Libraries that accept without listening

[Art Munson]

>”This is not a business that you can dabble in.”<

I don’t get this at all… Writing for music libraries seems to me to be perfect for dabbling. In fact, at the moment it’s hard for me to think of a business that’s more suited as such. I would imagine that most people that write for libraries are also doing something else. I personally make a living doing music production. About 2/3 to 3/4 of it is producing and engineering recordings for other people and the rest is from writing but about 90% of my writing income is from sources besides libraries. Hence my original post. I’m now trying to figure out how to get that library percentage to increase.

I want to be clear, I’m not debating you on the discouraging nature of the numbers. To the contrary, I see it in my own experience. The numbers can be quite discouraging. I suppose it all depends upon one’s perspective.  If I were depending on library music to make a living I wouldn’t be making much of a a living (I wouldn’t be making a living at all). But, as it is, an interesting and enjoyable sidebar to the other things I do in music, I love it. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t care about the value of production music. I do and I want to do my part to preserve it. I would love to see everyone here making more. That would be neat but I digress…

As time moves on I hope to do more writing and less other stuff just because I enjoy it so much. Time will tell if that’s possible for me but if it is I doubt that it will solely be through library music (although I understand there are several here that do quite well). I’m hoping that library music can be a good part of it though.

I’m just glad there’s more than one path and we’re all free to figure out our own.

 

[MichaelL]

Oh sorry, Kiwi, I think that you misunderstood what I meant about dabbling. What I meant was that if you want to earn a living from it, except in rare circumstances, you have to do more than dabble. Because that’s not your concern, no worries.

[Art Munson]

“The average gratis-license royalty as reported on my July ASCAP statement was $1.95 for each placement. I can earn $20.00 for a royalty free sale, or ten times that!”

I have to disagree here. My BMI income far outweighs what my RF income is by a factor of almost 10 to 1. That BMI income is about 85% from non-exclusive libraries.

[Michael Nickolas]

Same here Art. My ASCAP income outweighs my RF because of volume, also mostly non-exclusive. But if I compare a single cable blanket placement to a single RF sale, then I come up with a difference of RF being ten times higher. But that may not matter much if the volume of RF sales is ten times less than TV placements! Anyway, I’m glad to participate in both models.

[Michael Nickolas]

>about 90% of my writing income is from sources besides libraries<

Same here. I do library music when I’m in between paying custom composition projects. I also do sessions for clients, write articles for Recording Magazine, and do the occasional live performance. Library music income alone wouldn’t cut it for me!

[Art Munson]

Thanks for chiming in Art and Michael N. Art, you’re the main person I was thinking of when I said earlier that I know there are people on here that are doing well with the non-exclusive model…

I think that it’s hard to have a completely meaningful discussion about this stuff without certain details such as what types and genres of music are involved and the composition style. I almost always write television cues unless I’m writing for a specific opportunity that calls for something else. That means most of my tracks are 1-2 minutes in length and I’m thinking of television edit-ability and usability as I go. The RF libraries I’m with wanted longer tracks and aren’t as concerned with things like stings and certain types of breaks. If I send a track like I’ve written for the RF libraries to the folks that hire me for shows they will get anxious and ask me to tone it down and focus. The extra minute and added “artistry” is a useless distraction to them. All I’m trying to say is that it seems obvious to me that the music and writing style itself has as much more to do with success as the library model. Obviously, finding the best fit between the two is optimal and that’s what I’m trying to do…

[Art Munson]

“If I send a track like I’ve written for the RF libraries to the folks that hire me for shows they will get anxious and ask me to tone it down and focus. The extra minute and added “artistry” is a useless distraction to them.”

That’s a great point and may be the reason I don’t do better on the RF sites. I’m much more focused on the TV placements and their particular requirements.

[Art Munson]

>Library music income alone wouldn’t cut it for me!<

Amen! And beyond that,  in my experience so far, it’s been completely impossible to get any sort of grip on what’s got legs and what doesn’t. In the work-for-hire stuff it seems like it’s always that one little tension cue that I did in a couple of hours that gets played over and over but then one of my “masterpieces” will get some love too while the rest of the tracks (that I think are really good) barely make it into the show. In the library world, the first piece of production music I ever wrote that I don’t think is particularly great just can’t be stopped. It keeps getting used over and over and I have no complaints.

One thing I feel like I’ve learned for sure is to always keep moving and never get too involved with any one thing. Finish it and move on and get it out there. Fate will decide the rest…

[Art Munson]

“But if I compare a single cable blanket placement to a single RF sale, then I come up with a difference of RF being ten times higher.”

I’m looking at the whole “enchilada” though. I have about equal the number of tracks on both RF sites and the libraries going after shows. The “show” libraries do much better.

I’ve also noticed that my income from RF sites does not go up appreciably with the volume of tracks I upload to them. The opposite is true for the “show” libraries. YMMV though.

[Art Munson]

>That’s a great point and may be the reason I don’t do better on the RF sites. I’m much more focused on the TV placements and their particular requirements.<

Yeah, and I think that’s why I’ve been gravitating toward moving toward a couple more non-ex libraries rather than RF libraries. My intuition tells me that the catalog I have will work better with libraries that focus on television. RF sounds like a great idea but maybe needs a new batch of work on my part that is focused in that direction.

This discussion has been super helpful! Thanks to everyone!

[Art Munson]

“In the library world, the first piece of production music I ever wrote that I don’t think is particularly great just can’t be stopped.”

Amen, I have one of those too on a daily major network show. I venture to say that same library, today, would turn down that cue.

[MichaelL]

This is a great discussion. I think that an important concept is developing. I’ve known all along that the non-exclusive (re-title) market is very different from the RF market, with respect to musical preferences. AudioSparx likes to tout their TV placements, but I would wager that the majority of their, and other RF libraries’, sales are non-broadcast.  What kinds of uses are non-broadcast, and how does that music differ from broadcast?  There is a difference.

Imagine a typical reality show. There’s lots of activity, maybe a party atmosphere. My experience with the editors of these shows is that they just want to keep it moving, keep the energy up.  In the non-broadcast world, music often accompanies narration and technical matter. It is sometimes less about entertainment, and more about information. The music that works in each scenarios is very different.

Kiwi hit the nail on the head:

“the folks that hire me for shows they will get anxious and ask me to tone it down and focus. The extra minute and added “artistry” is a useless distraction to them.”

and

“All I’m trying to say is that it seems obvious to me that the music and writing style itself has as much more to do with success as the library model.”

YES!!!!  I spent 25+ years writing for, and working with, non-broadcast corporate, business and educational clients. That is one of the primary reasons that I’m not chasing libraries focused on TV placements. I’ve got 1000 + cues aimed at people doing historical documentaries, nature films, science, corporate image, etc, none of which is MTV ready.

I do “TV writing” for my TV shows. But…I’ve got a 1000+ cue catalog of non-broadcast cues that I’m not going to ignore. Two different worlds and two different revenue streams, which I think explains varied experiences between non-exclsuive and RF libraries.

This business is definitely not one-size-fits-all.

 

 

 

 

[woodsdenis]

“The music that works in each scenarios is very different”

Great discussion, I will always remember a film mix with the legendary Film composer Elmer Bernstein. It was a beautiful slow romantic oboe led piece. During the mix he kept lowering the oboe level so that it was nearly indistinct. When asked why, he replied that the cue was under dialogue. When we played it under the rough dialogue on the video his balance was perfect. The “soundtrack” version the oboe was up 4-5 db!!! Not only different music but a different mix approach for different scenarios. Now it is very difficult to write for all eventualities, and as is the case with commissioned cues you would supply stems too.Always something to think about when writing for TV or Film and submitting just stereo masters.

[Michael Nickolas]

>that the cue was under dialogue<

Back when I was doing a lot of songs for the Soaps, my publisher would give me guidelines regarding the vocals and lyrics. She said we  would have a better chance of getting placed if the vocals were sparse in order work better under dialogue. Lyrically she would  say don’t use proper names, dates, or cities. Which makes sense. A song about meeting Mary in New York in 2005 is going to have limited use!

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