[boinkeee2000]

Hi Lee, thanks for the vote of confidence. I have a few dozen tracks in p5 (the only RF i work with so far) that may not be a good fit with them. I’ve only gotten low double digit page and artist views after a month with them and no sales. I’m willing to heed the good advice here to “adapt and change”, and give your non-exclusive offer a shot as it maybe a better fit in your catalog…thanks again for informing me of this opportunity

[boinkeee2000]

Another thing id like to ask pertaining to the topic, I’ve reached out to some of the PMA libraries and gotten a few replies stating they dont need new material now and to revisit them beginning of next year. would that be subtext as a “brush off?” is it a seasonal thing for some?

[boinkeee2000]

It seems like any scenario is possible Dannyc, Ive been following your soundcloud page and i think your great at what you do best (orchestral/piano). . . I on the other take pleasure in the challenge of writing other genres for TV/Film. grew up listening to most of them and my favorites keep changing. My main thing is blues, rock and singer/songwriter stuff on the commercial side (not on my soundcloud page but it is on spotify). . . but i just cant see writing a 1000 of those on this side of the biz, 100 maybe, so i feel the need to diversify and separate my passion from the business side…

I dont have an orchestral background like most of the folks here but i love the music, so i try and create that with my measly VSL kontakt library in Komplete. whether any library will buy or take them is another matter, but no one can say i didnt put my heart & soul to it. same way i dont knock the cheesy midi keyboard blues guitar piece i heard on an RF site while I painstakingly record myself running through my Toneking Imperial with a 62 Fender Strat boosted by a blues screamer & miked with an SM57. maybe somewhere, somehow, someone would need that cheesy midi sound for their project and not mine.

I think you got it right when you said do what you do best, but i also believe theres nothing wrong in writing for genres that are not your best for the sake of diversity and just the love of writing as a whole… like i said its amazing how polar opposite strategies can still yield the same outcomes. and while i may never be good enough to create trailer music, i may get lucky and get one of my rock songs in a commercial ad or two. and who knows maybe later in the future Mike Petrie or LAWriter can compress their talents in orchestral music into a zip file and email it to me so i can one day be the next hans zimmer 😀

[boinkeee2000]

“Ask and ye shall receive” . . . once again thanks for taking the time and effort to answer my question LAWriter, I dont think anyone has ever broken it down so eloquently and descriptively the way you did here or in any other forum with no holds barred. I’ve heard your music, seen your beautiful studio, and have conversed with you a few times (if you are who i think you are 🙂 and do see you as an educator as well as an accomplished composer with many decades of experience and credits, who is also willing to assist those in need for free.

Most of your points hit me to the core almost like it was tailored to me ha! (I was the one bold enough to link my soundcloud page for all to critique, and dont worry im not onionskinned :D) and made me rethink on how I view what production music is. At different points through this journey, the advices ive gotten and that i heeded were “do minimalistic cues, thats whats needed”, then it was “Do the genre you do best and dont hold back”, and then there were more… “orchestral/piano music is whats considered evergreen”, “deadmaus uses this if you want to compete”, “use such and such sample libraries”, “analog summing is the key” etc etc etc….hence the byproduct of all of that is my “frankenstein” of a catalog, which now that i think about it, has no real direction or identity . . . with folks 50/50 on which were good tracks and were not (obviously the tracks I created specifically to those who advised me to do them was in favor of those) . . .

with no real placements under my belt, im trying to write production music for what i think it is, not for what it really is, like in a music supervisors POV.

I had an image before coming into this field that the process was like this . . . the sup send out a scene, folks try to write music to that scene and submits it, and they pick the best one that best fits. But to my surprise suddenly im working on material I have no idea where its going to go or who’s going to use it (not talking about briefs here)…

which then let me to a place on why this whole thread was conceived. “should i start writing music just like what i hear in the libraries? wait then i just become like the rest”, “would this library help me secure a spot?, but what if this library sucks”, “Should i buy all this expensive gear to compete with the big boys?, but how do i recoup that back if I dont get placements?”, to the point where “maybe the Elites are the key and i should strive for that” . . . I dont think any of the decades vets had to go through that mind$%# of a scenario in the 80s/90s. but thats the conundrum most of us newbies are in.

I’m pretty sure music for picture wont go away anytime soon, and the vets will pass on and be replaced by the newbies in the future, and all that crap with netflix and PROs will be sorted out. so im still hopeful that there will be a way to make a living in this field later on, i mean music (especially current) will still be needed right? And i sure hell aint stopping writing music just cause people (in general) say it sucks lol…

[boinkeee2000]

Those are some solid points LAWriter, especially to me coming from a business background and understanding how “Law of Averages” work.

If i may interject a long time commercial songwiters point of view to this matter, I see the word “Amazing” thrown a lot when it comes to the music…I am still uncertain on what that really pertains to. cause i hear a lot of music mainly on TV, not so much film, that IMO would not consider “amazing” in a technical or production standpoint, but rather it somehow just “fits the part”. So in the same way MichaelL asked a few posts back, I’d be interested to know what “defines” an amazing track…

I learned a very hard lesson when i was still part of a yellow pay to play company that, sometimes the masterpieces is not what’s needed, and its best to “KISS” . . . I threw away a good chunk of dough thinking the former while all these simple cues were getting the green light from the screeners. . .(and yes i know the whole pay to play issue and dont want to derail this topic any further), so there’s so many mixed signals for a newcomer that it just makes my head spin, maybe im just not getting something im supposed to…

[boinkeee2000]

the responses by the seasoned writers here are so enlightening to us newcomers and I am grateful for everyones input. Its amazing how polar opposite strategies would yield the same outcomes good or bad. Yet the closer I get to understanding the biz the more bewildering and convoluted a logical explanation and strategy is…

I see now that overanalyzing to make sense of it all is not the answer. stressing out on what to do, figuring out the right path and avoiding pitfalls the vets have made before even stepping into the jungle does not help or guarantee anything.

Looks like from here on i’ll be writing songs to the best of my ability, doing all the post prod and admin work, spending time researching, pitching/submitting music and try building relationships, see what works and what doesnt, work my way up the ladder, stumble & fall a crapload of times, make changes and adapt to new challenges and scenarios, and in 5-10 years reasses if it was all worth it and continue, or face the reality that i just wasted a good chunk of my life for nothing and move on…

the irony is ive heard it countless times and deep inside have always known that all along but just cant seem to accept it ,cause the simplest advise is usually the hardest to consider. “no shortcuts and enjoy stumbling through the journey”. thanks for taking the time to school me folks, much appreciated.

once i have the funds, I’ll definitely get the lifetime membership here…

[boinkeee2000]

Thanks Dannyc for chiming in and your insight. In no way did i want to come across or assume that my music is comparable or better than whats on extreme or any class A libraries. Im in the position of ignorance not arrogance…I honestly feel im not even close. but my concern is on what to aim for, meaning I have to have a goal regardless if my music and production is .9% or 99% close to theirs. And if pursuing 24 tracks this next 6 months only to have a .00001% chance of getting in PMA libraries is a waste of time and effort, then ill scratch that option and start focusing my efforts on lower tier RF sites, which leads me back to the same original questions, “is a livable, sustainable career possible without being in the “elite” club?”

[boinkeee2000]

Thanks LAWriter and Beatslinger for your insight. would you say your income (front, sync, back) from the PMA libraries would drastically impact your bottom line if it were to disappear? or do your other income streams carry most of the load?

I ask because im in the dark, atm i have just under 100 songs and need to take advantage of a 6 month hiatus from my business to focus mainly on composing and expanding my catalog, hence i need to use my time and efforts wisely.

a quality track from extreme/warner etc. would take me 1 week (or more) to produce especially if everything is organic. a happy ukelele track, rock track or a hiphop orchestral that i hear from the RF sites would be around 1-3 days. and a tension cue/drone or solo guitar/piano piece i usually can do 2-3 a day…

sorry if this is sounding like a math problem, but with the 6 month caveat, would it be wise to place my bets creating 24 tracks to pitch to the elites? create about 80-100 tracks specifically for mid tier NE & RF libraries? or do a crapload of drones and solo pieces to throw at the wall?

heres a sample of my work https://soundcloud.com/boinkeee2000/sets/tv-film-sampler

tbh, this is a really frightening business to a newcomers eyes… to follow a path that might lead to a dead end, make a composing strategy that ends up as a wrong decision 2 years later, or the whole sync world implodes suddenly taking with it the 1k+ material youve amassed.

thats why a lot of my composer buddies wont come near this side of the biz or they give up so early. If the long road wont scare you, the darkness will…not to mention all the wolves in sheeps clothing along the way..

I commend all of you making a living and sticking to this for years/decades, in reality you guys are the exception and not the norm,
Its a good thing not a lot of folks can bear this. Also thanks for your insight and knowledge you give for free while others take advantage…

I apologize for the winded commentary, i guess it needed to come out

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