Moving Out of the Comfort Zone: Post-Recording Session 1 Analysis

My Piece of Plastic

Clarinettist’s Thumb, Anyone?

I collected the session 1 mastered CD from Pete Ware just 3 days after the recording took place. I have to hand to the guy – he works fast! I would be lying if I said I calmly drove home, put the disc in my player and wept with the joy of such a sensitive and virtuosic performance.  Unfortunately, as real life often doesn’t mirror a movie script, the reality was somewhat different.

In actuality, I hurtled back down the mountain road into the valley where I live with my stomach churning and my brain throwing up random thoughts at 100 miles an hour. It wasn’t sure whether to offer postive expectation phrases or doom and gloom paragraphs. On arrival, in-house photographer was working on her upcoming inspirational coffee table book, sat in exactly the same position at the computer as when I had left the house an hour earlier. The cats had carried on sleeping; the dogs wearily lifted their heads and then let them slump down again. Depositing the coveted CD in my in-tray, I wandered out to the kitchen to tackle a pile of washing up. I sighed. ”I’ll listen to it later when I can concentrate properly”.

Halfway through attacking the plates, I vaguely heard some clarinet music warbling away in the background. Certain that I had recognised the Saint-Saens Sonata, the scouring came to an abrupt halt as I strained my ears to listen a bit more intently. Quickly realising in a flash what was going on, I grabbed a tea-towel to dry my hands and rushed into the office. The dogs were up out of their baskets and the cats had woken up and walked out - their usual response when I start to practice! The volume of the computer was up full blast and in quadrophonic sound, my clarinet playing was reverberating around the room. I felt as if I was witnessing an event that I didn’t want to see but some unseen force had me temporarily rooted to the spot. In-house photographer continued to noodle. I just wasn’t ready for this - not now, anyway; and I went back to my washing up.

I listened to the CD on my portable player after dinner one night a few days later. This time, the music had my full attention but as a listener not the wost of damning critics. As I sat on my patio looking up the stars spread out on the canopy of a clear night sky, I mused. You’ve come a long way in 18 months, Harrington – the second movement of the Poulenc had made me cry. A certain sentiment had permeated through the music and forced me to remember yet again the mental pain I had fairly recently experienced and drew on during the preparation period for the session. The Debussy bought me back down to earth with a hard thud – it lacked the smooth technical fluency that I was used to hearing on other recordings and this detracted from my enjoyment of the piece. I wallowed in a couple of movements of the Saint-Saens but started beating myself up in the last so I turned it off and went to bed.

It wasn’t until yesterday that I could find the psychological strength within myself to sit down with the scores and conduct a full objective analysis. Overall, I’m pleasantly surprised and pleased with the result but it’s not perfect. Putting that statement in context, the question on which I have to make a decision is whether or not I’m convinced that it’s good enough unleash on the general public. Most of it – yes – but as always there is room for improvement. I will most definitely re-record a couple of movements which went down at the end of session. I was tired at the time and I can hear fatigue in the performance which is simply not acceptable to me. What I want to avoid at all costs is nit-picking my way through every piece and repeating odd phrases here and there just for the sake of being note perfect. There is always the danger that the spirit of the music will be lost and I most certainly do not want my playing to dissolve into just being about reproducing the notes in the right order!

Session 2 is scheduled to take place at the end of November. It’s a much lighter programme: the Messager Solo de Concours, Pierné’s Canzonetta and the Milhaud Duo Concertant. I’m not sure at this stage whether to tag the repeats from session 1 to the end of session 2 or wait to hear the mastering of session 2 before diarising a session 3 just for re-records. I’ll think on it.

In the meantime, along with the practical preparation for session 2, there are CD programme notes to write and the design for the insert to complete. I have also appointed a “Secret Gang of Four Reviewers” who have agreed, lured by the thought of free copy of the final product, to give their constructive criticism before I give the order for mass production. I’ll certainly be kept out of mischief over the next few weeks!

Moving Out of the Comfort Zone: A Day Recording with Debussy, Poulenc and Saint-Saens

I've Heard of Working at Home but the Kitchen?

The day of the recording I woke to my alarm at 0600 as usual and just followed my normal routine. There was one major difference – I had a horrible knot in my stomach which wouldn’t go away. I’d clearly forgotten one of the unwanted side effects of performance!

When I set myself the goal of producing an album at the beginning of the year, I didn’t own a decent pair of professional instruments, couldn’t imagine where I would find a pianist to accompany me in the middle of rural Spain and had no idea once I had the coveted album in my possession, how on earth I was going to market and distribute. All I had was a very clear vision as to where I wanted to go and a burning desire to get there.

New instruments were generously gifted to me at the end of January with little effort on my part except for daily visualisation exercises. Jenny the pianist, like Pete the music engineer, was an old client of mine from my early days in business but with no real knowledge of her private life, the only reason I found her was because of a chance meeting with a social acquaintance in March who happened be at the house of a close friend who had just arrived back from a two year trip to Mexico. In April Jenny and I started playing together. The marketing and distribution plan gradually took shape  around another so called “coincidental” internet encounter.

It had been an extraordinary journey to date and now here I was, poised at the starting line waiting for the gun to go off. Little wonder I was nervous. In addition of course, there had been hours of practice, many private tears of frustration, sometimes colossal self-doubt and yet, I had clung on with my typical dogged determination and sights firmly fixed on my purpose almost to the point of obsession. The training period was complete. Now it was showtime.

How can I describe the lonely feeling of standing in front of a mic, a deathly silence all around waiting for my indication for the piano to sound the opening bars of the Debussy Premiére Rhapsodie? It was as if my entire life had culminated in one concentrated spot. Time had frozen. I centred myself, breathed deeply and nodded to Jenny to begin.

We started at 1200 and finished at 1700 with a 1/2 hour break for a bite to eat. I’m not sure how I managed to play solidly for so long. My cold sore blew up like a balloon and was painful especially in the upper altissimo register but I refused to throw in the towel. I’d waited so long for this I wasn’t prepared to wimp out now.

The session lasted far longer than I expected. I naively thought that I’d get away with a couple of hours. However, I hadn’t factored in Pete wanting to repeat a couple of sections due to me bumping a mic-twice-and then I couldn’t  pull off the same bits to my satisfaction; fatigue affecting performance and falling into the temptation of wanting to tweak when in actual fact the movement had been perfect the first time round.  There were times during the session when I thought I was going to weep with tiredness; others when I was ecstatic for pulling off a difficult phrase. It was a true emotional roller-coaster ride.

The experience has certainly changed my view of recorded music. Whilst CDs and MP3s give the listener a chance to appreciate a composer’s work and give taste of a certain interpretation, no longer will I use a CD or MP3 to form a particular opinion about any player. Theoretically, although extremely labour intensive, you could record a piece without necessarily being “performance ready”; the wonders of modern computing can tweak the sound so the final result bears absolutely no resemblance to real life for good or for ill. So for me now, only a live performance or unedited video will elicit any sort of opinion.

Recording can be soul destroying if you let it. Playing in a dead acoustic every note seems completely exposed and you could easily judge yourself as the worst clarinettist who ever walked the earth however skilled you may be. Hearing a brief “raw” playback, my normal round dark tone didn’t sound as it usually does to my ear; it was more pure somehow – not thin at all but focused. I’m suppose I’m just going to have to wait for mastering session tomorrow before I can pass judgement.

It's a Wrap!! No Wonder We're Smiling with Relief!

Moving Out of the Comfort Zone: Preparing for a Recording Session

*Gulp* Am I Really Doing This?

As part of the strategy for relaunching my career as a classical clarinettist, a key part of the plan was producing an album for public release. If you read my blog regularly, you might remember that part 1 of this project had been delayed, for various reasons, from June. The delay was positive in that it gave me more time to prepare but negative in regards to the fact that “getting stale” had become a real issue. As the 15th October grew closer, I reached the stage where my boredom threshold had been well and truly breached. Quite frankly, I was ready to posthumously decapitate Debussy, disembowel Poulenc and string up Saint-Saens if I had to keep their works performance ready one damn more day.

What saved my sanity was a classic “Aha” moment watching a programme on French TV the w/end prior to R-Day (as I called the event on my Twitter posts. It was a documentary about their great poet/composer/singers like Gainsbourg, Brel and Ferrat. What struck me was that they didn’t just sing the notes, they actually LIVED their music when they were performing. The light bulb in my brain didn’t just switch on – it exploded. At last I could finally understand the drive and motivation behind hour upon hour of my practise sessions, week after week. It wasn’t just an elusive search for perfect technique, I knew that already. What these amazing individuals had help me to discover was that my main purpose is not in demonstrating I have the best technique in the clarinet world (which I most definitely have not!) or some deep seated childhood desire for approval. My purpose is to use music to reach out to others: to say to them “yeah – I’ve been there, I understand and hey listen to this Sonata, so did that guy Poulenc. This theory is extremely logical if you know anything about my *ahem* rather colourful working career.  Well, that’s all very woo-woo and fluffy, touchy, feely stuff you may think. No it isn’t. The process to realise this purpose involves plumbing the depths of sometimes painful emotional memories and  dragging them into what amounts to public view via the medium of music. I guess this also explains why flash-harry techno wonder kids who can play notes at a speed of light leave me cold whilst less technically competent performances (the 12-year-old Bliss performing the Messager Solo de Concours, for example) have me in raptures if not in tears. The thought has occurred to me that perhaps I should start quantifying my performance quality via the value of Kleenex shares as opposed to album sales!

I want to challenge you, and this fits in neatly with the Marketing for Classical Musicians series: on an emotional level why are you doing what you do and what are you trying to achieve?

“Living the music” kept me on track with my practice schedule in the three days that preceded what I called “my date with destiny”. Over the top perhaps in the circumstances, but what I was about to do is scary stuff – well out of my comfort zone.

Finding a recording studio in southern Spain had proved easy enough. Amazingly there was one in my own small rural village. In a former life as sole director of my own company, Pete Ware, a recording engineer from the UK moved his family here a few years ago and sought advice from my company on Spanish bureaucratic issues. We had lost touch more recently but it was just a question of picking up the phone and meeting up which we did. A recording studio with a grand piano was another matter entirely. Hiring one would cost €800 + 16% sales tax – definitely a no brainer for my bank account! Pete suggested that providing the acoustic was favourable from his point of view, there was no reason why the deed could not be done “on location” at my pianist’s house, as he was used to recording live concerts. He had had over 30 years experience in the industry and I had no reason not to trust his judgement.

A visit to Jenny di Paolo and her husband Amadeo (5 minutes drive up the road, down a track and over a river bed) proved positive.  I had always found the acoustic there difficult during rehearsals: low ceilings and thick walls hung with tapestries deaden the sound but Pete was delighted as it mimicked the conditions in his studio back home. In any case, short of renting the huge state of the art village theatre, there was no other choice. Rather amusing how Spain can be a country of such contrasts.

Knowing that acoustic as well as altitude can colour reed choice, the afternoon before R-Day, saw me at Jenny’s place again, this time testing reeds for some glimmer of inspiration and calming of nerves. I’d played a series of 5 in well. It was going to be difficult choice.

Adding to the joy of the last preparation days, I sustained a wasp sting at a BBQ on the Sunday which had made my right hand swell up like a balloon plus the most ugly of cold sores graced the exact part of my lip where the reed sat. There was no way I was going to postpone now. The show just had to go on.

Marketing for Classical Musicians: Tools and Resources to Raise Your Musical Profile I

Are You Visible on the Internet?

Pardon me if I sound like Homer Simpson’s father, but when I was a young student in the UK if you aspired to being a soloist, it was silently understood that on graduating you organised the production of a nice glossy brochure, set up a few high profile concerts and then gained experience by treading the national music society circuit.  You might offer teaching in order to pay your rent and perhaps enter a few local competitions to raise your profile.  Quite straightforward really.

With the advent of the Internet, viral marketing, MP3 downloads and You Tube, from a marketing perspective it seems to me that a musician’s life is just a mite bit more complicated or perhaps that is just my middle-age talking!

Combined Static Web Site/Blog:  In a classic case of cobbler’s children who haven’t got any shoes, I am not a very good example at present.  Once I have cut the first half of my upcoming CD – The French Connection – I intend to perform a major revamp and combine this blog with my main domain name.  Whilst I’m a great advocate for research i.e., check out the sites of other classical musicians, the key point here is to make sure that your personality comes across and you communicate authenticity.  Have a read of : http://www.brightcecilia.com/features/classical-musician-internet-profile-web-design.html who incidentally is worth following on Twitter!  Also useful is http://www.musicianwages.com/the-working-musician/designing-a-website-for-a-freelance-musician

In my opinion, with a few exceptions like David Thomas: http://blog.davidhthomas.net most of the classical musician sites that I have seen to date are as boring as old pants.  Don’t fall into the trap of just listing achievements and qualifications!  Your personality is part of your brand package.  In addition, it has been proved time and again that people are more likely to ”purchase” when the trust element is present  and if they feel they have some sort of relationship with the person with whom they are doing business.  There are web designers aplenty out there so find somebody who will pander to what you want and not insist on their idea of what “professional classical musician” means.

The blog part does take commitment and work on a regular basis but believe me, it is well worth the effort in terms of generating interest and potential sales/job offers. 

You will need to investigate the best ways of generating traffic to the site but when it comes to Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), this is best left to a specialist.

Audio of Your Playing:  If I can find a local recording engineer in the depths of the Spanish countryside it shouldn’t be too much of a problem for you either unless you happen to live in the middle of the Australian Bush or African Jungle.  Finding a studio with a decent baby grand  “in situ” for my accompanist was my major challenge but I did find a very cost effective alternative to hiring a piano.  If the acoustic is good enough, record “on location” and engage the services of an experienced sound/music engineer.  At the most basic, all you  need are a few MP3 tracks for your web site. 

Could I encourage you to break out of your self-imposed musical cage and stamp your personality on the works you choose?  Yes it is scary to do your own thing and step outside the traditional box but if I can find the courage to do it, so can you.  I am already aware before publishing that my Debussy Premiere Rhapsodie and Messager Solo de Concours are likely to be controversal.  The Debussy is a bit slower and more lyrical than some (especially American) renditions but it makes more musical sense to me and brings out the dramatic dynamic contrasts of which the RC Prestige is capable.  The last page of the Messager is more like the finale of an aria (relantandos et al) because I feel the music just begs for it and that’s my interpretation. Don’t be afraid to do what comes naturally because it is that which is your musical personality.  It is your job to communicate; not to produce a carbon copy of whoever taught you, nor necessarily reproduce the exact phrasing and articulation that happen to appear in the edition that you are using. Combine ”what feels natural” with “research”.  If you’re still not convinced, check out the Artur Rubinstein version of the Grieg Piano Concerto on You Tube, especially the second movement.

As a guide, this audio exercise will cost around 1.000 of whatever currency you happen to use but it is far sounder investment than putting your money in the stock markets at present!  Apart from use on a web site, the tracks have multiple uses.  Produce an album version to market and sell, leaving just samplers on the internet;  use as a musical “calling card” when introducing yourself to potential hirers, music agents, corporate sponsors; come to the attention and pique the interest of a few major classical record labels.

Video: I do not recommend presenting your talent to the world via footage shot from your bedroom desk on a webcam although some months ago I came across an intentionally hilarious rendition of the Poulenc Sonata by a couple of college students which is well worth a view.  In my opinion, if you’re keen to go along this route, it has to be a professional job and take care with your presentation.

Radio and TV:  When I was in business, I broadcast monthly on radio and also had the good fortune to be invited on a couple of TV stations as well.  Whilst I adored live radio, I hated TV, particularly recorded shows with their endless retakes.  Radio is just so “cosy” somehow with the added advantage that you can turn up up in your PJs and the listeners are none the wiser!

Target local radio and TV stations whose demographics i.e., listener age and profile echo your own target audience. They need not necessarily be music orientated.  Always ask for a copy of the broadcast. It could come in useful at a later date.

Print Articles and Interviews:  And by that I mean newspapers and magazines.  Like radio and TV, the demographics should echo the other interests of your target audience. If you’re going for 20 year olds then there is little point featuring in a golf magazine.  Most editors and indeed radio shows are delighted to receive free editorial or special guests. I always write my own stuff which I suppose does help as it involves no work for the publication or presenter.

I haven’t forgotten Facebook, Twitter, competitions and publicity photographs.  There is a Part II of  Tools and Resources to Raise Your Musical Profile, which I’ll publish after a report on the eagerly awaited first half album recording sessionon scheduled for next week.

A Regular Practice Routine for the Clarinet Revealed!

Feel Pretty Cool Practicing the Clarinet Like So? George - Don't Do That

For the second post this week, as a couple of student clarinettists have got in touch to ask about my own regular practice routine, I thought it would be a good idea to immediately address this issue whilst it is fresh in my mind.  The revelation of what I get up to with my clarinets isn’t going to excite the general public or make the front pages of the tabloid press but it should serve as a useful guide for anyone looking to master a woodwind instrument.  Please bear in mind that this routine is what I’ve found works best for me but every player is different depending on their level of study and performance activity.  I’m not doing huge amounts of travel at present which helps enormously with consistency.  Adapt the basic pattern to suit yourself.

Regardless of the total time available, practice sessions should include the following  main elements: warm-up and  techie stuff such as long tones, scales and arpeggios; study; repertoire.  Earlier in my career I used to include orchestral extracts and sight reading as well.

Whatever else I have scheduled, I aim to fit in 4 hours, 5 days a week, with each day split into two series of 2 hours – morning and afternoon/evening.  Sometimes I can only manage one 2 hour session for various reasons and make up on a Saturday or Sunday.  

AM

Hour 1:  Apart from the fact that A clarinets typically get a lot less use than the Bb and therefore subject to cracking if they are suddenly picked up for a mega Mozart Quintet session, my typical masochistic Harrington logic suggests that if I can perfect my technique on these slightly larger and heavier instruments, I’m going to be truly virtuosic on it’s partner!  So – this first hour is always on the A.

Warm up exercises include easy 3-4 line studiettes in the chalameau register played very slowly followed by the same in the break/clarion area of the instrument plus a couple of Klosé exercises.  The reed has chance to settle down, my lungs get a chance to wake up and the joints in my fingers can shake out their sleepy dust. 

Long notes are next – an excellent way to improve your stamina.  Long means for as many seconds as you can manage without losing tone, pitch or keeling over.  I choose a register a week and play around with the dynamic on different days.  Slurred octave leaps over the compass of the instrument are fun! Do try it if you haven’t already. It’s a useful skill to have although it can be tricky once you reach the dizzy heights of the upper altissimo register.  Time check to this point is around 1/2 hour – occasionally longer if I’m playing like a drain.  Surprised?  Oh come on - all musicians have days like that even uber-pros!

In regards to scales and arpeggios: I elect a key signature per week and practise every permutation within that key signature.  What I’m talking about is legato as well as staccato, different rhythms, scales in thirds, dominant and diminished 7th, etc.  I work with a metronome and set myself a bpm target for the week.  It’s as boring as watching paint dry but believe me, the gain in improved technique far outweighs the pain of persistance.  Again, around 1/2 hour completion time for this section.

BREAK for 15:00 – Stretch, pull up a few weeds in the garden, pat the dogs, remind myself I have a fantastically supportive spousette to put up with clarinettist noises and show my appreciation with a cup of coffee.

Hour 2:  I figure after doing my technical duty I deserve a bit of a break so reward myself with the most difficult piece of repertoire I happen to be working on at the time.  No – this is not a “spot the irony” competition.  The Debussy Premiere Rhapsodie for example, has recently been replaced by the Messager Solo de Concours which has a particularly spectacular cadenza.  Ask yourself what is the most difficult piece you are tackling and slot it into this space.

PM

Hours 3-4:  Half an hour of study material first off gets my fingers moving in the afternoon and makes gives me a sense of being virtuous.  

I then have x2 3/4 hour sessions of repertoire which varies depending on my recording/performing commitments.  It’s my favourite part of the day and not just because I know a glass of wine swiftly follows when I finally pack away my instrument!

Note that sandwiched between the 1/2 hour + 3/4 + 3/4, I get up and move around, feed the cats, etc.  The mini-breaks are important. Your brain and body benefit from short periods of rest.

A few other tips that I have picked up over the years:

• Think “delayed gratification”! Put the elements of your practice you dislike most at the start
• Try and be “in the now”.  What I mean is –  fully focus on what you are trying to achieve instead of clock watching, thinking about the pile of washing up you have to do or that night out you have lined up at the weekend.
• It is not the amount of time you spend practicing that is important.  It is the efficiency with which you practice.  When I was studying at the RCM, it was pretty common to hear players boasting about their number of practice hours.  Apart from being enough to give any sensitive musician an inferiority complex, it is utter madness!  Always remember in the real world it is results that count, not the effort.
• A life makes a true artist so don’t forget you have one outside of music!  My “extra-curriculum” interests include animal rescue, running and weight training; I love good food and fine wine in the company of close friends and almost nothing can match a long walk with my dogs on a Sunday morning.

Any questions or comments? Post them below or drop me an email at my failsafe address: m.harrington@telefonica.net.

Marketing for Classical Musicians: How to Target a Specific Audience

 

Targeting a Specific Audience Requires Considered Creative Thought

Have you ever heard of niche marketing?  Niche marketing is where Proctor and Gamble would produce a washing powder formula and packaging targeted at a very specific profile of person with particular needs.  How can niche marketing improve sales?  Consider a real life example – an online t-shirt design company that launches in the Spring of 2009.  The collection is vast and includes at least one item to suit even the most eclectic of tastes and yet sales are sluggish.  The site is divided into themed “mini-boutiques”, each with a different presentation style aimed at appealing to a specific group of people; separate search engine keywords are added according to the target market defined for each “shop”.  The result is that figures rocket up the sales graph on a near vertical line with the only variable being that general had been replaced by niche.   

Keeping those definitions in mind, let’s look at these concepts in a musical context: Marion Harrington, clarinettist,  cuts a CD which features only late 19th Century Romantic French works.  This recording is not going to leap off the shelves into the hands of all classical music lovers this side of the Orion Nebula.  Other clarinettists is one niche; lovers of late 19th Century Romantic stuff is another; thinking more expansively - parts of Canada and even the entire French nation.  If I wanted to go down the path of reaching lower income groups, maybe I’d sell the rights to Woolworth (RIP) for them to release on their budget Pickwick budget label.  And kids? Ever heard a rap version of the Poulenc Sonata?

I stand to be corrected with a myriad comments of protest, but I honestly can’t think of anything, from pet food to plastic bowls, cheese to condoms and sausages to sleeping tablets that is not deliberately aimed at a specific niche market.  Even staples like fruit and veggies are packaged and priced to appeal to a certain sector of the population.

One of the reasons that many classical musicians have a tough time, especially on starting out, is that their marketing is way too generalised.   Depending on your age, experience and specialist interests, I believe that you should be looking at excelling in one area at a time, culminating in becoming the ultimate guru on your chosen instrument/voice for a good few years prior to shuffling off this mortal coil.  Although these days it is easy to acquire instantly at a touch of a button or swipe of a credit card. let’s get real here: you really can’t have it all at once the moment you graduate so it’s important to plan ahead.

If “guru” is your end game, I suggest breaking your career into 7 year segments.  The vast majority of international instrumental competitions are closed once you hit 35 so if you see yourself heralded as an internationally acclaimed soloist it would seem to make sense to focus on these and recitals at the outset.  I’m not saying that you should ignore chamber work and orchestral playing; only that your marketing focus i.e., the message that you send out to the world is that which befits your goals in any particular 7 year segment.  Landing a position with the London Symphony Orchestra early on is all fine and dandy – hats off to you – but seriously consider how important that is to the secretary who organises solo recitals for the national classical music society network.  If somebody invited me to play the melody tracks on an easy listening CD for Spanish pop music, I’d do it but choose not to make a song and dance about it because it doesn’t fit either my brand image or the “raison d’etre” of my 7 year segment.  However, it does help put food on the table which is essential for somebody with my enormous appetite.

So – you have established your brand/image and have identified your niche(s).  These together will help you answer the question: Who, exactly, is likely to pay good money to hear what you have to play?

My this I mean, profiling.  Invite some like minded friends over to your place and go wild with brainstorming over a bottle of wine.  If you are targeting the current “average” profile you’d be looking at aged 55 years plus.  What other interests do these people have – golf, church, gourmet food, grandchildren, etc.  This will determine the medium of your marketing i.e., specific mags, radio stations, banner ads on web sites, etc., as well as the tone and content.  It might well throw up some interesting venue ideas.  Talking of which, have you any idea what is their likely concert ”spend” i.e., how much they would be prepared to pay for a ticket to a concert?  Renting the Carnegie Hall for a night might seem to be a good idea but not very profitable is your only audience are the security staff.  

If it so happens that your chosen niche is over-populated or in marketing-speak, saturated, think about how you can accomodate your goals to fill glaring gaps in the classical music market.  Attracting a younger audience is one such gap but include their music loving grandparents and you have doubled ticket sales.  Making performances more accessable to lower income groups is another example, perhaps pulling in sponsorship from local companies.

 Next post in this series: Tools and Resources to Raise Your Musical Profile I

Marketing for Classical Musicians: Branding

What Does Your Brand and Image Say to the World?

Just like Ariel washing powder, like it or not, you are a product - a commodity – that you want people to buy.  Whether it’s a recital engagement, an orchestral appointment, a CD of your playing, a “How To…….” ebook on an aspect of your playing or winning an international competition, you are essentially selling – whether to adjudicators, the general public or potential future employees – what marketeers call a brand.

The next time you visit your local supermarket, take a look at the washing powder section and note what you see.  Yup!  Even in Spain I can find at least half a dozen different makes all jostling for space on the shelves.  Just like the rows of clarinettists adorning the pages of your average fairly prominent classical music agent, these boxes of soap powder all do roughly the same job although in a slightly different way and are therefore competing with each other!

Now ask yourself a question: what and why do you buy your particular brand of washing powder? 

Let me illustrate this with a couple of stereotypical examples.  If you’re single, living in one room, just starting out and have enough underwear to last you a fortnight, you wouldn’t go for a cheap family bumper size box would you?  I’d bet you’d pick out the smallest and most economical.  What about if you are a rip-roaringly successful mezzo-soprano with a lawyer husband?  Hmm – quality is the most important here for whiter than white shirts and dazzling recital gowns so I’d say damn the expense and go for top of the range which does everything except transport the garments to washing machine.

Paraphrase that original question and direct towards yourself: what exactly am I offering (differentiating myself to the competition) and to whom am I offering it (target market)? 

Pardon me for having a rant but I am rather tired of looking through musicians biographies which all read exactly the same and sound like standard boring CVs: conservatories studied, degrees passed, competitions won, orchestral experience gained, a couple of nice pics and maybe some MP3 tracks if you’re lucky.  I’m left wondering “Who IS this person”? and “Will they be able to meet my clients needs?”  More importantly, ”How can I be sure they are suitable choice for the event that I’m looking to fill?” and even ”Would I invite them to my party?”.

Each of us is totally unique as a musician with special talents that are specific only to us. 

What an incrediblely inspiring fact.  There is just ONE magnificent you in the whole world.  OK – if this is the case, why do so many musicians try to sound and look like their immediate peers?  As a young student, I had this idea of marketing what amounted to a musical chat show i.e., standard recital but with talking in-between pieces.  Everyone thought I was out of my mind (nothing new there), but I went ahead anyway and well, hello – surprise!  It was successful.  Why?  I was in my element (having already demonstrated exhibitionist tendencies in early childhood – see previous post on Photo Shoot) and consequently more relaxed away from what I often felt was the “”starchiness” of a more traditional set up.  More importantly, the audiences loved it because the format was something completely different.  Result – I made a profit.

The fact is, that the average classical audience age is 55 years old.  What will be your contribution to reverse this trend?  Don’t be afraid of doing something new and innovative.  If you are petrified about stepping outside the box, drop me an email and I’ll send you some resource links that can help get you unstuck.

Here’s a great question to help you focus in on unearthing your brand: “What do you want from your music and why?” 

As you think about this, I want you to leave all financial considerations on the sideline for minute – paying your bills doesn’t count for this exercise.  Believe me, until you can truthfully answer that question, you will continue to be yet another face with the same story on a music agency’s list.

Try these posers too:

Q1 –Why do you play the tuba/dulcimer/sing falsetto?

Q2-What is your purpose as a musician? What do you want to achieve?

Q3-What are your other interests apart from classical music?

Q4-Who is your ideal audience?

Q5-What is your USP (Unique Selling Point)? There is only one of me, Marion D Harrington – clarinettist (thank goodness, I can hear my Mother muttering).  A more user friendly way of considering this is – what can you offer to the marketplace that no other violinist/’cellist/trumpet player/contralto can?

That lot should keep you busy for a few days!  Just be very sure what you’re doing if you’re in the public eye and one day decide that having a crew-cut would be cool…….never again for me (see pic at head of post).

Next post in this series: How to Target a Specific Audience

Marketing for Classical Musicians: Introduction

What's Your Brand?

Since setting my feet permanently on Spanish soil in 1996, the vast majority of the last 13 years I have spent running my own show.  That is: I have either worked as a sole trader or stood at the helm of my own company.  Hanging up my designer suits for the last time in April 2008, my wardrobe has had to get used to sharing space with a pair of clarinets.  Similarly, more accustomed to living with a diet of background music supplied by Mezzo TV, the in-house menagerie of assorted animals have had to adjust to a daily routine of live classical clarinet.  With the first tracks of the (re)debut album about to be laid down at the end of the month (delayed from June for various reasons), it is not really a surprise that certain chunks of the day find me entreched in formulating and preparing to execute a marketing plan. 

Drawing on the same skills I successfully used in what I now call “the normal working world” for more than a decade, transposing basic concepts  to promote myself as a musician really isn’t such a big deal.  On the other hand, in conversations with other classical bods, it seems that this kind of touchy-feely relationship with marketing – to the point of actual enjoyment - is rather unusual.

My business experience, coupled with knowledge gleaned from my own journey of self-discovery - particularly over the last year and a half - has left me wondering why this sort of teaching i.e., personal development and marketing, is not made compulsory in music conservatories worldwide.  It was most certainly not part of my student curriculum.  After three or four years of specialist training and emerging from music college clutching the coveted qualification, it seems that you have to figure out your own answer to the question “What now?”.  You could state with some accuracy that the same applies to the subject of  “Ways to Make Money”.  Unless there is some sort of conspiracy going on, how could something so vital and important appear to have been missed out of what some call ”mainstream formal education”.  How many of us grew up with the limited belief of expecting nothing more than being employed by somebody else?

Consciousness, Creativity and Connections seem to be the winning trinity in any walk of life but you wont learn about that phrase at school or in music college.  By the way, if you’re curious to find out more about the creating your own economy in general, take a walk through http://www.thefenixemporium.com.  My point is this: you could be one of the most talented musicians of your generation but if underneath it all you lack self-esteem, have no knowledge of branding or basic marketing, think PC means “politically correct” and rarely venture out from the depths of the French countryside, you can conclude that you’re likely to be in for a hard time.

Have you ever wondered why some musicians, sometimes not the most talented in their field, achieve international acclaim while others, clearly superior in musicianship and technique do not? The only two things which separate them are attitude (mind set) and marketing. 

These days, it is simply not enough to sign with a prominent music agent, set up a Facebook page and rely on existing contacts for finding work.  I would suggest that in addition, you need to know yourself inside out as a person and musician, have a crystal clear vision as to where you’re going and a plan to ensure you arrive at your destination.

Over the next few weeks I’ll be posting some of my ideas on Marketing for Classical Musicians.  The aim with the marketing series is to pass on information as quickly as possible.  One of reasons this blog has been sadly neglected over the last couple of months is that an entrenched perfectionist tendency drives me to produce as polished a piece of writing as possible which is time consuming.  Although with a rapid delivery approach there is the risk of a less than grammatically correct literary work of art -*tounge in cheek*-  I conclude that this approach is far preferable to weeks of WordPress silence and emailing essentially the same information separately to individuals. 

I’m setting myself the target of publishing twice a week most likely Tuesdays and Thursdays.  As posts go up on the blog I’ll announce them on Twitter.  If you have any questions along the way, add a comment here, Tweet me or check out the Contact page.  I’m always happy to connect with other musicians!

Challenging Weeks

I am a person who functions optimally when there are deadlines to be met: a clarinet recital or a 1/2 marathon, for example.  I never have a problem with motivation providing there is a goal with a date to maintain my focus.  If an external pressure is absent, as in the case of internet micro-businesses, I make my own.  

The Fenix Emporium was due to be launched last Saturday, 4th July.  Even as I set and publicly announced this specific day, I knew workload was going to be heavy but figured it was possible to meet it with diligent application.  Unfortunately, not only was Zoe’s death impossible to anticipate so soon after the cancer diagnosis but I also hadn’t reckoned on the effect of such paralysing and overwhelming grief.  The arrival of 4 stray kittens disrupted the schedule further, along with Juan, our landlord, deciding (at last, after three years of us patiently waiting) to fit a brand new bathroom.

Being freelance and self-employed, the flip side of accepting a sometimes precarious financial position is the joy of flexibility.  In the circumstances I’ve decided to be kind to my emotional self and extend the deadline without adding a new one for the time being.  Labelling myself as a Type ‘A’ Creative, “going with the flow” is a rather alien concept.  However, it seems to be the most intelligent way to deal with what has a been and continues to be, a challenging few weeks.

Rationalising with myself, viewed from a lifespan perspective, delaying launch is mere hiccup.  I believe that a web site is a reflection of the mind that created it and as such, whilst I generally take a “Ready, Fire, Aim” approach, I would not feel comfortable knowing that a part of me has gone on public display without being properly completed and thoroughly tested. 

I wonder whether I am being taught the true meaning of patience – not one of my strong points!

Zoe – Part 3

Over the course of just a couple of weeks, despite the temptations of fresh fish and raw mince, Zoe stopped eating completely although she was drinking plenty of water.  With hindsight, it was just as well we had already made a vet’s appointment which was due in a couple of days.

Over the weekend Zoe looked really tired – her eyes had sunk into the back of her head – and I noted significant signs of jaundice indicating that the cancer had reached her liver.  I will never forget the pathos of seeing her curled up in a garden chair on the Saturday evening looking out over the fence at the sun sinking down to its bed behind the mountains.  The sky displayed stunning streams of pastel reds, pinks, blues and greys streaking across the dying day. The slow movement of Rachmaninoff’s 2nd Piano Concerto played itself through in my head.  I sat on the ground beside her.  Zoe looked me straight in the eyes as if to say “I’ve had enough”.  I knew.  She knew.  I wept – grateful to be alone with her.

As we drove to the vets, all of the occupants had acknowledged that it was going to be the infamous “final journey” which all animal lovers dread.  Zoe had vomited overnight and the water bowl had only attracted vacant stares.  In the car, the radio was unusually turned off; the cat was too exhausted to raise more than a couple of pathetic meows; the humans were incapable of speech – silence being an insurance against the tears. 

A revision and rapid lesson in feline anatomy and physiology ended with us being given the option of having Zoe taken to the operating theatre to see how much of the liver the cancer had consumed, then not let her wake up if the situation was as the vet suspected.  This possibility was declined without hesitation.  After spending nearly twelve years with Zoe, we wanted to be with her right at the end of her life.

Throughout the whole process she was purring – something we hadn’t heard for weeks – which was a source of enormous comfort although it did not ease the emotional pain of the moment.  I like to think that Zoe was thanking us both for her life and for letting her go.  As the injection took effect, we smothered her with cuddles and tasted the saltiness of a torrent of tears desperately trying not to let our overwhelming sadness punctuate the air with loud sobs.  We were given plenty of time alone with Zoe before the second injection was given which was very much appreciated.  In fact, the sensitivity and general unhurried manner with which this most awful occasion was dealt, deserves special merit. 

Zoe slipped away peacefully, still purring,  at 1545 on Monday, 29th July 2009.

Our emotions are still very raw.  Grief comes and goes with the monotonous regularity of low and high tides.  Focused concentration is difficult and although I find solace in my writing, for now I am carefully avoiding certain sections of clarinet works which are likely to floor me.  

I can’t recall who said  “Better to have loved and lost than not to have loved at all”  but I totally agree with the sentiment.  We were privileged to have known Zoe and to share her life.  I am certain that as time passes, rubbing in her healing balm, we will be able to remember her not only with great affection but be able to look back and truly celebrate her life.