MI Music Business instructor Bobby Borg writes about some of the top tips he has for upcoming musicians and creatives pursuing a career in the music industry.
Make no mistake that networking is a vital part of establishing a successful career in the music industry. But rather than using all your energy trying to break into established and seemingly impenetrable cliques, be sure to recognize others who are talented, intelligent, and ambitious (like your fellow students or local musicians), and create your own “clique of the future.” Get in on the “ground floor” and form solid relationships that will last forever.
I got my first break recording in Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Lady Studios in New York City when two of my longtime college buddies from Berklee College of Music looked me up after graduating. As a result of getting that studio gig, I was able to move from Boston to New York City and start my career in the majors.
Look, gang, a lot really does depend on whom you know—and who knows you! The majority of the work you do will be based on word-of-mouth recommendations and personal relationships you form over the years. So be sure to put yourself in situations where you can meet others who are already doing what you want to do, and who are working toward similar goals.
Great places to network and make new connections include college courses (like at Musicians Institute where I now teach), songwriting workshops, networking groups, jam sessions, and music conventions. A few conventions worth checking out include MIDEM, SXSW, Durango Songwriters Expo, and West Coast Songwriters.
Finally, for a great read that will improve your ability to form solid relationships, check out Dale Carnegie’s best-selling book How to Win Friends and Influence People.
1. Realize Your Dreams by Visualizing Them First
The first tip for pursuing a successful career in the music business deals with having a clear vision of what you’d like to achieve. You must see, feel, and believe in the potential outcome. If you can clearly hold a picture of success in your mind, your subconscious can bring it to pass.
In the early 1990s, in a small club called the Button South in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, I witnessed Marilyn Manson gaze out into the audience and say, “One day I’m going to be a pop star who shocks the world.” He truly believed this. Friends tell me he even kept drawings in a notebook mapping out precisely what his success would look like. With years of hard work, and one successful album and tour after another, Manson made his vision complete.
In his best-selling book The Power of Your Subconscious Mind, author Joseph Murphy calls this the “mental- movie method.” In his words, “If I act as though I am . . . I will be.”
2. Analyze Your Career Motivations
An important tip for career success is to consider just why you are pursuing a career in the music business. Is it for the fun and crazy lifestyle it may offer? Is it for the artistic respect it may earn you among your peers? Or is it for the spiritual satisfaction it may bring, and because there is nothing else in life you would rather do? As you know, fun, artistic respect, and spirituality are not always aligned. Thus, your answers to the above questions are crucial!
By understanding your true motivations and what’s most important, you’ll stand firm about what you are (and are not) willing to give up in order to succeed. You’ll surround yourself with people who share your vision and are willing to pay allegiance to that flag. And you’ll accept the consequences of your actions and not whine and bitch about the results in the end.
Tour manager/agent/promoter Chris Arnstein calls this approach to self-awareness the “decision-making tree.” Your career decisions (or branches) should be based on the core (or root) of who you truly are as a person. Without this level of self-awareness, you can easily go astray in this business. As they say, if you don’t stand for something, you can easily fall for everything.
If you haven’t thought about your real motivation for pursuing music professionally, now is a good time to do so.
3. Develop a Realistic Outlook by Ignoring the Media Hype
You’ll enter the music business from a much stronger position if you refuse to be blinded by all of the media hype or glamour you see and hear in music videos, magazines, and news shows. The expensive houses and yachts and the carefree attitudes and overnight success stories are often spun to make it look like the music business is an easy path to the good times. The truth is that these “riches” that artists flaunt are often leased, loaned, advanced, or purchased via other businesses and investments just to help a celebrity “look the part.”
By developing a realistic outlook, you’ll be better prepared for what may lie ahead and more accepting of this wonderful and crazy business of music. You’ll understand that it could take a great deal of time and money honing your professional skills, building a fan base, and putting up with a great deal of rejection just to get ahead. But you’ll be okay with that. You’ll know deep down inside that the true talents of music lived and breathed their art with no thoughts of ever turning back, and that this determination and tenacity in regard to your craft and career is precisely what is required of you.
So get your head together! Focus on the realities of the business, not the fairy tales. Peace and Good luck!
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