Garnish Music Production School

Demos

What is a demo? A sales pitch Demos – Then and NOW (records)

-Used to be able to do piano or guitar and vocal -NOW – records, no room for anyone to listen -Most of time aren’t listening, just reading

When to pitch piano / vocal -The right ears
-EDM pitch / piano

-Demo quality – current
-Can I play this in rotation of what’s on radio right now?

-Vocalist
-Amazing vocalists vs mediocre

-You can scare an artist, but do it anyway (imo)

“MIRACLE”
Original – boyband

Guitar – Clay Aiken
Male piano – Nick Lachay
Female rewrite – Tiffany Affair – Placement and dropped Placement and release – Matteo Markus Bok https://www.dropbox.com/s/imif2w0zmbh0f4y/MIRACLE

%20by%20MATTEO%20MARKUS%20BOK.m4v?dl=0

Other examples, “How Can I Be Falling” Demo Vs. Record Vs. Remix

“KISS THE SKY” From mid tempo to High Energy

“SORRY 4 MY LOVE” KDrew story, believe in your song

Power of the remix and keeping your songs relevant

“TRIPPING ON LOVE”

The magic of a vocalist

“NEVER GONNA BREAK ME”

-my demo -Jamelle -Shontelle

Kirsten Price “MAGIC TREE”

“HURRICANE” demo to “record”

Follow the leader, but placed (Werner) EMI / Dropped

Power of Remix

Suss – original to remix
Hello Hello – original to Odiseas to Remix

Different Vocalists – take songs to different places “BACK 2 LIFE”

“BACK 2 GETHER”

“LAY DOWN WITH ME”

Most demoed and cut song -Whitney Houston, Deborah Cox -Odiseas / Kendrick Lamar -Honor the song

“LAY DOWN WITH ME” inspired “RISE AGAIN”

OTHER SONGWRITER DEMOS

-Original Songwriter Demos on iTunes, Vol. 1 and 2

A&R

-What is A&R
-Did A&R for RA Records and Columbia -How I got my A&R job
-Indie Vs. Major A&R
-Development Vs Analytics
-Follow the leader, “HURRICANE,” Daniel W

WHEN TO LISTEN TO A&R

-Story of “RUN TO YOU” Whitney from Sad to Happy
-Story of Tommy Page “MIRACLE” from mature to youthful / Matteo placement

Publishing – Catch 22

-Hard to get one, but if you can good, not lots of development or gut belief -Not listening, reading spins, names and percentages
-Story of Melanie 10% publishing, randomness
-Ambulance Chasers

-Admin deal vs full pub deal -Pros and cons

-Physical Vs Performance collection -Physical

-Sony, Universal, BMG -Performance

-BMI and ASCAP

-Problems with songwriting and $ 2017, streaming -STREAMING

-Example: “Happy” by Pharrell $2,700 in publisher and songwriter royalties from 43 million Pandora streams

Politics, pitching and the name game

-“They aren’t listening, they are reading”
-Pitched record, started to play, pitched again, signed

-The Name Game -Everything is fair game -Pitching

-No rules
-Publisher, labels, managers, friends, studio engineers, producers, anyone

-People want a piece
-Give it be it an A&R, colleague or publisher

Income Sources
-Performance Royalties (radio)

– Will discuss below and in future (radio)

-Mechanical Royalties

**Writer always gets 50% of the mechanical royalties (the writers share)
-The other 50% is the “publisher’s share” (sometimes shared with the writer dep on agmt)

-Getting paid on a HIT! SCENARIO

-Let’s say the record goes “Gold” = 500,000 copies
-The writer in question composed 2 songs on album
-Statutory rate is 9.10 cent per song for songs 5 minutes or less (or 1.75 cents per minute or fraction thereof over 5 minutes)

500,000 albums sold X 9.10 cents per song X 2 songs = $91,000 50 – 50 split between publisher and writer = $45,000 each

-If the same writer wrote all 10 songs on the album that went gold (500,000) the writer would earn $227,500 from that hit album (not really going to happen often)

-Performance Royalties and New Revenue Streams

-Generated by broadcast or performance of a writer’s work -Can equal or surpass that of mechanicals

-For example: A hot single may receive tremendous radio play (esp terrestrial radio) even when the album doesn’t sell well (esp now with streaming issues vs downloading and CD’s)

-Performance royalties are collected by performance rights organizations (PRO’s) -ASCAP

-BMI -SESAC

-They issue blanket licenses to broadcasters and others for the performance of music from its catalog then remits monies collected to a writer based on his or her songs’ use in the marketplace
-A writer may collect income from a variety of other music uses, ranging from the old standard of sheet music and folio slaes to newer digital MP3 downloads, video downloads, satellite radio, Internet radio, digital subscription services and ringtones

Revenue Streams

-Broadcast (TV, radio)
-Nonbroadcast (clubs, hotels, stadiums)
-Mechanical Royalties (CD Sales)
-Sheet Music Sales
-Synch of music to film
-Special permission, licenses
-Jukeboxes
-Dramatic/Grand (plays/shows)
-Digital (mp3 downloads, ringtones, streaming, satellite radio, internet radio)

Emotional Stress as a musician

-Small daily movements and positivie choice make and break it all!
“Every year the average person takes 58,007 steps a year, enough to climb Mount Everest”

-“If you have your mind, you have everything” – My father

“The 27 Club”

-Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain, Amy Whinehouse,

Brian Jones
-Elvis Presley, Michael Jackson, Prince, almost Britney Spears -Mental Health is everything
-Musicians are generally more sensitive
-Face tons of rejection

-Even if you’re successful – media pressure

Gym

-Regimen -Alignment

-Like pitch, you can’t workout out of form / frequency

Believing in you

-Life’s Law of Averages: 5 people around you -Trusting your inner voice
-What really is intuition?
-Staying balanced

-Answers are inside, go inward
-“How Can I Be Falling” –Arty “Not #1”
-Realize people will let you down – MM
-Don’t lose yourself – Ernie with Kathy Sommer – Daughtry

Being inspired

-Nature
-Base line sound level NYC enough to give anxiety

The Loop

-Not getting caught in it -Breaking it
-Getting into the loop you want

Drugs

-Drugs numb out
-Go through pain to get to next level
-Pleasure always has pain built in
-What we really want: Joy
-They mess with your vibe in ways you don’t know

Food

-Artificial sweeteners -Toothpaste
-Cross blood brain barrier -Sugar and depression -Fried Food and depression

Money and making a living

-Side Hustle, surviving and making money

Surrounding yourself with positive and talented people

-Law Of Attraction
-Birds of a feather flock together -Rich get richer

Chuck Yeager

“Just before you break through the sound barrier, the cockpit shakes the most.”

MAGIC – IT HAPPENS

“Opportunity is where time and hard work meet” #anonymous “A #miracle is when God bends the laws for you.” #carolinemyss

-Getting my first internship, Dad saying, “If you want to get into music bus, read Billboard”

-Quitting Atlantic, getting job at WBR on way down to Nashville, knew William -First song released, #1 Billboard Dance Song
-Gary Salzman, “You can write great pop songs, how about dance”
-Met Michael Ellis as intern with my demo, met Gary and A&R for Columbia -Having a dream of teaching songwriting, and hear I am with you

-Blessed Ears Music
-Sitting in studio frustrated “Never have to write another song” Charlie/Jah/Akon -Segway into Puffy

SOCIAL MEDIA

-Follow your heart and love
-Puffy links
-For a singer, social media numbers everything today -Don’t Be O
-Be honest
-Project what you want

WHAT ABOUT YOU

-Your songs

-Listen and deconstruct

-Questions