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In this episode I get to chat with a fellow songwriter and podcast host, Aaron Davison on the super important subject of licensing your music for television, film and commercials, which is undoubtedly one of the best ways to make money from your tunes. It’s a lot of work up front, but with just a few successes, you can start seeing recurring passive income over the long term. Aaron’s website howtolicenseyourmusic.com and podcast Music Money and Life are great resources with tons of insight and inspiration from a full-time musician who plays internationally and has multiple licensing successes. Please comment below with any questions or opinions.

Unplugged! Grow your off-line social network. How the old-school methods are still so important. Especially as an independent artist. #unplug Not seeing as much results on-line as you’d like? Try leaving the house. Try turning off the modem for a week. Dust of the acoustic guitar and take to the streets. Live chat in-person, photocopy some flyers, go postering and rebuild your fanbase face-to-face, eye-to-eye in four dimensions. Some of you may have noticed that I haven’t posted a new episode in over a month. Bad form as a professional podcaster, but I’m not a professional podcaster. I’m a professional musician. Most of my income comes from playing live gigs, some of it comes from songwriting royalties, record sales and merch sales. I’m booked every weekend and some weekdays all summer long. How much of these opportunities come from the internet? Less than you may think. In this episode, I’ll be talking about why traditional methods for marketing your music still reign supreme. Is the internet important for your career? Yes, but for much of it can also be a giant time-waster if not managed efficiently, and putting too much time into your on-line engagement can take your energy away from the more effective, real-world tactics that yield better results. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Think it’s hard to get noticed now? How easy do you think it was to get noticed in 1990, 1980 or 1960, when there was way less ways to get your material out there (not to mention the cost of making a record)? Independent music marketing in the 90s was a lot different... I recommend picking up an original copy of Mark Makoway’s book, The Indie Band Bible. It is the ultimate guide for pre-internet band marketing, and I think all of those methods still ring true today, if not more so. The internet is noisy, cheap, fast and furious. Real connections happen at a personal level. The real, physical world is where fans fall in love. They might discover you on Twitter, but lifelong super-fans are created in person. One thing I want to underline is this: Many of your biggest fans are not discovering new music on-line, and if they are, it  doesn’

Goal Setting for Band Success SMALL WINS, BIG VICTORIES, STARTING RIGHT You want to be an original, performing/recording artist? Just getting started? Here is an example of how you can break down your goals into a realistic plan of action. Any successful plan needs a clear vision. That starts with your overall end goal –famous  band– being broken down into milestones (big wins), then those being broken down into target goals (short-term) and finally, into specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound (SMART) goals. first popularized by Peter Drucker in his 1954 book The Practice of Management. The goal here is to imagine your end goal and every step in-between, and to start walking in the right direction. First off, I’d like to steer you away from the goal of “getting signed”. Signing deals with a record company/distributor, booking agency, management firm, law firm and publishing company are all potentially great things that will do wonders for your career, but only once you’re an established professional with a loyal following and a timely sound, one the forefront of a social scene or movement. I’ve found in the musician community, many goals are relegated to fantasy status and are imagined as out of your hands. So goals often sound like, “we’re going to play as much a possible, make a bunch of fans, get popular on YouTube and Facebook and then inevitably, someone will discover us.” Sound familiar? The problem is “someone” is vague, and “a bunch” is vague too. How are you going to get popular on YouTube? I’m going to list examples of SMART milestones broken down into short-term goals: NEW ORIGINAL BAND: Release a 5 song EP: •Make a band (find the players) - make sure they’re all talented, and committed to the same vision and sound. 2 weeks. •Write one song a week for 10-20 weeks. •Start going to lots of shows and parties and making lots of new friends in the music scene that you identify with. Very important. Budget time and money for this. Network and socialize. Don’t be hard-selling your band yet. Just be supporting the scene and developing a personal network. Ongoing. •Get a band name. Make a logo. Write a short bio, or get a friend to write one for you. 1 week. •Get simple band photos taken. One day. •Set up a website like Bandzoogle, a Facebook page, link it to a Twitter account, and an Artist Data account. 2 days. •S

Just waxing philosophical on what mental state is positive for moving forward in your creative journey. Being critical may be good when editing your work, but not when trying to enjoy your life, and certainly not when trying to move forward in your creative career. Remember to add value wherever you go and the rest is easy(ish). No links to share on this one. All soft tips. Listen up and enjoy. Please comment below. S.  

Shawn Vandesande is a veteran of the independent music scene, having recorded, toured and recorded extensively with his previous band, The Apollo Effect, and more recently, with my band, The Clearing. In this episode, Shawn speaks about what he learned from Berklee Online and some software he's used in his new adventures as a producer. We also digress about some charities and their annoying, but ultimately probably beneficial tactics, and how some established artists are making do in the new music economy. Also a shout out to fresh, new singer/songwriter, Ceileigh Matheson. Here are links to what we talked about in the show.Digital PerformerBerklee Online Ableton

"Let's talk money!" We're artists, and sometimes pitching ourselves and talking about money can be awkward. In this podcast I talk about some money stuff, some booking stuff, some website stuff and how to add value to your gigs. I am happy to announce the very first Paid Musician Podcast. No interview here, just me introducing myself (hi, I'm Stephan) and talking about getting booked and getting paid. Also a couple pointers on standards for your website, some etiquette tips and some personal insights into the philosophy of the paid musician. Here's some resources I mentioned in the podcast: Bandzoogle.com , Craigslist.org, The Clearing (my band), ArtistData.com , BandsInTown, Sonicbids , IndieWeek , Reverbnation , CDBaby , Myspace (not kidding), MeetUp.com. Hope you enjoyed the first post. Let me know what you think! Cheers! Happy St. Patrick's weekend! Stephan LaCasse - ThePaidMusician.com *This podcast was recording using M-Audio Fasttrack, my trusty Sennheiser e935 and just my iPhone headphones into