Buzzing Reed- Classical Music & Clarinet Culture

Thank you to all who took the time to fill out the survey. If you have not, you can still do so at the Reader Survey of the Buzzing Reed.

Most of the answers were from a combination of professional and hobbiest musicians, with a few music students and music teachers. Most of you blogs on a variety of subjects. Most of you either subscribe in a reader or by email. A great majority of you use Facebook as your primary social media.

By far the majority of you like my posts on “Life as a Professional Musician”, and “Practice and Breathing Techniques”. But a large number all like the “Fresh Ideas for Classical Music posts”. Almost none of you seems to want the “Music Poems.”

You answered that you enjoy finding “Useful Information”, “Life as a Professional Musician” and then “Fun Clarinet and Music news Posts”.

Posting on a regular schedule did not seem to be an important issue, and your preferences for the number of posts per week were variable from 5 to 14.

Your requests for changes were equally divided between “Narrow to just Clarinet” and “Keep it the Same”.

You confirmed that guest posts by other musicians are welcome.

Thank you again for this very helpful feedback. You are always welcome to jot me an email.

What do you think?

Hello there. To help me offer my readers consistently good content on The Buzzing Reed, I ask a favor of you. I’d like to invite feedback from my readers. Please complete the following simple 10 question survey to help me steer The Buzzing Reed in the direction you would like.

Thank You!
David

Reader Opinion Poll for The Buzzing Reed

Yeah, some of you may remember.

Last summer I began a project to practice and record all 18 etudes from the book of 18 by Paul Jeanjean.

The idea was to post regularly about my progress, interspersed with sample practice takes. I got through the first two, and fully intended to continue. Then my Fall season hit in September/October. I tend to forget how stressful my regular indoor classical season really is. Then I am reminded all over again each Fall.

During the Winter, I accomplished a lot,

both in my playing and on the blog. But it was in a slightly different direction than I had planned.

I began to think about another project. I wanted to write a book online,

hopefully beginning soon. (Then again, it may fall victim to the Fall season, like the Jeanjean Project did)

I have made a lot of headway into the planning stages of the writing, and as you may have noticed, I have written more original posts recently.

One thing I have notice recently is that I drifted away from my original posting patters, into mostly reposting daily “fresh ideas about music” from the classical music news. I still want to continue that, but to a lesser degree.

From now on, I will aim for more evenly balanced posting.

Balance between all my many different posting subjects; including Jeanjean posts, general technique posts, social media posts, podcasts, and music poems; all interspersed with some classical news post.

The short of it is this.

I am officially getting back to the Jeanjean Project,

among other things. However, my original prediction of a completion date for the Jeanjean, this coming September, is unfeasible. I am guessing that you don’t really care. I just want to be honest.

But the bigger pieces are beginning to fit together, along with my (hopefully soon) finished website design, the rhythm of my posting will become more “regular”.

(Is there an ex-lax for irregular posting? Ex-Posto-Irregulario? Ex-Unpredictabilitypus-Destabulatorium. Now they sound like Harry Potter spells)

Which reminds me. I also enjoy playfulness,

in my playing, in my writing, in my vocabulary [excluding cussing] and hopefully in my thinking. Hopefully that “tone” is already coming across, though it may happen more often. (spells for that anyone?)

Back to Jeanjean.

Here is the official re-beginningus of that endeavor.

Phrasing in 4 against 3?

Take a look at the beginning phrases of this third etude from the Book of 18.

I have been thinking about this for awhile. The metric bar rhythm is 9/4, implying three groups of 4 notes. The music seems to follow that grouping reasonably well. But something is not quite right. Now, try looking at the actual phrase of his music in four groups of 4 notes. Then it all makes much more sense. At the end of the 3rd line, the first full phrase ends, a six part phrase in 8 bars.

I think the 4 against 3 phrases is quite brilliant, and now it is more satisfying to play it.

However, other than leaving behind the childish word games, I would prefer to put most of my short, Jeanjean updates, even practice videos, on the practice groups.

The Practice Group Cafe just a little off Main Street at Buzzing Reed… on a nice quiet corner… where I feel a little less exposed than I do in front of the whole crowd. I hope you’ll join me there.

A quick search for social media for musicians brought up an array of good articles on the subject.

Most are directed at rock bands, but should translate relatively easily to classical performers in most cases. Good music is good music, after all!

An L.A. Times article suggests 5 foundation ideas to keep in mind through the process of establishing your presence on the Internet. These distilled ground rules arose from a live discussion presented by the Recording Academy, which featured 5 “social media stars”- Pete Cashmore of Mashable, Kevin Rose of Digg, David Karp of Tumblr and actor-musician Jared Leto,along with the academy’s marketing maestro Evan Greene.

To tweet or not to tweet. That is no longer the question. Musicians who don’t take advantage of social networking tools will soon perish in the La Brea tar pits of old-school media. Here’s what the social media stars told us, boiled down to five easy tips:

1. Be real.
2. Pick a couple of services you like and focus on them.
3. Have something unique.
4. Share things that you are most excited about.
5. Embrace anarchy.

Any musician wanting to promote themselves on the Internet must keep these essential tips in mind. No amount of skill with social media will outdo a modest, but personal, message.

Take it from me… Having more friends on Facebook and Twitter does not necessarily translate into quality fans. Find your comfort level in terms of time and abilities, and keep it real. I guarantee, you will gain a good following.

Two articles published on the web technology and social media site, Mashable are definitely worth a visit. The first is 5 Social Media Tools for Musicians.

As the following quote from the first article makes clear, My Space is losing ground as the place to share music. But Facebook pages usually need a bit of tweaking to enable maximum accessibility to your music.

As we roll in to 2010, the selection of band-friendly social media tools is growing. Say goodbye to sporadic MySpace updates and incomplete tour information on Facebook. There are now more options for sharing your music with fans and empowering them to share it with others.

The social media tools suggested in the article appear to be cutting edge; the article was posted six months ago, making it relatively fresh information.

However, I think too many tools can easily overwhelm the average single musician’s ability to keep up. I will continue to emphasize quality, not quantity.

I encourage you to check on the features and services listed in the article, but keep in mind that you can achieve a lot without all the fancy tools. Each service is set up differently. Each wants you to join and login. Each has strengths and weaknesses. I have tried many of these tools, and have learned through experience that a few simple tools can go a long way.

social media chain interaction

Photo credit http://matusiak.org/

The second article, How Musicians are using Social Media to connect with fans, offers some of the better social media tips I have seen anywhere.

The ideas discussed are:

1- Fan Funded Projects- Using the micro-donation service Kickstarter, A new way to Fund and Follow Creativity. Fabulous idea to use it for small projects, like a solo classical album.

2- Using video to create buzz- A 10 part documentary of a band leaders life created a big buzz boost for the band.

3- Creativity from the fans- This is self explanatory. But I LOVE the idea. In fact, I plan to feature Twitter and Facebook friends suggestions, for repertoire, art and poetry, in an up-coming album of my favorite melodies to help fund music education for needy children. (I admit. I am much better at coming up with innovative projects than implementing them. Or, put another way: I need more time, please!)

4- Reaching out to non-music bloggers- Beyond reaching out to non-music bloggers, this idea works on Twitter and Facebook as well. If someone supports your project, it doesn’t matter if they are a musician or not.

Each fresh idea came from creative solutions successfully accomplished by different bands. I strongly recommend that any musician seeking better skills in social media take these fresh ideas to heart. Then give yourself permission to brainstorm your own versions!

The conclusion to that Mashable article:

No matter what the labels and corporations are doing, musicians are taking it upon themselves to use social channels to connect with fans, offer value, and create relationship. This has ultimately led to new business models and revenue streams from sponsorships, touring and live appearances, custom products, and social monetization through advertising.

An article from the site Insider Music Business boasts a clear diagram of the cross pollination connections between individual social media sites. (The diagram was created by Hit Singularity.)

Notice the two way arrows in some connections and one way in others. Also, by placing a single website at the middle, it makes a visual statement, that social media platforms are only helpful to expanding your web presence if they are coordinated to feed to and from your own website/blog.

As you can see, the choices and ideas for effectively using social media can be daunting. But I will continue to emphasize one ground rule which rules all the others:

Find or create or focus on your own personal style and message.

This process may require a few quiet days to contemplate. But the time is worth it. If you find a way to be all You across the web, the rest will make sense.

PS- I found one more useful article to get started with social media. 5 Steps to Social Media Engagement for Electronic Musicians. It’s also where I got the Tactics, Tools, Time picture.

The power of social media-

The number of Facebook users has surged to half a billion, indicating that the power of social media is here to stay. Facebook reaches across the entire planet. If Facebook were a nation, its population would be the third largest in the world, behind China and India. Bigger than the US.

Musicians often use Facebook as a place to chat with friends. It’s good for that sort of fun networking. But Facebook and other social media offer powerful tools to enhance your network much further, to get your playing and your name out there.

A changing world for musicians-

With advancements in online download possibilities, most music consumption takes place via the Internet through iTunes, Amazon mp3, and download subscription services like Naxos. Musical performing organizations are scrambling to adapt and catch up to these shifts in consumer habits, including symphony orchestras, chamber groups and soloists.

As a musician whose salary is half of what it was 5 years ago, I must adapt as well. I have learned to appreciate the power of social media in establishing myself on the Internet. The reason? As a teacher and performer, the more people you know the better.

The importance of finding your own style-

But it’s one thing to just play around on Facebook or Twitter. It’s another to create your own niche of musical style, musical message, and presence, unified by clear goals and methods.

I was terrible at making and keeping connections through most of my career. I like to say it’s just my style. I’ve always preferred to go it on my own. And that method has worked, to a degree. But I have learned that connections are vital to any performer’s career, like it or not. Internet social media systems allows me to make connections, build networks, and build my future audience from the comfort and privacy of home.

Monetizing your web presence?-

Can you make money from all this? Potentially. In the long run, an established Internet presence can translate into paid lectures, performances, even some income from mp3 downloads of your own music.

I don’t (yet) advertise on my site, because I still find most ads targeted too generally, selling products I don’t know, and do not want to be responsible for recommending to my readers. I am waiting for more targeted ads to be available. I want to be able to recommend specific products I support, and be able to work out specific deals for return on sales which come from my advertisement.

As for selling your own performances, there are numerous sites to upload your own music and sell it right from the site. These include Bandcamp, Tunecore, Soundcloud, Reverbnation, Nimbit, and Indaba Music.

The problem of being everywhere and nowhere-

But these alone do not complete a package of image, message, personality, events, and music. Someone might post music on one of these sites, then have another url for their blog, then another place or two for their friends. All the effort to maintain separate locations for your music, message and connections becomes dispersed, part here, part there.

Seeing the big picture before you begin, you can coordinate all aspects of your presence on the Internet, and make a lasting impression.

Don’t get me wrong. There is no quick fix to create a presence in a few clicks. Building up steam takes some time, perhaps six months to a year, after you outline your goals and intentions.

Mission very impossible after planning-

Once you have your mission statement clear, it’s a relatively fun learning curve to becoming quite visible on the Internet. Once you find a comfort zone of daily activity on the Internet, it is not difficult to maintain and progress at a sustainable pace. If it’s not enjoyable, you have gone beyond your comfort level, and can back up a bit to just maintain without losing your social media presence.

My Internet story begins 7 years ago when I started my own personal blog, Glittering Muse, to host and share my poetry. Blogs formed communities way back then. (scary how quickly Internet culture changes!) Then MySpace and Facebook took over the community aspect, and blog culture became more competitive and less fun.

The Buzzing Reed blog was created 5 years ago, mostly for fun. I enjoyed writing in a personal style, sharing my behind the scenes musical experiences with the general public. For awhile, my blog became politicized, something I decided I did not want to continue. I, along with millions of others, am learning as I go. Experience has taught me quite a bit.

Three years ago I had a professional website designed, separate from my blog. With stagnant (unchanging) content, that site rarely attracted visitors, whereas my blog, with fresh content almost daily, was building a steady readership. It dawned on me that there must be a better way.

WordPress magic. Code is poetry-

A bit more of my blog history. My choice to use WordPress.ORG as my blog platform paid off in the long run. WordPress.org was a fledgling platform among stiff competition such as Blogspot. I also liked the tag line of WordPress: “Code is poetry”.

WordPress.org has become wildly successful, adding a hosting service to the platform at WordPress.COM. It is now the most versatile platform, and its capabilities reach far beyond mere blogging. The user interface on any WordPress site is efficient and clear, allowing someone to edit their own website. Before that, a website had to be edited in raw code, quite difficult for the average user. (Though I tried a good bit!)

Most new users of WordPress get steered to the combined hosting service, at WordPress.COM. I still use a self-hosted version, which can be downloaded at WordPress.ORG.

I prefer the self-hosted route. Renting a domain is cheap. Once you set up your site on your own domain, you are free to do whatever you want, to upload unlimited videos and music files. At WordPress.com, you will pay more for music and video uploads. The same goes for Blogspot.com.

Other options, or not-

I have recently noticed a few sites which specialize in the whole web package for musicians, most notably NoteWay Media, do it yourself website for musicians.

However, any instant website with creation with download features and unlimited storage space will cost at least $15 per month. That’s $180 per year. Compare that to hostin own your own domain, which costs about $4 per month for unlimited space, and $8 per year for the domain.

A self-hosted WordPress platform website has functionality and versatility that is as easy as it gets. And it is cheaper that any of the above options.

Summary and Conclusion-

Bottom line. To use social media effectively, you need to plan your intentions and coordinate your output across the three giant resources: Personal Blog/Website (with regular, fresh content); Facebook (friends and groups); Twitter (different friends and groups).

There are numerous tools and methods for easy coordination of posts and content, making it easier than ever to reach a global audience.

I will be writing a series of articles covering all aspects of planning, organizing and launching your own Internet presence through social media. Stay tuned!

An Alive Performance!

Photo credit- Lighthouse Strings

Part III: The Spirit of Performing Live Music

Extending your practice into your performance, an Alive Performance-

We come now to the ending part of the process of planning, publicizing and performing your own recital. This is what all musicians live for: Performance. Right? Wait a minute. I’ll have to disagree with myself. I don’t personally live just for performances. I live for the experience of the beauty of music, whether in rehearsal or performance or personal practice.

In fact, I would like to extend the optimism and patience of personal practice up through the experience of the performance.

A performance is a formal practice, and also a measure of the end of a stage of practice. If we think of performing in this way, as an extension of private practice, it becomes much easier to see each performance in perspective, as one of many, rather than a final line to be crossed. Granted, if we take performance to its extreme practice, we see some performances, such as auditions, quickly rise become life-changing events.

But we are discussing the goals of personal recitals here, not an audition. In that spirit, a performance can be seen as a celebration of a personal practice, perhaps a personal graduation of sorts. Celebration is the spirit with which I like to approach as many live performances as I can. In this spirit, we invite the audience to share the experience, one which is the culmination of a defined period of our practice.

Alive. Performance Robot?

In this healthy spirit, a performance is genuine, filled with optimism and eagerness, for the sake of the shared, communal experience. It becomes a living experience shared by you and your audience, an Alive Performance.

iAdvise: Keep a healthy Spirit of Performance in your sights throughout the technical and musical preparations for your performance. Bring genuine desire to share a unique stage in your practice with your audience.

The performance itself-

In a performance itself, I try to ask myself if I am enjoying the experience, or suffering through it. It is terribly easy to forget to enjoy the music as a specific goal, and to instead dwell on any flaws which occur, or worry about a difficult passage. Those habit of thinking encroach in any performance. After all, a well prepared musician has put a lot of effort into this experience. There is a lot to lose. A recital, well planned and publicized, is best enjoyed by arriving with the intention for deep connection between music and audience.

iAdvise: be sure to make a point of reminding yourself several times during the actual performance to (at least attempt to ) enjoy the moment. Perhaps even a note above the part at the beginning of each piece.

Connecting with your audience-

Now to more “practical” efforts, such as how to help the audience, that you worked so hard to get, experience the music as richly as you have worked to achieve.

I chose to try something completely new to me, and perhaps to most of the performers and audience at my recitals. In the spirit of the Chicago Symphony multi-media musical programs called “Beyond the Score”, one of which we performed in the Columbus Symphony a few months ago with conductor Jean-Marie Zeitouni, I created my own “personal” program notes, with musical excerpts as examples.

A sort of hybrid mix of descriptions of themes and theme development in the music, I added descriptions of the “character” of the music. By describing the moods and emotions each excerpt held for me personally, I felt more tuned to what I wanted to say when I played the entire piece.

Am I recommending you do the same. Not at all. I only suggest my solution to bridging the gap between music and audience as one fresh idea for accomplishing that goal.

iAdvise: carefully plan and rehearse/write out about 10 minutes of specific history, anecdotes, musical examples, and more importantly, your own characterization of the music, what you see as the “moods” and “characters” and “images” in the music.

Other possibilities for enhancing your learning curve-

I ended up planning two recitals in a row. And, in fact, there were two more recital performances added, ones with my sister in Bethesda, Maryland. I performed the Debussy in all four recitals (though with two different pianists).

My recommendation is to plan at least two recitals fairly close together, perhaps one or two weeks apart, so that you, and your fellow musicians, can evolve in the subtlety and spirit of performance over several repetitions.

Another possibility is to plan the first recital as an invite a few close friends only recital, which I sort of did for my first one as my home. (though including board members in my guest, including the chair and his wife, it could be said to be slightly more risky than inviting close friends! :-[)

iAdvise: Plan several recitals while you’re at it. It offers a much better chance of really learning from the experience, and it doubles the musical output for (hopefully ) less than double the effort.

Publicizing your Event

Part II: Getting a Good Audience

New Skills required for most musicians-

Planning a recital requires a host of variable skills, few of which I excel at, other than performing. (hopefully!)

This is the second post of three on the subject, outlining ways to insure you have an audience at your performance. There is nothing more dampening to a performance mood than a tiny audience! The more the merrier. The energy between performer and audience is critical, and often overlooked. While a performer’s inspiration cannot only rely on their audiences attention, any performer will tell you that an appreciative crowd helps them reach a bit beyond their own expectations. That’s where the magic begins.

Perhaps the steepest learning curve in my recent experience was how to effectively publicize my recitals. Effective marketing requires some detailed planning, as I learned.

I had general ideas of what I was trying to market, but had not hashed out details of my intentions for the recital.

Questions to ask yourself in the marketing planning stages:

1- How is my recital different from any other recital?

2- Who will find my program interesting and rewarding?

3- What are the unique qualities of my approach to the music?

4- How can I express my deepest desires and goals for this recital to my future audience.

iAdvise: Really believe in what you are offering. The rest will come easily.

Use local newspapers

Luckily, the Internet offers easy access to local newspaper arts listings, where anyone can sign up to list their event. I easily found the event submission form for several news rags and filled them out.

Consistency of message is important for any event, product or profile appealing to a mass, anonymous audience. “Dances and Dreams” alone didn’t describe the event clearly, and chamber music concert was too generic. Next time I will carefully plan several various lengths of clear descriptions, such as “Dances & Dreams Chamber Music concert”, and “Dances and Dreams Columbus Symphony Chamber Music concert”, which match in style and content, but offer choices of length.

These considerations also apply to the more detailed description of your event. Be sure to plan various lengths, but matching content, for event details to use in different situation.

iAdvise: Choose your event title and description very carefully, to allow for consistent message despite variable lengths of listings.

Use your blog if you have one

Naturally, I also used my blog to market my event. But since many of my blog readership are located internationally, I couldn’t expect most of my readers to attend! I know my blog friends want to hear me play, but friendship can only travel so far!

Use the radio if possible.

It doesn’t hurt to call your local classical music station if you have one, and tell them of your recital date and theme.

Definitely use Facebook

Facebook offers another good tool for publicizing your recital. Facebook Pages are different than profiles, in that anyone can view the contents of a page, whereas only friends can view the full details of a personal profile.

I created a Facebook Page just for the recital. I again urge you to plan your event title and description very carefully. My lack of careful planning came back to bite me yet again after I created the Facebook Page. I called it “Dances and Dreams Chamber Music Concert June 18″, which is not bad, but not quite good enough. Since the title of the page give the reader instant information, I could have listed even more in the title, adding time and location. But once you create a page title, you cannot change it. Of course, I didn’t know that when I created the page, and gave little thought to the most effective title. Again, good planning in the beginning really pays off. Silly me.

iAdvise: choose your Facebook page name VERY carefully! You cannot change it later.

After creating the page, I had to invite people to join and become a fan of the page. This will enable them to receive updates you post to your page. Sifting all the Columbus locals from all my Facebook friends, I invited them to join. Most did.

But the work was not yet done. Each of those Page members could invite others. How far can you push a friend to help you publicize? If done nicely, I believe most people have no problem with timely reminders to reach out and pull in their local friends to my page. I could have been more persistent in this respect. But I am a musician, not a salesperson! Better learn fast! Or be left behind.

iAdvise: Be willing to pester friends and Facebook fans a little. They receive lots of requests for attention. You have to rise to the top, politely.

Then, I needed to maintain the page and submit new comments and content so as not to be forgotten by the newly joined members. Once again, creative planning helps greatly. Review the question offered above and use your intentions to think of daily updates for how your recital theme and content are developing.

If you designed and printed fliers as suggested in the first article in this series, those will need to be distributed widely.

However, I didn’t want to put up the fliers TOO early, for fear they would become part of the landscape and will go unnoticed as the date approaches. The best time to distribute and post fliers is about 3-4 weeks before the event.

Unfortunately I was out of town at the critical time, and didn’t plan another way to get them out. Also, I simply ran out of energy, and didn’t have the will to drive all over town to post them personally. I did make the effort to get to a half dozen locations, but should have done more. I could have found Internet lists and address of: libraries, coffee shops, music stores, student centers.

iAdvise: Research a list of places more likely to attract potential audience members to your recital.

As I learned while posting the fliers, some places would allow one to be posted on a bulletin board. Others allow a pile of fliers for their customers to take. I should have planned two (similar) types of fliers, one flashy (and more expensive) for single posting, and a cheaper, smaller design to leave a bunch of.

iAdvise: This advice merits repeating from the first article- Plan two set of fliers, one larger and flashier, and one smaller and simpler.

Since I planned these recitals as fundraisers for my orchestra, the Columbus Symphony, I was lucky they were willing to send out a mass email advertising the event. But I knew from my own experience that those mass emails are rarely opened.

To my surprise, I had very full audiences at both recitals. And to my even greater surprise, most of who came were personally invited by myself or another performer in the event.

iAdvise: The best publicity is personal publicity. Reach out to friends, remind them several times, ask them to invite their friends. Show excitement about your event. Know how and why you are doing something unique which they should not miss!

In tomorrow’s post Part III: The Performance, I’ll finally write about a subject I know fairly well. I’ll outline my successful experiment in speaking about the music to my audience before each piece.