Defining Moments

 

I'm jumping through the hoops to get onto Spotify right now.  The process of defining my music well enough for it to be categorized always makes me a bit queasy, as if I'm cooking something unhealthy that I don't even like to eat.

Back in the waybackwhen days I tried desperately for about a decade to get a manager.  I sent out cassette tapes and endless reams of photocopied promo packs with newspaper articles and carefully typed up reviews.  I had this idea that if I could just get one person on my side, just one person to represent the music, I could make a dent. 

When the rejection letters came rolling in, they had a common theme.  They loved my music, they thought they could sell my looks and personality, I had a fantastic voice - but they needed me to sing something else.  Or write different music.  Not because what I was doing was poorly done, but because there was no way for them to sell it, or me, as there was no category that I fit in.  As one fellow put it, "You're not pop, you're not R&B, you're not classical, you're not soul, you're not rock, and you're all those things. Pick one."

These days there are categories for vocal driven music that I fall into naturally.  I don't fit 100% but well enough so I can sneak into and perch in the corner until I'm discovered and tossed out.  Back when MP3.com was a thing I was able to stay in their World Music section for years. Nowadays I use the Alternative Music category and get emails from folks yelling at me for putting "weird stuff" in their preferred section. 

I don't think my music is that odd, to be honest.  Perhaps it's because I'm living with it everyday. Perhaps it's because the structures I'm using are often verse chorus based and that's relentlessly normal (well, tbh the next CD has a lot of not-that-normal-of-a-structure pieces on it).  Or maybe it's because most of the time my arrangement may be voice only but they do mirror standard rock/pop frequency spreads.

It's my hope, my prayer, my belief that the work I'm doing has value and merit of its own accord.  That no matter what the arrangement, there's a method to the madness and that people don't need or even want to have music so rigidly assigned and defined.  That eventually all music will define its own category.

In the meanwhile, I'm checking off the "Alternative" box in the Spotify application.  Wish me luck.  

Perspective

Like all creators, my process sometimes involves That Which Is Other Than Creation.

This is one of those times when I'm writing a little and connecting a lot.  It's time to update the blog, wrap up the online courses, generate social media, and make contact with other musicians. I'm dashing from project to project, finding new ways to present ancient ideas and keeping a sense of balance.

Every few years I seem to do this.  I make an effort to bridge the gap between myself and the rest of the world.  I teach more, write about my work more, reach out to listeners more, aim to find more sources of funding.  This time I'm using online courses to teach more, this blog and Facebook to write about my work more, Spotify to reach out to my listeners more and Patreon to find more sources of funding.

Something is different this time around though.  Usually these types of tasks feel like forcing my way through a hip deep river of sludge, but right now I feel oddly energized.  I think that I may have finally found a way to communicate about my music without having to simply play my work and then wait for folks to get it or not.   I think for the first time that people are responding to what I do.

I write vocal driven music.  Soaring, cutting, floating music.  Music that adds, music that resonates, music that relates. Writing is powerful, moving, razor's edge stuff.  Singing what I write is like constantly yearning and sometimes getting nearly, almost close to what I have in my head. Somehow I'm getting the hang of communicating that.  And why it's important for people to be a part of it.

This are lightening times, the tide coming in and sunlight on the top of your head times.  Far landscapes and the feeling of a puppy nosing under your hand times.  There's few times that are better.

So please be a part.  And reach out if you'd like me to be a part of what you create.