Is music a Charity or a Business?
These days to break into the music industry you need to be a start-up entrepreneur as well as an artist. In order to get noticed you need pro quality branding, organisation and marketing strategies. All of these ultimately fall at the feet of the love of music, but are important nonetheless, to give your music the 'setting' it deserves. But lets talk about charity.... I've received a lot of funding from people. Actually my entire musical career has been community funded. Some people make a lot of money this way. Last I checked Amanda Palmer is voluntarily GIVEN $32,727 every time she does something because people have signed up to do so. And people have criticized her for it. Yet people don't criticize large salaries of business execs (well...). Is it offensive if an artist makes a huge profit? Why? Surely they are providing 'value' to many people, and people enjoy giving back. Hold on, people ENJOY spending money? Giving it away even when they don't need to? Yep. That's right. And that's why music is a charity and a cause no matter how much the artist is making. The artist does not have to create art. Someone with Amanda Palmers business mind could surely make a fortune in a more traditional career. But I respect her, and all artists, for sticking to what they love. And no, the audience does not have to pay for music. Not with youtube, spotify, internet downloads and the fact that many artists are now giving away their recordings (download mine here!), but they want to. It feels 'right', like insisting on buying a friend a cup of coffee (yes please!). I need a community of people to play to as much as communities of people need musical experiences, artistic creations in their streets, clean air and good food. Arts contribute to our lives beyond monetary value, and arts reflect our community culture. They are community endeavors for love of the art form itself which is why I believe musicianship is a charitable enterprise, and deserves all the support it can get! Go Artists! Keep On Creating!
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Once, while up on Dartmoor's misty hills in the mid-winter, I had a strong feeling of...the brevity of life. A sense of journey, and of leaving all *this* behind. I stripped in the rain (no-one was around) and danced atop the hills. I managed to completely slip over in the puddles that had gathered in the grass and ended up covered in mud, water, and a big smile. All while thinking about death...which is also thinking about life. I came home to a warm bath and the listening ear of my friend Charlene, and I sat down and wrote this song by the fire among tea and biscuits. I feel a strange longing for something beyond life. To be part of nature in an unconscious way, or perhaps I feel somehow cut off and I wish to return. I feel this song really captures what I experienced atop the moors. It's a song about leaving, while not really having left... Lyrics
Last I saw you swimming in the sea, beyond all else, far away from me. And how I long to be with you, a drop of water in the blue. Here and waiting for the tide to rip wide open this disguise. Biding time and holding on till I'm gone, gone, gone... Gone, gone, gone, gone... People call me as I wait they all have trouble on their plates. They've invited me to stay, but still I'm going on my way. I can but offer them relief since I have nothing up my sleeves! Just a temporary solution, before I dive into that ocean. Gone, gone, gone, gone... So they wail in despair, they cry it's utterly unfair, That one should leave this little town, but I can hardly hear them now. Out and running with the wind I feel the rain over my skin... ...It storms out in the wild, I feel I'm burning from inside! Gone, gone, gone, gone... And once I'm gone I shan't come back - there'll be no retracing of tracks... Destroy the past, leave me wide open, suck me in to your great ocean. Gone, gone, gone, gone... Looking from the other shore you tell me that you wanted more. But you go back to where you came from - leave me alone with this ocean. Gone, gone, gone, gone... Last I saw you swimming in the sea, beyond all else far away from me. And how I long to be with you, a drop of water in the blue... |
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December 2022
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