A Musician Speaks Out...

My dear friend, Heather Hammond (her stage name), responded to an invitation I sent her to check out the MyGigNet brochure online. Heather is one of the more blatently honest people I know, and it formed the basis of our friendship down through the years. So, when she says something, she means it, and with a genuinely inquiring mind and heart of a true artist, her statements are hard to ignore.

With that short introduction, I'm posting her email message to me about her experiences in the music business...

---

I think this is a great idea Boyd.

I think you should include an easy way to copyright and legally protect one's music. I know people who have written prolifically and gorgeously and fear losing their music because they can't afford to copyright it. So they never let anyone see it. Much of it is hit music if they would just let somebody else record it.

The copyright office/business seems slow and cumbersome. If there was some other way to protect the music that was quick, easy and inexpensive, like a lifetime automatic copyright for everything you submit, or something, something easy, like a personal copyright page so anybody could say "let's record something by Harry Pierce," go to his page, peruse his written or recorded music, pick something, contact him, get his permission, make a fair business deal so he gets royalties, and record it. People could be making a fortune off his music, and he could also, as a songwriter, because it's great.

That's what I find to be one of the greatest problems, people stealing other people's music. I do it myself. I tried to get permission with Harry Fox, waited for months, finally figured I'll just keep track of how much sells and when they sue me they get their cut. I never have ever heard from them.

There needs to be some way to keep people honest. Contracts through your system or something so recording artists would have to honor their agreements and make fair agreements with songwriters. They should be required to put on every cd, credit to your website and to the songwriter, to do business with you.

I don't know. I'm just guessing. The technical stuff is beyond me.

Another thing you could do is help get recording studios together with artists to record and distribute on a sale-based agreement where both parties produce the recording at their own expense, share expenses, and get equal royalties. There's a lot of little recording studios around that are going nowhere. Make it so these techies and artists could find each other and make a deal. Or audio engineers who come work other people's equipment. Take that time restraint off the studios racking up money by the hour. That preys on the mind of the artist while he's trying to concentrate, dollars slipping away every minute of studio time, and he can't help lousing up his performance.

Skerik recorded one of Harry's tunes, Harry wrote the arrangement for him, and Skerik recorded it and is selling it online. He gave Harry $200 a couple years ago. No royalties. I don't know if he's copyrighted it in his own name or what he's done but it's selling and Harry is getting nothing. The name of the tune is Let Me Be Your Voodoo Doll. If you look it up online you can hear it and hear Harry's arrangement of it. It's selling.

Harry is homeless! He has hundreds of great tunes. He could be a millionaire but he can't afford to copyright and gets frustrated with the procedure and the delays. Any kind of official paperwork. He's totally an artist and just can't deal with it. I see him clutching these tunes to his breast and he won't let anyone have the sheet music. He's written several books worth of music. Gorgeous stuff.

He wants to record it. He has several cds worth but he hasn't got the money, he's barely surviving playing Schubert for a ballet class, he's homeless, tries to keep his spirits up but he's depressed, his voice is going and he's going down man. He's going down. And he keeps writing.

Somebody like Harry should be able to put up everything he has written, arrangements, everything, and people should be able to buy it online without registering with the site. Just go shopping and buy it. Let the fund in his name build up and he can draw it out once a month or whatever way you want to do it. And protect his music.

iTunes is supposed to be the best but I'm on iTunes and I don't know how anybody finds anything on there. All these sites require that you register and download a program to buy anything. It's confusing and who can remember all those passwords?

I want to buy anonymously. I want to be able to go to any site and buy a product without registering with the site. Maybe a generic registration that everyone could use, if it's necessary to register at all to buy. (NoCharge dial-up has a generic registration, everyone signs in as "guest" and the password is "password.") Of course the sellers would have to register and get set up. But it should be easy for buyers to buy.

The focus should be on getting out the music that is being suppressed by the system. Right now, studios make money from losers who have money to invest and limited talent, while the real artists go hungry and the losers don't make it anyway. Or if they do, it's just stupid.
Just more of the same. Just another take on the same old bullshit.

We have Shakespeares and Gershwins and Bob Dylans among us and they're dying like rats on the streets. I've seen it all my life.

Ever since I was very young I've wanted to have an institution someday for 'criminal' jazz musicians where they could practice, write, record and live until they were recognized and could go out on their own. I wanted a big garden to feed everybody and everybody would be required to spend 5-6 hours a week working in the garden or cleaning up or something, a community, but the focus would be on rescuing these great talents. No drugs. The recordings would belong to the institution, whatever they recorded while they were there, or the royalties shared for all time on those recordings. Then when they leave, everything they do outside would be their own. Something like that.

Anyway, I'm willing to help. I think you have a great idea. That's all it takes is a great idea and honest people to make a fortune these days on the internet. I like the name too, mygignet.

This constant struggle for musicians is just awful. They have to do their own marketing now, they only get one night a month in a club, they're reduced to playing in bars for drunks, prostituting their talents, or being controlled by the big record companies who will only promote certain styles that generally debase the public. We don't have real music any more. People need real artists. All we have is junk stupidity. The same old thing over and over. In the old days the jazzers used to say, as rock was gaining ground, " don't play good, play loud." Well they got blasted out. The music we have now does not give people what they really need. Party party party is all they think about because that's all they're allowed to know. They think that's life. Meanwhile, the real life is dying, penniless.

That's my 2 cents worth. I think the major focus should be on rescuing these great talents.

hedy