Monday, December 23, 2013

Experience Marketing Songs?

My wife has written a number of songs in the Christian worship genre that I think are actually pretty powerful.  How does one go about getting these into the hands of those performing this style of music?  Is this typically done through an agent?  Or is recording them and making them visible on YouTube (like Justin Bieber's path to fame and fortune) the right way to do this?

3 comments:

  1. I have no idea about the music industry, but it seems that you answered your own question.

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  2. I've only extremely peripheral involvement in this. Best advice is to use your own network of friends and musicians to use it, then you will come to the notice of the publishers.

    Bear in mind that even the Christian worship music business is a business first and foremost. The "publishing" of the words&music is actually where the big money is in the business, a few cents at a time through many many units.

    © can be asserted freely and asserted cheaply, so the songs that you hand around can be protected as yours fairly easily.

    http://www.tfwm.com/1009-gettingyourmusic

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  3. I'm not a composer, though I play worship music on a semi-regular basis.

    Two people I'm distantly acquainted with have written worship songs that ended up on CD's. Those songs traveled a fair bit; I was mildly surprised when I got music for a song I knew, and recognized the author's name.

    The impression I get is that some ministries generate/attract a lot of worship music. Sometimes generated by talent nurtered in house, sometimes through relationships with authors in other places. Some songs show up very often, and quickly get published/recorded. (There is a clearing house for license fees, called CCLI...which is probably involved in ways that many church secretaries and worship leaders know, but few others are aware of.)

    Coincidence: I know that I will run into one of these people in the coming week, and may be able to tell you more. If that happens, I'll drop you an email.

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