Things that suck about finding a job on music.

[Liontamer]

ive already figured out a way to download my clothes

Winner!

[The Author]

Unless you plan on being a full time burger slinger, any career worth dreaming about is gonna be hard to achieve. It's that simple.

Kids who want to be lawyers don't dream about being divorce and drunk driving lawyers. They wanna be the guys that have a real impact. Getting in law school might seem easy, but standing out and making a name for yourself is not that simple. It takes dedication, effort and passion.

You can be a passionless teacher (we've all had those) or you can work hard to be a great teacher. One shows up for work, does what he has to do, and goes home. The other takes the time to do what he does the best he can.

Musicians are the same. You can be a "soulless" musician, go to some weddings and such, and have no fire in your heart. Or you can put everything you can in your passion, and work hard to reach the top. (I'm not saying that wedding musicians are all soulless musicians, some have passion for what they do in any venue, I just needed a contrast.)

So yeah, the music industry is hard to get into, but you don't see my name on any books in the library right now. (Well, except The Firm, but it's only luck that a character bears my name.)

[tgfoo]

Reading through this thread made me lolz several times.

To the OP, welcome to real life. Having a degree in music won't help you get a job in music, unless you want to teach. Rather than whining and bashing those who get the gigs instead of you on the internet, your time would be better spend refining/improving your craft and making connections with the people who can get you work.

[Bahamut]

woah woah woah woah--

In my studies for being a musician, I have to work a lot harder than almost any other career path out there (maybe with the exception of medicine) so that I can hold a stable career in which I will be making less than Joe Smith who went to law school. But in this highly competitive field, I shouldn't be paid at all? I pay 40,000 dollars a year so I can go into an "industry" that shouldn't be paying me?

Music is plenty free--if you want free music, go tap on a table. Or go to the music store and play around on the keyboard until they kick you out. Or sing to yourself. Let me tell you that most "professional" musicians don't do it for the money--if my biggest goal in life was to be rich, I would've been a lawyer.

Harder than a physicist or electrical engineer? I doubt it . But music certainly is a more uncertain path. /offtopic

[The Author]

Harder than a physicist or electrical engineer? I doubt it . But music certainly is a more uncertain path. /offtopic

Trust me, there is no sure path when you follow a dream.

[audio fidelity]

why hasn't anyone mentioned the importance of finding and being immersed in a market that suites your niche. if you wanna score for video games go to the action in san francisco and meet peepz. if you want to do film you have to go to los angeles. with technology now, we can do things from afar, but you have to go to the source and find the people who can and will pay you.

[DrumUltimA]

Harder than a physicist or electrical engineer? I doubt it . But music certainly is a more uncertain path. /offtopic

you'd be surprised! Then again I don't know how hard those guys work

[Chickenwarlord]

you'd be surprised!

Drum is right. Learning about 15 instruments minimum, being able to read/transcribe music on the fly, composing in different styles, knowing the differences between eras of early music and practicing your given instrument + vocals takes a large amount of work.

Ironically, most of the physics majors I know find their homework to be tediously easy since it comes so naturally to them.

[The Author]

Drum is right. Learning about 15 instruments minimum, being able to read/transcribe music on the fly, composing in different styles, knowing the differences between eras of early music and practicing your given instrument + vocals takes a large amount of work.

Ironically, most of the physics majors I know find their homework to be tediously easy since it comes so naturally to them.

Them being good at what they do does not mean that what they do is easy. Even being an English major can be a challenge, no matter what people say. The thing is, if you chose the right path in life, it's gonna be easier on you.

So, it's not about a specific path, it's about what you get out of it.

[Malaki-LEGEND.sys]

itt we dismiss others' career choices as being "easy" and thus of less value than their own.

[DrumUltimA]

i never said other career paths were "easy"-just that mine is hard

[Sil]

-Every thread requesting musicians for a paid project gets overcrowded with answers of self called "musicians",very little deserving of calling themselves that, with minimal skills and absolute ignorance on music composition and forms. And what's worse... there's always one of those who gets picked and paid.

Who are you to decide who and who isn't deserving of calling themselves a musician? Don't get me wrong, I know exactly what you're talking about, so my question is rhetorical. I too could cite several of the top composers in Hollywood as being undeserving of their glamorous careers while other, more talented composers get shafted, but to quote Good Will Hunting: "only a handful of people could tell the difference."

If anything is to blame for the oversaturated market for composers, it is the general, all-embracing nature of society towards music where image sells, derivativeness sells, and everything else sells too. Remember that there is nothing you or I can do that anyone else can't do thanks to computers and technology. Sure, I could go on and on about how much better I am than everyone else at this or that, but in the end no one cares. No one can hear the difference. In a sense, technology leveled the playing field so anyone with a computer can be a marketable musician. But again, technology is not to blame. Society's inability to tell the difference is at fault here.

It sucks so much studying music for YEARS, and seeing that other ones that suck get those freelance jobs while I don't. Maybe it's that I have to be the very first to answer because being good doesn't matter anymore.

Yep, it does suck, so you have to compensate somehow. You have to be extremely aggressive in how you advertise yourself and demand the phone numbers of anyone who might be able to land you work. People are not going to be knocking on your door looking for a composer, especially since it's likely they already know someone with a computer who dabbles in music, or worst case scenario, they think they themselves can write good music. Sometimes you also have to be prepared to talk down other composers competing for a position while talking yourself up. You might even have to lie. Is that something you're prepared to do?

[1337 1]

I know there was a thread that was somewhat similar in nature, about how hard it is to break into the industry. The general notion there was that its often easier (or more feasible) to get a job in media if, rather than specialising in one area, having skills in everything. Much like an in law of mine; he works for pixar, doing animations and such, while he has majors in all the main media types (images, sound and video). Even though most of the work he does is animations, the fact that he's got all these other qualifications sometimes helps. Although, there can be times when you won't get hired because you are overqualified; a sad reality.

[The Author]

i never said other career paths were "easy"-just that mine is hard

Here's something I learnt over time: Everyone's life is the hardest.

[DrumUltimA]

Here's something I learnt over time: Everyone's life is the hardest.

bah that's not what i meant either!!!

perhaps this works: the amount of money I will be making will not be "worth the effort" i put into it, compared to somebody in another field. This is not meant to imply "my life is hard", but rather "if you're going to go into music, you better fucking love it because otherwise it's not a rational decision"

[Bahamut]

Drum is right. Learning about 15 instruments minimum, being able to read/transcribe music on the fly, composing in different styles, knowing the differences between eras of early music and practicing your given instrument + vocals takes a large amount of work.

Ironically, most of the physics majors I know find their homework to be tediously easy since it comes so naturally to them.

Then they're probably at the wrong school for physics then. I remember doing stuff like spending a whole week almost completely dedicated to doing a take home thermodynamics final for example. I'm talking 12+ hours a day during this time. And then there's what some others do such as spending 40 hours in 3 days studying for one test. And when days aren't so crazy, we still would have stuff like some 9 hours straight in class days. It is easily the most brutal major I've seen/experienced.

[DarkeSword]

Then they're probably at the wrong school for physics then. I remember doing stuff like spending a whole week almost completely dedicated to doing a take home thermodynamics final for example. I'm talking 12+ hours a day during this time. And then there's what some others do such as spending 40 hours in 3 days studying for one test. And when days aren't so crazy, we still would have stuff like some 9 hours straight in class days. It is easily the most brutal major I've seen/experienced.

Yeah seriously: don't underestimate the technical majors (science/engineering). When taught properly, they are brutual.

[DarkeSword]

Sometimes you also have to be prepared to talk down other composers competing for a position while talking yourself up. You might even have to lie. Is that something you're prepared to do?

Jeremy Robson

Bad Dude (+500)

[Monobrow]

Then they're probably at the wrong school for physics then. I remember doing stuff like spending a whole week almost completely dedicated to doing a take home thermodynamics final for example. I'm talking 12+ hours a day during this time. And then there's what some others do such as spending 40 hours in 3 days studying for one test. And when days aren't so crazy, we still would have stuff like some 9 hours straight in class days. It is easily the most brutal major I've seen/experienced.

You should have tried my major :U

Anyway I think the point Doug was trying to make is that a comparison like MY MAJOR IS WAY HARDER THAN YOUR MAJOR (Physics vs. Music) doesn't necessarily gel. I think the two focus on different things, but can be equally as taxing, as you're learning to master a skill that people compete in fields to be payed for. You have to be THE BEST.

The arts and entertainment are an oversaturated place where mediocre leads to either a mediocre job, or no job at all. A physics major of course has tough work, but I don't think it's necessarily a harder field to major in than other areas for the following reasons:

I myself don't know anything about majoring in music, but I'd say that it probably wasn't much different from my field of study, which was fucking HARD.

Basically from day one, most of my professors in some way/shape/form told students that they should drop out and find another career, that most of them weren't half as talented as they thought they were, and if they wanted to get better they had to have dedication, or be extremely fucking lucky... Cynical professors that push and push and don't care how crazy they drive their students was the norm in my field. But to tell the truth, they really do half of these kids a favor, because like has been said before, in this day and age, you have to push yourself over the limit to basically "make it" in SO many desirable fields today. If you don't know exactly what you want, you're probably going to be chewed up and spit out.

I can imagine that studying music involves a lot of strenuous practice, assignments about things you have no interest in, hours upon hours of work and study, and professors basically pushing you until you have nothing left to give... And what's worse, is that unless you're a prodigy or genius, you probably have been made to feel like it could all be one tremendous waste of time. That probably goes without saying for a lot of fields... So I don't necessarily think that one field is harder than another... There are a choice few I'd consider harder than anything else... But it's really about how far you want to go in it... And drawbacks as to what you have to do in order to make the most, or on the flip side, anything at all out of your time and effort.

[Bahamut]

But...I was responding to this exaggerated comment:

woah woah woah woah--

In my studies for being a musician, I have to work a lot harder than almost any other career path out there (maybe with the exception of medicine) so that I can hold a stable career in which I will be making less than Joe Smith who went to law school.

Or specifically, the first half of it. Generally to be successful you have to work hard in general., regardless of the discipline However, the hard sciences/mathematics/engineering are not beaten for the additional mental stress incorporated into the work through deep abstract thinking as well as comparable workloads in terms of time spent.

So in short, I was not the one who brought this comparison up initially, and merely responded to it.

[Mustin]

Neat.

I understand where T-Rock is coming from. But with most misunderstandings, there's a level of ignorance - most people just don't understand what it takes to record music, create good music, and make it sound good.

First problem I noticed - how many people bashed "shit on the radio."

If you're not deep into production (as 99.99999% of people are not) you don't understand how amazing the stuff on the radio actually is. It's not 50 Cent that makes his music sound the way it does. He just raps (more or less). One main reason Outkast is so good is because of John Frye. He's their usual engineer. He's what makes Outkast sound like Outkast. And like Drew Coleman to The Neptunes - he's the one responsible for their sound. Then the mastering engineers - oh my GOD the mastering engineers - are the guys that make this shit just EXPLODE.

The Truth is that much of what's on the radio technically is the best of the best because at that level, the best people in their fields can be hired because of the money backing it, and that puts the end product's sound so many cuts above the rest.

But again, only a handful of people are going to notice.

Alas...

Ultimately, I agree, to a point, that some music should be free. But never would I make anyone say that a musician or any person working in the music business should be working for free.

A hard-working artist deserves any money they can get.

T-Rock, you say you buy all your CDs, but then you say that people should make music for free? That's hypocritical, no? If you think all music should be free, but then buy the music anyway because you don't think you should resort to illegally downloading the music, you really shouldn't be buying music at all, and should just listen to free music (NIN and Radiohead's latest free projects, and indie people like Jonathan Coulton and the like that put music out for free).

Music, on a Major Label level, is just as involved as making a big-budget movie. There's some scrawny accountant person in some building somewhere that is very much responsible for making Kayne West make money. Same with the thick-rimmed slinky indie girl that brings coffee to the engineer's ASSISTANT while he's working on tracks (while the main engineer is working on yet another project). There are a lot of people working to get paid.

On the other hand, a good album can be made in a bedroom by one person with the technology and the persistance necessary to accomplish a such a daunting goal. But that person doesn't have the financial resources to pay a Marketing Firm to plaster it all over the Internet via ads, or have the clout to pull off the Payola used by all major record companies to get the music on the radio.

There's so much that people don't know about the music industry. Even most musicians. A lot of people on OCR don't know enough about it! And that's okay. Ultimately, musicians are going to do what they're going to do. But as a person without the knowledge of how it all works, one should not make uneducated blanket statements about how things "should be" or how they "are." It's fine to express opinions, though. That's what this country is great for.

So I implore anyone with a strong interest in music - be it as a listener or creator of music - to pick up one of the many books about the music business and give it a read. Just so you know you're educated about it. You'll walk away saying you know more about it and can then either appreciate the business more, or go back to not caring. Again, choice is a thing of beauty.

If interested in reading about the business, Donald S. Passman's Everything You Need to Know About the Music Business (ISBN: 0743293185). It's an easy read and even has some good laugh out loud moments. You can click on the link there and even take a look in the book to get started.

Regarding the actual topic, if you really want to get into the business of For Hire music, you gotta know people. Like McVaffe said, you just get lucky 99% of the time. I know from personal experience - all jobs I've gotten for doing that kind of work has just been through people I know - TV commercials, the GBA game I did music for, TV shows and short films - all through people I know. Get on LinkedIn and try to build a nice network.

I've spent a lot of time trying to get my labels off the ground, getting my band to take off and so on. I can tell you that you spend over 90% of your time doing the business part. I'm really busy with the band right now and don't have much time to actually work with the music. There will be close to two weeks that go by sometimes and I don't even touch my bass - my instrument in the band - because of the business stuff (and this is why I suck at my instrument!). It's not very glorious.

But I do it because I love 1.) the feeling of making the music in the moment and the joy it brings me to create or re-create sounds from within and put it down in a tangible form and 2.) the feeling of being on stage and entertaining people.

But I also think that I do it well - to a point - and that I should get paid for my hard work. If you don't, cool.

And if you do, I love you.

[DrumUltimA]

alright lemme clarify this, I didn't mean to downplay other career paths:

As a musician in music school, I go to school at 8:30 for my first class, and between classes, lessons, practicing, and rehersals, I don't get back until 11 pm or so (assuming I don't have tendonitis, once that set in i couldn't). That was an average weekday, completely unexaggerated. Of course I take breaks for meals, so lets subtract an hour and a half or so from that. I had trouble doing homework before I had tendonitis. Any less than that and I'd fall behind. I didn't have any sort of job during this time. This is not exaggerated.

Now lets compare that to my friend who is going to be going into Pharmecuticals. Don't get me wrong, he doesn't have an easy time going through college, and there were points where he almost couldn't make it. Not to mention that in order to get his degree, he has to do like 8 years or something ridiculous. However, he's going to get out of school to a nice job that will take care of all of his expenses for the rest of his life. The point that I was trying to make, is that even though I think music is totally worth it for me, to take that MEAGER amount of money that we have waiting for us IF we get a job and tell us that because we enjoy music we shouldn't get it is unbelievably frustrating for me.

The reason I said that about joe smith and etc was to reflect on something that my teacher reminds us all the time--and that is if you're not 100% sure that being a musician is your destiny, than don't do it. It would be a completely irrational decision because there are so many other people in the field, climbing to higher and higher levels and fighting for jobs that don't pay nearly as much as being, like, a lawyer, engineer, etc. Go be a lawyer instead: putting in less work in that field will still give you more money. Putting in the same amount of work in that field will get you tons more money.

So yeah, of course everyone should be working hard. I'm talking about salary, not work ethic. Didn't mean to downplay those who do, I'm on your side

[Sil]

Jeremy Robson

Bad Dude (+500)

Film Student: Hey Jeremy, can you give me a soundtrack like the one in Running Scared?

Me: Sure, it's one of my favourites.

Film Student: Thanks!

Me: (note to self: rent Running Scared this weekend)

True story.

[Patrick Burns]

What we need is an elite group of musicians to organize, refine their skills, and direct their abilities to the protection and cultivation of peaceful co-operation throughout humanity. After proving their great worth to the right societies, they could become an international organization entering into agreements with governments around the world to lend their abilities to allaying conflict in return for funding. Leading lives of aesthetics and wielding their instruments of choice, members of The Order would be ministers of sound, living for the music and continuing the tradition through master/student relationships – always searching the young population for instrumental talent or exceptionally high MIDI-chlorian counts.

[The Legendary Zoltan]

In response to the very first post:

You're worried about other people making it while you're not. You can try thinking about it the same way that I do and you MIGHT feel a little better.

Of course, I'm trying to make it too yo. I also went to college as a music composition major because I wanted to learn how to write music. So now I can write music but I still don't have a music job years down the line. But trying to get something that's easy is no fun anyway. If I make it before I die, it will be a dream come true. If I don't, knowing that I tried my best until the end will be enough for me to die happy. Travelling the path is more important than reaching the goal, wouldn't you say?