor (Duran Duran).
Mark has been working in the web space since the early 90′s, launching his first B2C ecommerce play in early 1996. In 1999, he co-founded echo, a company focused on building communities around entertainment brands. He was the co-creator of the patented platform echotools™, a direct to consumer delivery and data management system which ultimately grew to serve millions of users and distribute hundreds of millions of pages, data feeds, and e-commerce transactions. In 2007, the company was acquired by Barry Diller’s IAC/Ticketmaster for eight figures.
David has had great success working with some of the worlds most impressive brands, including Coca-Cola, Nike, Ford, Budweiser, Right To Play, P&G, and every mobile company to name a few. David was an integral part of the team that created the phenomenon that was “Dove Evolution,” and the campaign for real beauty. David also divides his time working on feature films, new media ventures and supervising music for A-list televisions series like HBO’s “Less Than Kind” and CBC’s hit comedy series “The Kids In The Hall - Death Comes To Town”. David is also lead music supervisor on the new Ubi-Soft video game “Shaun White Skateboarding.”
Cameo has been at the forefront of the digital music revolution from its earliest stages. Billboard Magazine named her one of the industry’s top mobile executives.
She has been involved in radio, from terrestrial to online, and was the rock and alternative music director for AOL Music. She spent three years as manager of label relations and music programming at iTunes and has been the executive VP of Universal MoTown Republic where her role included mobile, online and digital sales, promotions and business development for artists such as Drake, Amy Winehouse, Lil Wayne, and Jack Johnson to name a few.
David Weiss is President of D Media, Inc. (www.dwords.com) and is an internationally published freelance journalist. He is the former NYC editor of Mix magazine, the world's leading pro audio publication, and his work has appeared regularly in publications such as Systems Contractor News, Archi-Tech, Digital Television, TV Technology, Time Out NY, Remix and Drum! magazine. He is also co-author of the book Music Supervision: The Complete Guide to Selecting and Licensing Music & Sound Design for Media, published by Schirmer Trade Books in September, 2005.
Gene Simmons of KISS first tapped Michael’s skills as a pioneering online marketing strategist to launch and manage all aspects of Kissonline.com’s multi-million dollar enterprise, including their ground-breaking VIP ticket program.
When it comes to success it seems that successful people know what they want and don't give up until they reach their goals. Even the interviews I post here have that in common: every one made a conscientious decision to make their career in the music industry and none of them have ever given up.
If you commit yourself wholeheartedly and believe that what you are doing is the right thing, chances are it is! If you know what you want, you have a goal and are committed to obtaining it then sooner or later it happens!
