music buiseness 4 main areas of the music industry
Live performance is where artists will perform at venues or go on tour. The venues could be big venues such as the o2, wembley, medium venues like hammersmith or it could be at small venues like pubs and clubs,either way they are all still considered live performances.
Everything that a live performance consists of is tour manager, sound engineer, lighting engineer, stage manager, instrument techs, wardrobe/styling, accomodation, catering, promoter, transport, equipment hire, MD's, flights and insurance.
The tour manager is most likely to get paid by free lance. Their job is to organize the bands appearances and gigs at the venues they are going/want to perform at. The tour manager also handles the advancing which is where they contact each promoter and venue to make sure that the artist/band's accomidation food and tech needs ETC. Another thing the tour manager does, is travel on road with the artist/band,Their day to day job on the road could consist of doing things like: finaliseing accomodation bills, overseeing hotel departures on time, overseeing venue arrival, settling performance fee with promoter and collecting any fees that are owed to them etc. On a larger tour the tour manager role may be split between a few people IE, there could be a tour accountant manager who manages finance and then they may have someone else managing the road crew. An advantage of having a tour manager would be that it makes everything more structured and organised as they take care of all the time consumeing things that need to be sorted. E.g the artist/band and dont have to worry about their accomodation, or transport to be on time because they have someone (the band manager) to take care of that and sort it out. This takes stress off of them and allowes them to focous on the music and bend rehersals etc. A disadvantage would be that there is too much responsibility upon one person, (unless the job is split), which means if they forget something, there isn't another person to remind them, or back them up because there is only one person responsible. also, they need to pay the band manager a cut of the pay which could be alot and if you did this yourself like many smaller bands do they would eliminate the cost of the and manager and therefore the band get more money.
The job of a sound engineer, is also likely to get paid by freelance. A sound engineer is a person who is responsible for the sound at the live event althought this is down to more than one person . They communicate with the band and make sure the levels in the monitors are suitable for the venue (loud enough) and loud enough for the band so that the band can hear eachother aswell as themselves. also system engineers are in control of setting up the amps, PA's, speakers ECT for the band and the other sound engineers. However, all of these roles are normally done by one person if it is a small venue. The roles of the sound engineer are likely to be split into seperate roles when it is for a bigger and well funded tour. An advantage of having a sound engineer would be that the music would be of the highest quality and the band wouldnt have to do the sound themselves this means that they can foucous on playing the music and not worry about the sound too much. Also having a sound engineer would also give the band the opportunity to have certain effects on certain songs to give a specific feeling. Disadvantages would be things like working long hours, being pressurised to have the sound perfect. Also if their communication skills with the band aren't good, it can make things overly difficult.
The lighting engineer is in charge of the electrics and lights in the venue. In live music the lighting technichians work under the Lighting director. The lighting engineers are responsible for setting up any lighting equipment, and any visual effects that may be used during the performance. They may also, lay electrical cables, wire fixtures, install colour effects and focus the lights. An advantage of having a lighting engineer would be that it can make the artist/band the main focus by having the bright lights on them when they are playing solos ECT. It can also determine a mood in the venue by using different colour lights or using certain effects with the lights and overall to make the band look good A disadvantage would be if they forgot when to put the lights up and what lights to use on what songs.
There are two different types of record labels: A Major lable and an Independent lable. Independent or "indie" will do most things themselves like recordings and promotion because they dont have the money to pay people to do those kinds of things sometimes bigger record companies will buy a smaller independent label and support the finance.
My personal opinion is that they both have their streanths and weaknesses but i think tat independent labels are better because they get out what they put in this means that if the artisits put in lot of hard work they should get that back out from the record companies. record companies are one of the main ways to make it in the music industry and they will get you out there on the radio if they like your music, to get them to here your music you need to send them a demo and conctact details and if they like your demo they might come and hear some more of your stuff at a gig. once they are sure they like you and want to sign you they will get in contact with you or your band manager so that they can arrange to see the band perform after this if they think that they can make some money from your music then they will offer you a contract for so long and one this is confirmed they will oversee everything that the band does.
major record companies have all the money and power to spread music quickly and possible to other countried around the world.most of their money goes into marketing and promotion they do this by useing TV adverts, social media like facebook and twitter, music magazines and the radio this allows the music to spread quickly and to "big up" the band as much as they can and this is a big streangth of the majour record companies.however, the disadvantage of a majour labe is that the sound of the music is so overproduced in some cases and this makes the music lose its originality and makes it sound computer processed and almost to the poin of it sounding fake in some cases because of all the changes they make by useing software like logic ETC.
independant record companies have many weaknesses because being a small company they dodnt have the money or the time to do a major marketing and promotion campeign compared to a major company and they dont have the resorces to put their bands/artists on a massive radio channel but they do find other ways to premote their music.on the other hand indie lables are run by a few people who are working close with eachother and this gets things done quickly and efficiently.Internet music sales are promoted by Independent record labels, but most of the time they illegal which has an effect on the whole of the music industry for all companies are losing money. In the industry most artists, after creating the music and being offered a contract, will record music in a Recording Studio.
The music industry is a selling business of recordings, compositions and performing music. Within the industry there are different organizations such as the music publishers, who have the role of making sure the composers and artist of the music are paid to an agreement through a publishing contract.
This links with live performance because both of these areas need to promote their bands/artists and spread the news of what is happening quickly through various methods.
In conclusion this means that within the industry every organization and all the different roles tie in with each other are all just as important as each other in order to make a good
successful business within the industry.
The job of music publishing companies is to pay the songwriters for their songs and create a contract that signs over the copyright to the publishing company in return getting a percentage of the sales from their songs.once this has happened the company owns the rights to use it whenever and whereever they want. the main purpose of a publishing companies is to find composers and songwriters that could make both of them money and copywiting their songs so that noone else can use it. when an artist des a live performance and want to do a song thet they dont have the rights to they have to get the performance rights which pays the rightfull owner of that song(s) which then allowes the band to perform that song(s).
Music piracy is when someone illegally copies a piece of music.
Music piracy is a major reason why the music buisness is falling apart because people dont buy the CDs or the songs off websites like itunes the artists dont get the money that they should and this affects many of the areas of music.
Artist mnagement used to be the person whom is responsible for getting the artist a record deal or deals. However, this has recently changed this is no longer the case.This job is now about about trying to unlock your band/artists full talent and potential and the value of your bands this is callled buisness development. most managers thesedays dont have a clue about buisness development and most have no proper buiseness training and this results in complete confusion and in some cases faliure. on the other hand some learn quickly in order to survive and to make money.
four main areas of the music industry
online companies such as spotify, itunes and 7digital all use diffrent marketing techniques for example when spotify first came out it said that you can only have it if you have an invite which created a a "why cant have it and how do i get it mood" this is good because it gets into peoples heads that they want it just because someone else has it. i think that it is also good because it spread extreamly because one person sent out an invite to 2 people then they sent it to two more people and so forth and it "infected" people quickly so they sent it to their friends. the bad things about this technique is that if you dont get that i want it feeling then the whols process fails.
itunes however approached it from a diffrent angle and said if you want to put your music on here you can pay us for advetising your music and w take a percentage of the each sale. the neggative effects of this are that they gave the option for the customers to buy only one song rather than a whole album which means that the muscians arnt making as much money as they could because they charge less for one song than a whole album and this allows artists to produce may be two good songs on an album and the rest just filler songs.
old companies (music shops)
the main problem with music shops today is that online companies are takeing over it is far easier for someone to log into itunes and buy a album or track than to go to a shop and only have the option to buy a overpriced album. also the fact that most people dont want to buy a £15 album because it is too expensive and inconvinent this is why many of thease shops have now shut down or are in trouble.
However, vinal companies are still selling and this is because they are considered a vintage item and this is the main reason why they are still selling also, many rock fans like vinal because this was a very popular format around the time in which rock was making a big impact and may of the big artists like the rolling stones, cream and The who and countless others but rock wasnt the only genre to come out on vinal you also had people like the clif richard and the shadows ,tom joans and elvis presley.thease are just some of the legends that are the reason why vinal is still selling today.
