Won't You Commission A Work of Art From Me?

Back in previous centuries, there were 2 major players in the music industry: Composers and Minstrels; the only way you got paid to create music, was if some rich person, like a King or lovely Prime Minister commissioned you to compose the next great masterpiece, or on the other side of a coin, a rich person legally bought you to play the lute for life.

The Composer of yore is almost a mythical figure. His role was considered very important to society, compare that to the average artist today, and it's almost comical how far we haven't come. They were often manic, mad scientists of sorts, guys like Beethoven for example, started losing his hearing in his early twenties, yet kept composing and performing while he was completely deaf later in life.

We've all seen the movies, where a lowly minstrel is on beckon call to entertain the king and his court. None of those jam sessions were ever recorded, so the minstrel had no way to get rich back in those days. If it were today, he'd be selling cds, t-shirts, have a myspace page, and eventually find a way to earn an income. Oh how times have changed, or have they? You can probably count on your hand the number of indie artists (live ones) who get rich off CD sales alone these days.

In turbulent times, the music industry is. A transitional period, in which everybody is struggling to come up with the one holy grail that will bring the good old days back. Surprise! The good old days ain't comin' back! The artists who might get back to their former sales numbers will be the ones who were around before the whole downloading thing and eventual crash took place. The facts are in: Dead artists like Kurt Cobain and Jimi Hendrix are still bringing in the most money, through more than just CDs, of course. But if My Band wasn't around back when sales dictated your success, I don't have that perceived value that was attained back then. There's no way in hell I can sell a million records on my own today. No way.

I was recently thinking about the band Buckcherry, not to be confused with the great guitarist and writer from Vancouver, Buck Cherry aka John Armstrong who played with the Modernettes, I mean the 90's hard rock act. Love them or hate them, I heard that they recorded their first record for a couple thousand dollars at a friend's studio, and through a connection, got Sex Pistol Steve Jones involved in some of the production. That first album, is actually their best one. Godsmack is another band like that. The first record may have been the most raw sounding, but that's because a) it doesn't have multi-million dollar production behind it, and b) If a band records and produces the record themselves, there's nobody but the creators calling the shots. That's when it's the most pure.


On the cheap is the way to go, i guess. You can't buy creativity and wisdom. People are recording music in their home or office nowadays. Use what you have and make the rest happen through the people you meet. There was a lack of community in the recording industry, from what I've seen at least, but it's getting better. Vancouver is a laid back city, and it's reflected in the local industry. That could be why it's a bit harder to crack the big leagues out here. Many say it's the amount competition for the limited gigs that is at the core. I agree in principle, but I think the underlying reason is that the industry itself is rather disjointed. I am just giving my observations after working for 2.5 years at Music BC, the province's industry association. Times were really tough for the struggling artist 3 or 4 years ago. There are success stories of course, thank jeebus for The New Pornographers, and all the good folks running labels around here and getting music out to the masses.

What Music BC has done in the past 2 years, basically since I left the office, has really astounded me. After attending the Annual General Meeting this week, I got a sense of what's going on. The presenters painted a great current picture, showing the big improvements from past years in funding, projects, and the most important thing, members. Not to say they don't want to be cautious moving forward, anticipating the worst, and never relying too much on new funding. The education that Music BC has provided individuals is starting pay dividends for the local scene.

I think one of the main points stressed at the Music BC meeting was that, Hey artists, this is YOUR industry. You outnumber everybody else here, and right now you probably feel like you are getting the short end of the stick, but let's work together and try to change that. I'm not saying that other industry-types don't benefit from a strong Music BC, because they are part of the community too. I think the different ideas, the creativity, and of course the music, is what's gonna produce the solutions to navigate the speedbumps and try to keep the community going for as long as possible. The more people who seek out communities, not just Music BC, but just anywhere you can find a bunch of artists just like yourself, or managers if that's what you do. It's great if you can write, record and perform everything yourself, but like comedians say, a joke's only funny if there's someone else there to laugh at it.

If you are a new, developing or professional musician, you can benefit from membership. Keep an on www.musicbc.org for upcoming grants for touring musicians, a songwriting contest, The Peak Program, and my favourite, all the links and resources. And no, they didn't pay me to say that. What do I mean they? If you are a member of Music BC, it's your community too, and inessence, your organization. You won't know how much community support can help you unless you use it to the full extent.

So hey Music BC, what would you think about Commissioning Me to write a biography about Music BC, the people behind the organization, past and present, and through interviewing all these fine folks, I am sure that together we can come up with a good idea or two.