by George Howard

The Sine Qua Non
This article addresses specifics that you as a musician or participant in the music business must face head on. Put simply, if you don’t address these issues, you have little to no chance of succeeding in the music business. These specific details can be referred to as the sine qua non of the music business. That roughly translates to, “without this there is nothing.”

There are two specific details that you must address immediately. The first is a concept that Jim Collins outlines in his fantastic book, Good to Great. It’s called the Hedgehog Concept. The second is an internal factor. Specifically, it’s the belief that your own music, or the music of the artist on whose behalf you work, must be heard. I’ll explain both in some depth, beginning with the latter. continue

by Patrick Ross (http://blog.copyrightalliance.org/)

In this five-part series I will be channeling Ebenezer Scrooge, and sharing my inner crankiness with those willing to read past this sentence. In the years in which I’ve been promoting the rights of artists, creators and copyright owners, I have repeatedly heard tired canards that too often go unchallenged. I have challenged them in isolation, but in this and four following blog posts I aim to go after ten of them, one at a time. I ask my readers to be like Tiny Tim and go in with an open mind, recognizing the positive inner spirit of my message. God bless us, everyone, creators and users.

1. “Artists are being empowered by the Internet and digital technology, and copyright is stifling them.”

The first statement is absolutely correct. There have always been writers, software makers, film makers and recording artists who produced and distributed their own works, either out of a need for total creative control or because they couldn’t find a professional partner. The Internet now makes it easier for these individuals to produce works and find an audience. Recent studies show that in the crowded and noisy Internet, they are unlikely to rise up to the heights of professionally distributed artists, but the potential is there, and they are still quite capable of doing better than they did before, with both reproduction and distribution costs lower (marketing costs are not necessarily lower, as free “viral” marketing has limits when millions are attempting the same thing).
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by Regis Behe

It used to be a musician’s goals were simple: A record contract, a national tour and, if the stars magically aligned, “the thrill that you get when you get your picture /on the cover of the Rolling Stone,” according to the song by Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show.

That was long before the Internet, P2P file-sharing and a sharp decline in the sales of albums created a new paradigm for musicians. No longer is it enough to merely release music and tour.

“It’s definitely an evolution,” says Pittsburgh-based musician Bill Deasy. “I’m hard up against the economic realities. I can’t really sustain myself on the old model of recording and touring.”

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Stunning New Look and Interactivity
Sporting a sleek new look, Pro Tools 8 is as easy on the eyes as it is to use.

All of the Pro Tools functionality you know and love is still in place but with some subtle enhancements, double the inserts per channel, more customizability, and easier access to editing options than ever before. Customize the toolbar to show only your favorite tools, and rearrange them the way you want. Tile or cascade your window arrangement. Change the color of your channel strips, tracks, regions, groups, and markers to any hue. Navigate through sessions quickly using the Universe view. And with the QuickStart dialog, you can jump right into an existing session, quickly create a new session from scratch, or start from one of the new session templates.

A Well-Stocked Studio
Pro Tools 8 comes fully packed with a huge, comprehensive collection of music creation and sound processing plug-ins, giving you a well-stocked studio right out of the box.

Create and play music with groundbreaking new virtual instruments, including the Mini Grand piano, Boom drum machine, DB-33 tonewheel organ, and Vacuum and Xpand!²™ synths. Dial-up awesome guitar tone with Eleven™ Free and SansAmp®. Play DJ with Torq® LE. Add character to tracks with 20 new AIR effects. Make music with nearly 8 GB of high-quality loops. And with dozens of professional sound processing plug-ins and tools at your disposal — including nine new additions worth over $1,300 (USD) on their own — you can fix, enhance, and polish your mixes with ease.

More Tracks Than Ever
Got Pro Tools LE or Pro Tools M-Powered? Get ready to create even larger mixes than ever.

Pro Tools 8 expands the power of your current hardware interface, allowing you to work with up to 48 mono or stereo audio tracks. Add Music Production Toolkit 2 (for serious musicians and music producers) or DV Toolkit™ 2 (for complete post production, Pro Tools LE only) and you can create huge mixes, with up to 64 mono or stereo audio tracks. And with the new Complete Production Toolkit (Pro Tools LE only), which combines both toolkits, you can work with up to 128 audio tracks AND get 7.1 surround mixing capabilities, making it easier than ever to collaborate with Pro Tools|HD users. Score Your Music
The new Score Editor lets you view, edit, arrange, and print MIDI data as music notation.

Whether you want to compose music using the notation tools, or transcribe recorded, imported, drawn (with the Pencil tool), or step entered MIDI data into notation, the Score Editor features everything you need and nothing you don’t. Write parts on a single staff (choose treble, bass, alto, or tenor clef) or grand staff. Place and edit notes, and edit the meter and key signature at whim. Add chord symbols (Dm7, G, and so on) and chord diagrams (for guitarists) to sessions. Transcribe MIDI parts in real time. Print out a score in its entirety or print only certain instrumental parts. You can even export sessions as Sibelius (.sib) files for further finessing in Sibelius. Complete MIDI Production
If you use virtual instruments and MIDI, Pro Tools 8 features a comprehensive array of new MIDI tools.

Gain extensive MIDI editing power through MIDI Editor windows, which can display MIDI and automation data for Instrument, MIDI, and Auxiliary Input tracks. Work with new features that let you separate, consolidate, and mute MIDI notes; scrub and shuttle through parts; view superimposed MIDI and Instrument tracks for easier arrangement editing; color code MIDI notes by track, type, or velocity; audition velocity changes; and play MIDI notes when tabbing. Edit MIDI automation and continuous controller (CC) data through multiple Automation and Controller lanes. Even watch your musical handiwork scroll by in real time during playback. Transpose with Elastic Pitch
As a complement to Pro Tools software’s powerful Elastic Time tempo and time manipulating tool, Pro Tools 8 introduces Elastic Pitch, which allows you to effortlessly manipulate or correct the pitch of any audio region in real time, right inside the Edit window.

Easily transpose an entire audio region in semitones — up or down up to four octaves — without affecting its timing or tempo. Fix a less than perfect vocal performance by altering the pitch of individual notes in cent intervals. Or create cool sound effects by linking pitch changes with time compression/expansion using the Varispeed algorithm. Comp Tracks to Perfection
Creating flawless performances is easier than ever.

Pro Tools 8 features new track compositing workflows, enabling you to quickly and easily piece together the best possible version of a performance from multiple recording passes. Simply loop record multiple takes on an Audio track, view and audition the takes in Playlist view, select the best parts from the track’s alternate playlists, and copy them to the main playlist with a single click. You can also rate regions on a scale of 1 – 5 to help identify which takes you like the most when compositing playlists.

New Editing and Mixing Capabilities
Pro Tools 8 equips your system with even more editing and mixing capabilities.

Lock regions to the timeline to prevent them from being inadvertently moved or edited. Use the Automation and Controller lanes to view and edit track automation (such as volume, pan, and plug-in automation) and MIDI CC data (such as velocity, pitchbend, and modulation) without changing track views. And with 10 inserts to play with per track, you can now use more plug-ins than ever before.

Expanded Pro Tools|HD Features
Pro Tools HD 8 extends the extensive capabilities of Digidesign’s Pro Tools|HD audio hardware with the new Satellite Link option, which allows you to control up to five Pro Tools|HD systems as one.

For the ultimate in post-production efficiency, the new Video Satellite and Video Satellite LE options bring Avid® and QuickTime HD/SD video playback to Pro Tools in high definition, without sacrificing your audio track counts or processing power. Pro Tools 8 also delivers major enhancements to ICON users, bringing new functionality to the Soft Keys, adding a local assign mode, introducing I/O view, and letting D-Command® and D-Command® ES users expand their console to 40 faders.

Expanded Hardware Control
Pro Tools 8 deepens its ICON console, Digidesign control surface, and M-Audio® controller integration, enabling you to map plug-in parameter controls to almost any encoder on your controller, and access each track’s 10 inserts. With ICON, Pro Tools 8 brings new and improved functionality to the Soft Keys; adds a local assign mode for assigning Inserts, Sends, Inputs, and Outputs; introduces I/O view; and lets you expand a D-Command® or D-Command® ES console to 40 faders with an additional Fader Module. More Great New Features
Pro Tools 8 is chock full of many other amazing new features that’ll help you become more efficient, inspire your creativity, and provide more flexibility for your workflow needs. Here’s what you can experience when Pro Tools 8 hits the streets:

• Check for Updates feature keeps Pro Tools and your plug-ins up to date
• Windows Vista (32-bit Business or Ultimate) support on Pro Tools|HD
• QuickTime HD support on Mac OS X-based systems
• Enhanced session open and close times on Pro Tools|HD
• Supports files up to 4 GB in size, letting you work with longer files with higher sample rates

I’ve been going on a spending spree lately, which I sometimes do during the gray winter months here in Michigan. I got BFD2 the other day. I bought the original BFD 1.0 when it first came out several years ago, and was thoroughly disappointed. My computer met the minimum requirements, but the sounds wouldn’t stream correctly and the program was full of other bugs. I ended up selling it on ebay, then finding a hacked copy of 1.5 last year. With a faster computer and more RAM, I found BFD to be pretty nice and even bought the Joe Berassi Evil Drums expansion pack for it. Still, I didn’t use it much because it was lacking something. When I saw some of the previews of BFD2, I thought it looked like they made some major improvements and decided to give it a second chance. I forked over my $399 and went legit again with Fxpansion.I’m a “try before I buy” consumer. If I can’t find a demo version and I can find a hacked version, I don’t have a problem trying it. Ninety-nine percent of the time I end up not using the program, but there’s always that 1% that turns out to be a gem. I believe BFD2 to finally be one of those gems. Out of the box, it was an easy install and activation. I got up and running in less than an hour (a full install of 55GB!). It’s pretty intuitive to use and laid out well. I was jamming to the luscious new sounds within minutes (although I strongly suggest reading the extensive manual to learn everything this has to offer). How good does it sound? Unbelievably realistic. You get a whole new library of sounds, and I can still import my expansion pack to use with it. It comes with an extensive array of fx, so you can use it for any genre of music. I’m really pumped about this release and am recommending it to anyone who is wishing to capture that acoustic drum sound without the hassle of mic-ing up a real kit.

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 Taurina [1:04m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

 

 Hey Liverpool: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

 

 Nice Trip: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

 

 Colors: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is a seven part video interview and well worth the time checking it out if making money off your music is in your game plan.

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First some disclaimers: I’m only going to discuss the tv and film side since that’s where I have personal experience.  Besides, figuring out mechanical royalties on record sales is nothing more than simple multiplication since the statutory mechanical rate is common knowledge.

Also this info is applicable only to the placement of existing songs and compositions, not to custom underscoring type work (except for the royalty part, which would be the same).

The royalty info below is based on me being a BMI affiliate, ASCAP will be generally similar, although recent changes may affect this, see below.  This is for the US market and may not be applicable elsewhere.  All numbers are applicable to unknown and unsigned artists/songwriters/composers only. 

So, there’s basically 3 ways to make money from tv and film:

1. Upfront money you may get paid when you sign a contract with a music library or publisher (henceforth MLP)
2. License fees you may get paid when your song is placed in a production
3. Performance royalties you will get paid if the production airs on TV or is shown in movie theatres OUTSIDE THE US.  There are no payments for US theatrical performances. 

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