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Justin,
Just out of curiosity, by “up-front” I’m assuming you mean fees paid by publishers/sites for your material and not licensing fee shares from royalty-free work. If you don’t mind my asking, what’s about the average up-front fee per cue that you’ve been getting and what libraries are good for that? I was getting $250 to $500 some years ago and I’m wondering what they’re paying these days for the average library cues.
TA
Thanks Michael. That supports what I’m saying when I mentioned that niche genres and other specialty areas in demand will continue to do well no matter what. And to clarify the flooding issue, I’m mainly talking about competition within the online RF libraries that do not direct market your material, have relatively low screening standards and mostly rely on web promo. I’m concerned more with the online search engine competiton than with talent competition in thise cases. No matter how talented you are, you still have to be seen. A ton of composers means a lot of weeding out just to get to your music. As the flood continues, things can only get worse unless more libraries raise the bar on screening for talent.
I have to somewhat disagree about diverse catalogs although that is current conventional wisdom. I’m 100% in agreement that it works now and I too have written in several genres. However, being merely a competent composer in many genres may not work in the near future as more and more highly talented composers and artists who specialize enter the writer’s pool from other areas of the music industry. That’s what I was referencing when I discussed the independent recording artist situation and its advance towards royalty and royalty free music licensing of popular genres. That has become big in the last few years and many very talented unsigned artists are getting into it. Small indie labels are also getting more involved in having material licensed. The downfall of the record industry and the rise of the internet opened this avenue for them. It will always be profitable to be among the more talented and marketable within a genre. If you don’t reach a satisfactory level of accomplishment focusing on what you do best, then I guess diversity it is and hope for the best. But if I’m a top library, and there is an abundance of solid talent in a genre within a huge pool of hungry artists, I’m going with those guys, not the jack of all trades…. unless he’s better known as a king of all trades. I suspect that is where the future is leading. This isn’t necessarily a flooding issue as much as a newer and fresher resource avenue for libraries that brings more competition into the mix and could be an initial sign that “one man band days” are gradually fading out. I would love to be wrong. Time will tell. Look at the game music business. There was a time when that was a niche and quite a few people with some degree of musical talent, nothing special, and technical skills in working with game audio assets were most of the composers. Now, you have big name film composers doing game music. Times are changing.
Anyway, that’s just my 2cents.
Hey guys,
From reading the last few comments following mine, under the name Tony, I hope my comment was not misunderstood, although it was not specifically addressed. I’m also an RF composer and will be one for as long as it takes to reach another personal goal in library music. I joined this site to become more involved in the music libary arena and I’m looking forward to sharing, and hopefully not defending, my view points. I apologize if anyone felt a need to offset my subjective comment with a different personal opinion or for being overly sensitive if I’m interpreting the last few comments incorrectly.
I agree that the Plato’s cave analogy referenced in another post is a good one, but there is a question regarding which points of view reflect cave dwelling and how many caves exist. There is likely to be more than one cave and it’s possible to step out of one, only to end up in a different one. Perhaps I found a new cave. Perhaps I’ve left caves for good. Time will tell as the RF model continues to adapt while new composers continue to flood the RF market.
TA