The Sound & Music Industry

There are areas in the music industry that keep the business running and going and the areas in the business are important. The areas are recording companies, artist management, music publishing and live performance. All of these areas work together to combine working, sell music globally and making profit.

Recording companies

The recording companies are vital in the music industry and It is one of the key aspects of making the music running. There are various recording labels in the world to choose from and each label have the same goal to achieve which is to hunt down new musical talents that will sell working with them, making them sell music world wide, sell albums/Cd's and sell records and they offer new musical talent to musicians and give them the opportunity to become famous in their music career and be globally known as for who they are and for what they do.

After the artist decides he/she wants to make the next step, they will go find a record company to sign them and work with them, but the artist needs a manager because that is the manager’s job to find a good record label that will work with his/her artist and promote them.

The artist or the band needs a record label to sign them, promote them and to record their tracks. Won’t be easy for the artist and for the manager to find a good record label to work with the artist, because it’s not all the record labels that are interested in signing the artist/band.

Artist management

The artist management is very important in the artist’s life because they keep the soul of the band or the artist together. Their job is to control and look after the band, for example, pay for the booking of the flights for the tours, making sure promotion is up and showing, so that people know about the album and making sure that the label it is fine.

If the artist or the band want to be successful in what they do, they need to find for them an artist manager, because the artist manager is very important in the artist’s life because he/she does most of the work for the artist/band and they are the ones that helps the artist to be prepared for what is coming for them (Record their songs with a record label that suits the artist, etc.)

The artists and their artist managers need to have a good and close relationship with each other, they need to be friends and trust each other, because in the music industry there are loads of cases where the artist and their artist manager didn’t get along, didn’t trust each other and because of that they crashed, because the artist manager didn’t do to the artist what they were committed to do.

The artist manager receives most of the money the artist gains, because the artist manager is the one that try to get you somewhere and make your dreams come true, which is to make people listen to your music and for you to get sign with a record label. The things the artist manager does to their client are:

• Find the artist a good record label
• All support the artist and encourage them no matter what.
• Negotiates and secures a record contract
• Book all the artist/band’s meetings
• Pay for the booking of the flights for the artist’s tours/gigs.
• Formulates and markets the artist’s image
• Get them with different people from the industry (Other artists/bands, promoters, etc.)
• Give them the right advices, so they can make the rights choices.

Music publishing

Another thing that is very important in the artist’s life is the ‘Music publishing’, because they are the ones that will help the artist to get more people to listen to their song and know who the artist is. After the artist record his songs and finally his album or just the singles, that where the music publisher will come in in the artist’s life because they will publish the artist’s album. The publisher’s job is:

• Make sure the song writer and the composers get their payment when there are people using their songs, or when it playing in radio, TVs, commercials, etc.

• Try to get their songs to be used in films, commercials.

• Try to get another artist/band to sing one or more of your song.

In the music industry when it is about music publishing all the rights go to the song writers and the composers because they are the person who wrote the song and the have the rights for people to know if it’s their material or not and just because of the doesn’t mean the artist does’t get anything/credits because he/she does get credits for performing the songs, but even though they are the one performing, the song writer and composer gets more credits than the artist/band. If you deicide to be your own publisher you will receive up to 100% of the money which is a great thing with you can write and compose your own songs, but if you prefer to hire a music publisher he/she will receive up to 100% of the money being earned by the composers and song writers.

Live Performance

Live performances are very good for the artist or the bands firstly because that's where the musicians get closer to their fan and also because if you perform more you will gain more confidence and also gain more popularity. Behind all the live performance there is jobs and roles that need to be done for example your band manager will basically do all the financial stuff and sort out all the venue and money. Promotion is very important when organising a live performance because you want people to know about your gig and you want to earn profit by getting a lot of people to come. In the promotion you want to be able to give clear information about the gig, price and venue. At the gig itself and if you are a new artist in the music industry you are actually giving people a sample of what your music is like and showing yourself who you are as an artist.

Bibliography:

• Record company:http://www.mzeus.com/news/2007/06/what_does_a_record_company_do.php
• Artist Management:http://www.myjobsearch.com/careers/artist-manager.html
• Artist Publishing:http://www.tomtmusic.com/what_is_music_publishing.htm
• Live Performance:http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20101028170243AAM3vo5