Conference napalm::commusic_v1

Well, I've been using my "studio" for audio/video work for the last six months
so its finaly started paying back for itself. 

The work involves putting music to a United Nations monthly television program
(AZIMUTS) that goes  out on a few European stations (Belguim ,France-FR3,LA5) 
and several asian and african stations as well. 

The people who "commisioned" me wanted to see the studio (so appearences 
count :-) ), wanted to "test" the product before buying it (they said: "make
us a 20 second theme  for a 3rd world U.N. program with african and asian 
influences. We want it next week.") , then they wanted
to make changes to 2 second bars and the way the drums sounded. A bit like
software prototyping with the user sitting next to you.

Having a midi-based studio must be the biggest asset in my case. Everything
that went on the final 2-track DAT was off the midi-sequencer. A lot of time
is spent with the producers reviewing the music for a particular edition
of the program. Change requests are constant. Sometimes I don't get a video
to work with, just a brief (we want 20 seconds with landscape images. The 
subject of the report is ..... and can we have it in 2 days ?). 

The competition is too expensive for the UN so keeping my rates down means
I'm more attractive cost-wise.

The experience hsa been very gratifying since making music to images pushes you
into corners you never imagined when doing song-based pieces.

Now that I've established a foothold with them my intent is to review the
way I charge and to establish minumum notification (I've spent too many
sunny weekends trying to finish some work that got handed to me on Friday
night to be deliverd on Sunday afternoon).

Zayed

    My studio for commercial work?  Well, technically, yes I guess it has
    been used for commercial work in that some of my stuff will be in a
    Digital internal training video.  And, I have plans for the future that
    I am acting on.  If successful, I'll let you know.  If unsuccessful,
    well, we'll just call it a hobby.  MIDIlust, it's a terrible thing.
    
    Steve

    I've thought about it - in fact, I was hoping to "seed" that end
    of my music business by doing some freebies including some background
    music for a promotional video by the National Speleological Society
    (cavers).
    
    They never even sent me a copy of the tape though, but at least I
    have something for a resume.
    
    At the moment, I'm busy enough with my band that I haven't pursued
    this any further.

	That's what our old friend Karl went off to do.  Don't have status to
	report.
	Anyway, no.  But I made a couple tunes for cable access, especially
	Runner's Journal, which is shown all over eastern mass on 
	10 or 20 different cables.  Two digits host, look for it on
	local cable studio channels.
	I knew about a guy who wrote this peculiar arrangement of
	the Art of Fugue, and it showed up on Nova.  He must have just
	sent it in, or known someone or something.  They have interesting
	scores.  I wonder how hard it is to get into documentary music.
	I'm just not very ambitious.
	Incidentally, come see me at The Performance Place in Somerville
	MA June 27,28,29 (Thurs,Fri, Sat), 8PM for my piece
	A Refugee From Performance Art, mostly stories about artists in
	a gallery in Seattle, with computer graphics and I guess some
	computer music as an afterthought.  The fee is semi-small.
	Lock your car and walk fast; there is parking.
	The Perforamnce Place is with the Elizabeth Peabody house.
	The phone is 623-5510.
	Tom

	The jingle business is a tad competetive around here - basically the
	top radio stations (all three of them) have their own "facility"
	for doing commercials and jingle construction. And their prices
	to the advertisers include that as a package, so there's really not
	a good way to break into that (at least up in VT).

	But, doing soundtracks for commercial/industrial videos happens,
	maybe not as much as I'd like, but enough, considering I'm in a band
	these days and have no time. Gotta know people who need the service,
	like videographers and such.

	I do about one band demo every couple of months. Not too much money
	in it (bands generally have no money), but it's usually a quick 
	four-night affair. I also have done a lot of taking people with
	a guitar and putting MIDI drums/keys/strings/etc behind them. Those
	projects usually drag on depending on how much money they want to pay.
	They generally have no studio experience, so you get to train them too.

	It hardly pays for the equipment. Not by a long shot.

	/pjh

    Funny, this topic show up now, because I have been recently 
    researching the MIDI preproduction business, particluarly down in 
    Trinidad, althought I have a gospel choir and a group (both without
    money, I play for both) needing this service up here. I would actually
    like to go down to Trinidad (in the Caribbean) and set a MIDI 
    pre-production studio, and break into the jingles business.
    Relative to studios just how can one expect to charge for those
    services? I would also offer musical arranging services.
    
    I have a connection to guy who is looking for someone to put music to an
    instructional video tape , he is in Miami and  wants the person
    doing the music to be local, there goes my opportunity to make some
    cash. (Any Miami folks out there.)
    
    Now if I can only get 'the package'  I would make up mind real quick.
    
    Errol(who'll_love_to_get_paid_for_having_fun) 

Tom - are you saying Karl M no longer works for DEC?

	Dan

    Malik...
    
    Edd

My favorite mag in all the world, EM (Electronic Musician), has run some
excellent articles during the past year on home studios and their application.
If I recall correctly, one of them concentrated pretty much on video scoring-
it may have appeared in AmigaWorld, though, I'm not positive.

Recently I received a MIX-sponsored mailing on a "rave-reviewed" seminar
entitled "Doing Music and Nothing Else." Although the brochure was filled with
a lot of typical hype, the MIX endorsement is a meaningful validation IMHO, and
many reiterations of the "money-back guarantee" also remove some concern which I
might otherwise have. I'm not taking advantage of the seminar this time around,
but I'd be glad to bring in the info if someone's interested.

BTW, I'm just revving up on Bars and Pipes Pro (Amiga sequencer), and it has
some nice features targeted toward scoring videos. You can create SMPTE
timelines for videos, specifying the placement (graphically) of each song used
for the score, and you can specify tempo by specifying a SMPTE *end* time for a
song- tempo changes are inserted automatically to make the song end at the
precise time desired. Neat-o. Personally, I think this package and the Amiga
would be a good foundation on which to build a video scoring studio. FWIW.

Cheers,
	Bob

I've done this quite often. I have a current set up where I produce cassettes
(in the form of Cassingles or short Albums) for a limited set of individuals
and then I keep the master. If they want copies, I charge $1.00 above my
cost (with a minimum quantity of 5) - This allows the people that I feel have
it together to produce thier own album and sell it at thier gigs without
having to come up with the $ for 200 copies. When you figure that I can
put together a single color cover with graphics on my PC (I use Ventura
Publisher on a 386 based PC), and buy tapes locally for less than $1.00
each, my total cost is about $1.50, which lets me sell them for $2.50 each.
5 Would set back the person $12.50, and they can pick them up the next
day. I haven't had to send any out for larger orders (5 or 10 is usually
all that anyone needs at a time), however, that is an option. I still use
my trusty (I've had it since 1981) Teac #144 Porta-studio. I'll admit that
it's a bit noisy, but I've not had any poor quality recordings because of the
hardware. I'm exceptionally picky about who I support in this manner, as
I don't have time to waste. In the past, I've also done recordings at live
concerts (or what ever you might want to call them) and turned around an
done the same thing. These could be bands, Barbershop Quartets, Childrens
Chouruses, or just some special event that you see a few bucks in. There
is not much competition for these lower paying recording efforts, however,
almost every one has turned into a paying Job (one has been having my band
every other month for the last 2 years) because of the good will it generated.
The other advantage is that I don't do any of the distribution of the tapes,
I let the people who are trying to push themselves control that aspect of
the sales. They can sell thier tapes (if they want to) for $5.00 or so, and
not take a loss. Many give them away as demo tapes, or to friends. I've looked
into CD's and at $3.00 (or so) for quantities of 500, thats a possibility
also - I would demand all costs (including my $1.00 per copy cost) up
front however; It'll happen one day I'm sure.

I say that you can put your low end hardware to work for you, as long as
you set the right expecations, and no one tries to rip anyone off. 

I've also done a number of radio spots (for free). In these cases they always 
put in a plug for my band, so, it's quite a fair to me. 

I think that all it takes is a bit of creative effort to find a way to be
successful and build your skills.

								Jens

    I'd also love to hear how Karl Malik is doing.
    
    I'm off for the entire month of June.  While waiting for my CD,
    I've got two separate commercial projects going.  One is a cassette
    album for a huge recovery center - Sierra Tucson.  I'm recording 
    someone doing recovery-oriented narratives, and doing appropriate
    music behind it.  About 2/3 done.  I'm getting X$ per hour plus a
    small cut per cassette. Sierra Tucson is part of a foundation, 
    with many centers U.S. wide, and the tape will be sold at all locations.
    
    The second is just unfolding, but should be more of a technical challenge 
    - doing music/effects backgrounds for various video projects, also with 
    Sierra Tucson.  Will obviously involve SMPTE.  However I'm only currently 
    set up for LTC SMPTE, buth they're not currently using LTC or VTC SMPTE 
    at all.  Maybe put LTC SMPTE on the SAP video track. 
    we'll see how it goes.. 
    
    I'll check in next week - Karl M (II)

	If you can live with small quantity or incremental sales, you might
	contact some organizations around town and ask if they need membership
	recordings of any sort. You might find that a lot of people are
	interested in training tapes, but don't have the resources to get
	started, or any idea of even where to start. I also recorded a vareity
	show that was put on by a Lodge here in town. All of the stars wanted
	copies (again not much $ but a start point). 

								Jens
	

>	If you can live with small quantity or incremental sales, you might
>	contact some organizations around town and ask if they need membership
>	recordings of any sort.

	What does this mean?  "Membership Recordings"?

Dan

>	What does this mean?  "Membership Recordings"?

	For example you have a club event (for members only) and they
	want to make a complex set of instructions available to users
	so that they understand what they are supposed to do. Some also
	have training tapes (I'm working on one of these now) that discusses
	benifits of certain products. These are hard to elaborate on,
	because it could be just about any spoken instructions or music
	that fits the need - I have a series of Sequences with different
	armed services themes on them as a result of doing on of these.

	You've seen these things for sale where someone wants to teach you
	something (the Perfect Pitch tapes that I see advertised in
	Electronic Musician), and DEC occasionally releases product information
	that can be listened to on a cassette deck while driving to a customer
	site. If you know anything about AMWAY, there is a group of musicians
	that tailor songs for the company (all are positive message songs,
	many are covers, a few are originals - the band is called the
	GOADS (thier last name) if I'm not mistaken), AMWAY also produces
	seminar tapes in a similar manner. Tapes are often for sale at
	meetings or seminars (and they have lots of these).

	I'm certain that just about anyone who has something to sell might
	want to create instructional tapes. In another case, you might find
	that some private clubs want personalized music/advertising for 
	special events to run thru thier club's P.A. system & they play
	thier promo tape once or twice an evening.

	There are lots of creative uses for your studio, that all tend to
	bring in repeat business (I look for opporitunities for my band
	to play, and I usually get many jobs out of it). 

	I hope I didn't lose you too much in this. If you have friends
	that are members of a club, or there is church group that is
	doing something special, you might find an opporitunity to help
	them out with a low cost set of tapes that solve some of thier
	needs and provide additional support for something that they are
	working on.

	Here are some places to look (Source is the book "How to Keep 
	Yourself Booked A Year In Advance - Alexander Publishing), but not
	necessarly on the topic at hand, these are places to look for 
	opporitunities:

		Colleges
			Student Unions
			Fraternities/Sororities
		High Schools
		Country Clubs
		Weddings
		Mall Promotions
		Local Clubs/Bars
		Hotels/Motels
		Political Parties
		Corporations
		Private Clubs
		Churches/Synagogues
		Local Cable Company 
		Sporting Events
		Fund Raisers
		Private Parties
		Miltary
			Officers Club
			NCO Clubs
			Base Functions
		Teen Clubs
		Convention Centers
		Department Stores
		Concert Bookings
		Resorts
		Museums

							Jens

    Just could not resist stating how helpful I have found this topic.
    Althought I did not create this topic I want to say thanks for all
    the great replies so far, because I have been meaning to ask some
    of those questions. 
    
    Errol

I, too (as the originator of the topic), want to thank those who have responded,
with special thanks to Jens for both the online and offline comments.  It is 
always interesting for me to hear what the rest of y'all (<- I live in Missourah 
now, gotta practice 8^) are doing with your gear.

It is especially interesting to know that there is very likely profitable
opportunities out there (if one looks for them) should there be a need to "tide
one's self over" in such a shakey climate as we have here in Digital these days.
Of course, whether I am able to deliver the quality required is my own matter.

I am presently completing a demo of a medley of instrumental styles that I plan 
to have onhand should an opportunity arise.  I'd be glad to send it out to 
anyone that would like to hear it and, perhaps, offer some critique.  On it I
have represented a full orchestral style, jazz, rock and something more whimsical
suitable for children.

I am also working on a children's tape that has been one of the most fun 
projects I've done in some time.  For some reason, my imagination is able to run
a bit more wild when I have a child audience in mind.  That is a bit more of a
long term project, though, and I don't foresee it being done before the end of 
the year.

This note is not to put an end to the discussion, please continue to enter your
thoughts and experiences.  I'm particularly interested in hearing what some of
you may have encountered as obstacles, or legal requirements, or clients'
perceptions, etc.

Dan

	I have heard many mondern avant-gardists on  Sesame street, including
	Philip Glass (couldn't have been an imitator) and Joan LaBarbara?
	just last week.  I think I recognized her voice.  She had
	Morton Subotnik's kid and is a better composer than he is, too ;-).
	Mr. Roger's neighbourhood has authentic live jazz (not some studio
	hack's imitation of it) on the set.  So the finest musicians
	have written music for children's tv.  good luck.
	Tom

    Re: .17
    
    Other artistes I've spotted on Sesame St.:
    
    Kronos Quartet playing "Purple Haze"
    
    Yo Yo Ma jamming with Hoots the Owl and some honkers on a piece by
    "Murray" Beethoven.
    
    As for Mr. Rogers:
    
    Empire Brass
    
    Queen Ida (jamming with King Friday!!!)
    
    Wynton Marsalis
    
    						Brian

I know it's off the topic, but I can't resist...

I once spent about ten minutes watching an incredible entourage of celebs do
bits of "Put Down the Duckie" on Sesame Street: musicians, football players,
folks from "Upstairs, Downstairs," you name it. Helluva tune!

Back to the topic- yeah, kids' stuff seems like a pretty neat avenue, if you've
got the material to go in that direction.

Bob

    Seems to me John Tesh does the soundtrack for a kid show (Bobby's
    World?).  Pee Wee's Playhouse had, I think, stuff by Tod Rundgren (sp?)
    and others.  That's a neat area.  Kids like the sounds of synths.
    I know mine do, anyway ... when my synth is not in the shop.  :(
    
    Steve

	I guess the message here is that there are a lot of markets for
	music. You don't have to write songs about trite topics or something
	that doesn't appeal to you. Some one like Weird Al Frankovic who
	toys with popular songs can make good money doing what he likes
	best.

	People like Roger Whitiker (spelling?) who advertises and sells
	exclusively on late night TV ads doesn't have to cater to some
	Record company executive (he produces all of his own stuff), and
	has sold over a million copies of his first release (he even
	produced his own TV spot). He does what he thinks he is best at
	and will return a reasonable profit. If you think that your
	efforts will either make you money, or make you happy, then do it.
	
	In particular, I try to work with people who I think have potential,
	and thier style of music is compatable with mine. I get to work
	with lots of people that way, and also get to know other people
	(networking is another word for this).

	I think that kids music is a great thing to work on. I don't like
	music that goes on and on and on and on, however, this might be
	perfect for a movie/video that someone needs done (listen to the
	stuff you watch, there's lots of music), or to set ambiance at a
	restaurant or a Wedding. One Ski area that I played at had a whole
	tape that was just quiet music that had a lot of natural sounds in
	it (some of Karl Moellers submissions on the COMMUSIC tapes come
	to mind here), and commissioned someone to write and produce it
	just for them. While I tend to think of music as 3 to 4 minutes
	as a song and tend towards commercial sounds and tempos, I also
	recognise that there is a lot more that can be done. If you have
	a vision, you should probably try to emulate things that are
	similar until you grasp the technique needed to get a certain sound
	of feel (I recorded many covers of my favorite songs to find out
	how to get mixes to work on good speakers as well as very low end
	speakers, and a $25.00 cassette deck), then once you feel that
	you can get the type of sound and feel that you want, you should
	start trying to produce your own efforts, or what ever you feel
	is important. You should be able to find others that want customized
	music that you can create. Put that home studio to use!

								Jens
	
	

Although it can be updated at any time, the demo tape is finished as of midnight
last night.  It is a short tape with a 4 minute (or so) medley of musical styles
(instrumental, no vocals) brought together in a manner not unlike broadway 
musical overtures.  Although most of it is sequenced, there are two sections of 
guitar parts, one acoustic, one electric.

Due to some of the responses I received, I realize I neglected to mention that
this tape is available free of charge to any commusician (or DECie in general).
Its not mandatory, but I'd appreciate any suggestions for improvements from 
those who receive a tape.  Send me your home address, and I'll get a copy out to 
you.

Dan

    
    I have a feeling this may be straying from the topic, but I'm
    also interested in doing a childrens tape. I'd like to do
    an instrumental lullabye tape using synth and guitar. Does anyone
    know the copywrite rules or have any hunches regarding lullabyes?
    Are most of them old enough and written by good old "trad." ? :^)
    I don't know that I'll get as far as selling one, but I like to
    dream.
    
    thanks,
    Dave
    

    Re:.23
    
    I'd trot off to a bookstore or library and check out a children's
    songbook, see what the copyright info says in there,  That'll give you
    a good idea if there's lots of PD stuff or not.
    
    
    						Brian

Who says this conference ain't work-related?  

I was sent a memo by Mary Beth 4GL::Raven inviting me to see a video entitled

	"Designing Dialog Boxes for DECwindows Motif: A Style Guide"

It was shown:

              Tuesday, July 30th, 1991
                    9:30 - 11:30
              ZK1-3, Babbage Auditorium

It is a Digital internal-use training video that might eventually become a
product for outside as well.  They used a fair amount of my music in it (with 
my enthusiastic permission, of course).  Unfortunately, because my group was 
moving the system it was mailed to was shut down.  So, I didn't get the invite 
until after the premiere.  She said that there were some good comments about 
the music before the showing, but I haven't heard anything about how the show 
went.  It's all part of a pilot program for doing this type of thing.  The 
tape goes for about 55 minutes and I should be getting a copy one of these 
days.

If you are into the design of Motif applications (which, coincidentally, I'm
doing nowadays), then you might also have other interests in this video.

By any chance, did any of y'all happen to see this?

FWIW, the tunes that I did before are now being redone on my new setup.  I
hope to put out a CD some time between this fall and next summer.  Now, excuse
me while I go outside and yell for a while ...


Steve

	I was at the presentation. The comments were varied, from one
	person who wanted background music through the whole thing,
	to another who wanted to do without. The music didn't sync
	too well with the narration. Most of their technical problems
	were soundtrack-related (editing problems, poor sound quality).

	As for the music itself - it sounded very PBS-documentary-like
	to me. Dunno if that was what you were going for or not:-).

	Mike

    Wish I coulda been there.  I didn't have any control over what went
    where.  What they did was use some of my master cassettes that I used
    to make a cassette album a couple of years ago.  Too bad about the poor
    sound quality.  Nuts.
    
    Steve

    I thought the sound quality was ok.  You have to remember that it
    had been recorded into a Macintosh and played back by the Mac under
    control of the animation program.  The Mac's basic sound abilities
    are 8-bit samples at 22K/sec, giving a high end of only 11kHz.
    
    They only picked out a few segments and used them over and over
    again, with no attempt to match segment length to what was on
    the screen.  Several people commented on this.
    
    The production facilities available to this project were quite
    limited, especially in the sound area.  They used the two audio
    tracks on a U-matic tape recorder, with music on one track and
    narration on the other.  They admitted they did not have anyone
    on the project with any great knowledge of audio production, and
    there were comments that if they wanted to *sell* this tape the sound
    should be done over again by professionals.
    
    This was not a critical comment on the music itself, but the way
    the audio tracks were put together.

    Ah.  Wonder if they'll be intersted in my remixes on the D70 ... :)
    
    Steve