Gary Powell, Composer/Producer

by Gary Powell

Rational, investigative and creative disciplines continue to be circumvented the much easier path of just making stuff up! “Copy and paste” music-making is now widely accepted as a legitimate production standard and because of this lowered standard the creative credentials across all the arts and sciences have been co-opted into the service of sycophants, pretenders and deal makers. With neither a discerning eye or direct experience, young artisans are sucked into a swirling system where the terms songwriter, composer, musical arranger and producer all become meaningless and interchangeable. Simply having an opinion about any creative gesture, regardless of the artistic discipline, is the same as the creation itself.

Wall Street Journal writer John J. Miller in his article for Opinion Journal suggests that “libraries should seek to shore up the culture against the eroding force of trends.” Benjamin Franklin and his think-tank, the Junto Society, first founded the idea of the public lending library in Pennsylvania. Knowledge was no longer to be accessible only by the elite and the aristocrat. Despite Dr. Franklin’s efforts, there is now evidence that the public library is no longer the keeper of our national coherence. So, who is?

Just like craftsmen of the machine age of the early 20th century, modern musicians have been losing their recording session work to synthesizers and samplers since the mid 1970’s.

Similar to what has happened to professional musicians, composers are also now at risk of losing their jobs to both software and blurred professional boundaries around creative credentials. There is plenty of blame to go around for this including the lack of both personal and organizational ethics along with a legal system which supports both of them.

Writing music is the ability composers develop and use to deliver their musical ideas in a form discernible by other musicians. The eroding trends of the point-click-copy-paste music-making demands understanding. First of all, this is not music composition. With the help of technology, this is simply choosing preexisting compositional elements. Assuming we continue teaching musically literate players, most of these students are now finding their lifelong goals of becoming adult professional musicians compromised. Composers are suffering the same fate. So, is this really an ethical dilemma or simply a market inevitability? It’s hard to diagnose how a wheel turns if you are a spoke. But, it’s even harder if you wish to affect some change of direction without losing your own purpose or crashing the entire wagon. Then again, maybe the wagon deserves to crash.

Benjamin Franklin was a master painter of the big picture even though he was in it himself. He was the keeper of the flame even while working both sides of the Atlantic. The flame was one of free speech and the effort to maintain the integrity of the individual so that each person might prosper from the seeds of their own education, preparation, risk and labor by means of personal freedom.

But, why should you care about Benjamin Franklin? Because, whoever is standing closest to the cash register keeps the money. Here is where greed and shortsightedness often sacrifice individual initiative and progress. While still young, it’s hard to understand how part of you is sacrificed during this transaction. Benjamin Franklin was offered and could have easily sold out the colonies for a cushy life in England. He was indeed standing by the cash register. He made a different choice, because he personally came to understand that he was the keeper of the flame. This is why you need to meet this man!

The keeper of the flame is now me and hopefully you. But more pointedly, the flame is you and me. This is where, despite being in the big picture ourselves, we call out the allies of education, competence, hard work, talent and loyal associates to keep all our flames together burning brightly.

This is how we will keep our lives culturally rich, our bank accounts full and our careers satisfyingly prosperous. This is the place where we as musicians deepen our relationship with both our individual and collective creativity. This is where, like Benjamin Franklin, we make a difference for the whole of the good.

Please consider the links below
for further reading and study:

Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by author Walter Isaacson

Library of Congress
Wikipedia on the United States Bill of Rights
The Oxford Club Investment Newsletter on Benjamin Franklin’s The Way to Wealth

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Filed by Gary Powell at 1:33 am under Music Business Insight
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by Gary Powell

It was brought to my attention from a reader that there is no how-to-succeed to-do list for becoming a recording studio session singer on my site. Before giving you the career path for becoming a professional recording studio session singer, I thought you should have the job description.

• YOUR “EAR” IS JUST AS IMPORTANT AS YOUR VOICE.

1. Many recording producers will rely on the studio singer to come up with their own vocal parts in the session. Even if the producer has an idea for what the parts might be, few have the ability to score the vocal arrangements or even dictate musically the notes you should sing. In this regard, you will literally become the vocal arranger. Singers with this skill will simply work more. I do all the vocal arranging for my Austin recording sessions; some are scored and some are simple “head charts” meaning we do it all by ear. I have found that singers who have honed the ability to dictate or score vocal parts have had more experience singing in vocal ensembles and have amassed a higher level of musicianship. Some of the most talented singers who work here started out as either pianists or reading instrumentalists.
2. Certainly most producers will ask you to match the vocal tone, style, and performance gestures of other singers. These may be other singers performing with you live in a “group sing” or they may have been previously recorded. Regardless, you will have to manipulate ALL the elements of your sound on demand. You will also have to be an expert about how to accomplish this with your voice as most producers won’t be able to tell you how to do it. They WILL know, however, when they don’t like it.
3. Your ear will be held accountable for your pitch accuracy. Regardless of what you’ve heard about “Auto-Tune”, I simply don’t use singers who have chronic intonation problems.

• LEARN & PERFORM A SONG IN UNDER FIFTEEN MINUTES.

1. You will seldom know exactly what you are going to sing when you get the call for a recording date. If you are a soloist, the producer often has a recorded “scratch” track or demo of the vocal melody line. You will be expected to learn it by ear with only a couple of times-through hearing it and then deliver a stellar performance immediately.
2. As a studio singer myself, I have never been given musically scored vocal parts (unless I was hired to write it), so don’t freak out if you don’t read music. A great ear which is well integrated with your singing ability can cover for your music reading deficiencies.
3. You will, however, need music sight-reading chops if you want to work in a jingle-house which specializes in jazz-voiced radio I.D. tags or similar group sing work. Almost all a cappella vocal jazz charts require some knowledge of music theory in that most ears just won’t hear these harmonies outside our Western popular music harmonic vocabulary. I do have singers who work with me, however, whose ears are so well developed that they can work in these sessions ordinarily restricted to music reading vocalists.

• BE PROFESSIONAL.

1. Don’t try to fake, hide or be embarrassed by your inexperience. Everyone started out knowing nothing. Most producers like to help out inexperienced talent. It’s to their advantage for you to grow and improve. Be confident, but not arrogant. Let them help you and it will be to your advantage in the long run too.
2. Don’t bring your personal music projects into another client’s recording session. This is not the place to promote your solo career. If you have a recording you secretly wish someone would ask you about, then stick the CD in your briefcase just in case someone asks about it. Otherwise, don’t mention it no matter how tempted you are. If you do, it could be your last session. Believe me that there will be plenty of other egos in the room that will need to be serviced before yours.
3. Be on time. In fact, be early. Follow the rule of professional orchestral players who are in their seats tuning their instruments and looking over their parts 15 minutes before their session’s call time. Dress well and appropriately. Greet and meet everyone in the studio even if no one is gracious enough to introduce you. Look happy to be there. Remember that someone in the studio is vested in the outcome of your performance.

• WORK WELL WITH OTHER SINGERS.

1. You will be asked to work quickly and intimately with singers whom you have not met. One of those singers will be the leader whether it is spoken or not. Put up your antennas to figure who that is just in case it’s not formally announced.
2. You will certainly be expected to learn parts. As mentioned before, you may even have to instantly become the vocal arranger. You should learn all the parts that your voice could even possibly sing as these parts are being assigned to other singers. Often, you will be asked to switch parts or double someone else’s part or just exchange parts in order to stack or record the same parts again to thicken the sound. If you have already learned all the parts you will be a time saver for the producer and be recognized as a valuable asset for future recording sessions.
3. Don’t point your finger at other singers who may be singing out of tune or the wrong part. Even if you are right you won’t be popular with anyone. You may eventually move to a leadership position which will allow a graceful supervision of others. Until then, let the producer or session leader take this responsibility.

• WORK WELL UNDER STRESS.

1. Recording sessions are great fun when well organized, well prepared and well cast with talented people. However, add in a time crunch, a singer having a wreck on the way to the session, a room full of advertising account executives, an arrogant untalented producer, studio equipment failures, a singer who is singing out of tune, re-singing a session you’ve already recorded because of a technical issue or a focus group…….and your fun experience can go South quickly……and this is the short list of inevitable studio circumstances. All this to say that we all live in the real world where things happen which are out of our control. As a producer I do everything possible to eliminate the bad juju from coming in my studio. However, when these things happen, your professionalism must shine.

• BRING ALL YOUR MUSICIANSHIP.

1. Singers are notoriously the worst musicians in the world. Their lack of knowledge of common musical language is appalling to me. Singers are the super models of the music business. So, if you bring NO musicianship or studio skills to a session then you will probably be forced to become the star at a later date.
2. Before stardom occurs, however, you might want to learn the common terminology of music harmony. If asked to sing a minor third below your current note, then you should know what that means. Familiarity with the language of music theory will be helpful to you. Know how to spell any chord in any key. Can you answer this question? How do you spell a minor seventh 4-chord in the key of A Flat? The answer is Db, Fb Ab, Cb. Okay this a little tricky, but this is the language of music. Learn it. Know the intervalic relationships between all the chord members; the root, the third, the fifth, the seventh, etc. You will be asked to sing them. If asked to sing the fifth of the 5-chord in Bb what note is it? (It’s a C) Although this is not absolutely necessary, being a complete musician as a singer will amaze people and will help you get work.
3. You will also be expected to know the common vernacular for musical rhythm such as time signatures and note values. If someone asks you to sing the pickup as an eighth instead of a quarter note, you should know immediately what that means.
4. The ensemble experience of having played or sung in a school band, choir or orchestra will help you greatly in the studio. Although the language used in non-classical sessions has been colloquialized, the intended results are the same.

• BRING YOUR MULTI-LANGUAGE SKILLS.

1. In Texas we often have Spanish language recording sessions. You don’t need to be fluent in the language, but you do need to know the correct diction of the language. I took a music course in college called “Diction for Singers” which was designed to teach singers the correct pronunciation of the Spanish, Italian and German languages. It was a great course and has been very helpful in my professional career. Depending on what part of the world you are in, language skills will help you get work.

• LEARN HOW TO WORK A STUDIO MICROPHONE.

1. Learn how to control your plosives which are your popped “p’s”. This is air from your mouth which hits the microphone diaphragm causing a low frequency explosion which must be dealt with by the mixing engineer later.
2. Learn how to control the sibilance of your “s’s” and “f’s”. Despite the electronic tools we have like de-essers to control this problem, the recording will sound better if you take care of this yourself. Talk with the engineers you work with about how to do it. They will probably know. If not, you can learn to either shorten, drop the pitch or lower the volume of just your “s’s” and “f’s”. You will be very popular as this saves valuable time for the mixing engineer later.
3. Talk with the recording engineer about how you can help him control your recording level. The engineer will probably be cutting (recording) with some compression, but you can be of great help by backing off the microphone for loud passages. Encourage the recording engineer to assist you in making smart decisions about volume and distance from the microphone. This will help him with his technical issues in capturing your performance which will make you sound better naturally AND be greatly appreciated.

If you read this far, I’ll give you this: the paradigm shift you need to undertand is simply to make your clients look good. We singers think it’s all about us looking good. It’s not. Make your clients look good and you’ll be invited back to the party! However, you can only do this with your competence and integrity. All other methods are hollow and won’t deliver your desired results over time.

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Filed by Gary Powell at 9:36 pm under Music Business Insight
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by Gary Powell

Academics are accused in the creative arts of being too “left-brained”. On the street, this term defines people who are close-minded, uptight egg-heads who kill all our natural creative impulses. These creatively repressed individuals live within the confines of the confines of the confines of the out-of-touch and intellectually disconnected. Everyone who has been educated can certainly name professors who deserve this description. There is a disappointing consequence of this widely held viewpoint: When standing at the academic well, many young, creative people decide that no water is better than drinking bad water.

Our popular music industry icons are largely spawned from the “I’m too creative to be contained” school of thought. I use the terms “school” and “thought” here facetiously. They often recite the mantra of the intellectually afflicted follow your heart, then foolishly confuse their lack of artistic discipline with “magic”. If your “magic” is continuing to deliver the same old tricks, it might be time to reassess what you have not learned. (Of course, without education, a therapist or mentor, this is impossible).

All in all, as we intellectualize our passions, I really believe it makes our artistic expressions even more powerful and connected to the whole of being human. - Gary Powell

As a person in the creative arts, there are two concerts going on in our heads. One, our observing ego which wants to learn and understand ourselves, and the other, our very creative and extroverted performer who is well willing to just wing-it so as to bask in the glow of the applause meter as soon as possible. What can be confusing is that in this dual/duel concert, both our inner audience and inner performer switch roles freely and often even play at the same time. Learning which inner voice to listen to becomes the tool by which we sculpt ourselves in powerful ways. This is where the right-brain, left-brain integration begins and where the truly spectacular individual is born.

The more you integrate the inner diversity, that we all have, the more you operate with integrity in the outer world. - Anne Sophia Dutoit

If achieved, the integration of your right and left brain can help you in a number of ways.

1. It eliminates “writer’s block”.
2. It unconsciously deepens how your audience responds
to your work by providing the “math” for the same integration within them.
3. It will help put your ego in check and your watchful perspective on duty.
4. You will be much less likely to suffer the ubiquitous plagued heartache of the artists’ life.
5. You won’t miss deadlines.
6. You will attract a more fair-minded clientele.
7. Your friends will be so happy that there is something to talk about other than YOU!

However, science’s understanding of human brain function is not as primitive as what’s in the pop lexicon of the “right brain/left brain” model.

Am I off-topic and meandering? I don’t think so!

“What good fortune for those in power that people do not think.” - Adolf Hitler, as quoted by Joachim Fest.

Freedom of the mind comes with much responsibility, which is one component making the institutionalization of humanity surprisingly easy to accomplish. The “just do as I say” model of parenting should bear much responsibility. The consequences of authoritative parenting teaching us to blindly “follow” is eloquently investigated in Alice Miller’s book, Thou Shalt Not Be Aware. Unfortunately, this teaching model is rearticulated with a numbing lack of insight within some of our educational institutions. If this has happened to you, then you probably won’t know it. However, if the world looks a little black and white or you feel like you have all the answers or every driver on the freeway is in your way, then I suggest reading Alice Miller’s book while you still have a few friends.

Here’s hoping that we as artists use our fullest integrated capacity for focusing more on the size of our ideas than the size of our audience.

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Filed by Gary Powell at 6:12 pm under Music Business Insight
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by Gary Powell

Be self-determined.
Make your own path.
The cream rises to the top.
Nobody can do it like you can.
Everybody gets their turn at bat.
Follow your heart.
You deserve a gold star.

We’ve all heard these pearls of wisdom and found ourselves naively depending on them throughout our varied careers. Your personal pursuit of happiness is at stake with these words and, disheartening as it may feel, it might be time to move from colloquialisms to maxims. In legal terms, this would be explained as moving from hearsay to evidence.

Maxims are sayings which by definition are widely accepted for their own merit. Meritorious success is born of education, experience, trial and error, reason and risk. These things are accessible to nearly everyone. Colloquial success is born of accidents of either fortune or genetics. If you wish to trust your life’s work to fortune, then stop reading now. If you are trusting your life’s work to a genetic advantage, then you have already been born into aristocracy and can also quit reading now. All others, please continue.

Education and self-reflection are often shunned by artists. Please realize that education will eventually become self-directed, regardless of the academic art degrees you hold. Self-reflection is not about “what’s wrong with the world”, but more about “what in the world is wrong with me?” But let’s be good to ourselves and eliminate the judgment and just ask, “what in the world happened to me?”. A career in the arts has special considerations, some psychological, some in business organization, some in education and some in self-reflection. Understanding it all will help you in your pursuit of happiness. So, let’s try to understand what hurts us and what helps us as we begin to “go public” with our art.

Everybody gets their turn at bat.
(As long as they know how to build a bat and have hired a pitcher.)

By way of elucidation, IMAGINE there are only two types of artists across all artistic disciplines. Both types consider themselves artists. For now, let’s call them Adagio and Grandioso artists. The Adagio artist creates for their own edification and understanding, finding meaning through their expression of either the wonder or disenchantment of life or both. This artist’s validity comes from within and are more likely to be painters, writers, composers, sculptors and printmakers. The Adagio artist can be found working in their studios.

The Grandioso artist creates in order to be “seen”. Their art is a vehicle within the complex framework of their own ambitious goals both defined and fueled by their emotional needs. This artist might be either more or less talented than the Adagio artist. However, this artist’s validity comes from outside themselves and are more likely to be singers, dancers, comedians, and performers. Psychologists might describe these artists as being “other identified”. The Grandioso artist can be found working in television, theatres and movies.

en·tre·pre·neur, n. [ahn-truh-pruh-nur-ship] Etymology: French, from Old French, from entreprendre to undertake: one who organizes, manages, and assumes the risks of a business or enterprise

It’s possible that neither type of artist thinks of themselves as entrepreneurs. Some do and balance art and business beautifully. Some turn an early inspirational expression into a business so well that the inspiration eventually morphs into an assembly line. Some artists go straight to work on the assembly line and like, Norma Rae, finally rebel with a resolved “NO MORE”, move to Marfa, Texas and reinvent themselves living lives without focus groups or reviewers…. finally determining their own validity.

Most “Grandioso” or performing artists have been tap dancing for the family since they were born. This encouragement taught us to look outside ourselves for applause and adoring faces. Healthy children will all go through a developmentally appropriate “narcissistic period”. This developmental phase is important and will serve us well throughout our lives. However, many become stuck in their narcissism which will begin to erode their healthy adult relationships later in life. Narcissism, often misinterpreted as self-love, is described by the story of Narcissus, when he sees and falls in love with his own reflection in the river. However, behind the outward self-love that narcissists present to the world is a darker and malignant self-hatred which is kept under constant surveillance so as NOT to become visible to the world.

Enlisted into service are press agents, designers, managers, ghost writers, dentists and cosmetic surgeons, all becoming the army to fight back the damaged hidden self within. Maybe it’s time to watch the “mirror, mirror on the wall, whose the fairest of them all?” scene from Snow White again with this perspective. How about “The Portrait of Dorian Gray”? Only if we could all keep our hidden portraits in the attic or in modern-day terms, hire enough handlers to keep the ugly contained. Think of this the next time you see a celebrity with a posse.

Entrepreneurs think of themselves and their mission or products in context of nearly everything. They build relationships with every kind of person and service required to bring their newest hair dryer, radial tire or ART to market. The monumental effort of bringing a new product to market is seldom mentioned in our popular culture. As a culture stuck in our own adolescence, we simply want the new stuff.

People rant about gasoline prices with no knowledge of what it takes to suck oil out of solid rock five miles deep while balancing on an off-shore platform. Then there’s that small matter for transporting crude oil some 5,000 miles to a rather expensive factory (which is often larger than the Texas town it’s in) and refining it into gasoline. Let’s see now, how can we deliver this gasoline across the country and to neighborhoods to better serve our customers and increase our profits?

As artists, we have much to learn about the mechanics of business which, regardless of size, always include investment, risk and thousands of absolutely brilliant humans. If you think that your art is what it’s all about, then there is one of those large pieces of reality headed your way like that extinction-event asteroid 65 million years ago.

EDUCATION either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity or… it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world.
- Paulo Freire

Regardless of whether you find resonance with the Adagio artist or the Grandioso artist or both, I’m suggesting that you gently, without harsh judgment on yourself, start seeing your art and yourself within the context of everything, particularly the very typical yet monumental effort of the entrepreneur. You don’t have to join any group, give up your individualism, pray, march or vote like anyone else. I am suggesting that we artists make a very conscious move to study entrepreneurship and apply that knowledge to our artistic endeavors. And, even more important, the effort might just help purge any of our residual and unconscious narcissism. It is certain to benefit us personally, professionally and artistically to begin envisioning ourselves within the larger context of the human experience.

For further study on the topics presented, please consider these links:

Filed by Gary Powell at 5:56 pm under Music Business Insight
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by Gary Powell

Every parent will be presented with different challenges and opportunities concerning the development of their talented offspring. It might be the right time to think about your child’s development strategically and not just a strategy for financial success but a strategy for nurturing a balanced human being who also loves to sing. Soon I will have the Guide for the Parents of the Gifted and Talented written and made available here on my site.

Meet Lauren Tenney, a 15 year-old singer referred to me this summer who has now landed her first major record label singing credit on “Cheetah Girls Karaoke”.

Weekly, I become a music career consultant for wonderful parents who recognize their child’s talent and want the best for them. The book will endeavor to address all your best wishes and even some hidden or unconscious wishes as well. In the meantime, I will share with you in this post a quick overview concerning several aspects of the young singer’s talent and career development.

As more performing opportunities arise for your children to showcase their talent, you parents of the gifted and talented will soon reach that awkward stage of being caught between the excitement of emerging opportunities (which are your child’s and yours) and those hard-earned-well-deserved cautious attitudes (which are solely yours).

We adults quickly make the shift of assessing whether or not upcoming amateur performances at service clubs, funerals, weddings and church events could or should be managed into career-building steps for your young performer. Many of you will find a plethora of opportunies for singing the National Anthem almost anywhere. (I sang it while precariously hiding behind a tree at a veteran’s funeral in Huntsville, Texas while in music school.) This period can create difficult decisions for parents who want not only quality opportunities, but safe opportunities for their sons and daughters. For most of you, the ensuing love-fest of these events will eventually turn into a chore.

No doubt your off spring’s talent, beauty and youth is rich for speculation. My first advice is that you, the parent, are the one who has to step back from the seduction of the business and try to get a good “read” on the people with whom you choose to associate your child. Second, really get truthful about the source of ambition which might be a bit tricky when the whole family engages around this highly charged topic. There’s nothing wrong with ambition; it’s just important to know where it’s coming from and whom it is going to affect and for how long.

If the path leads you to music recording producers, always do research on the credentials of these prospective producers, remembering that having no credentials is not necessarily bad and having great credentials is not necessarily good. Listen to their previous recordings and have someone you trust listen to them also. Ask lots of questions about their creative procedures. (I will help you with the right questions in the book.)

If producers use phrases like “it’s just magic”, “wow, magic happens” or “we just wait for the magic”, then please immediately knock on the next door down.

Be legal and contract wise. You should examine length of contract, percentage of future earnings, who owns the master recordings and for how long, delivery dates, termination clauses, etc. It’s not unusual for the contracts to be heavily weighted in favor of whoever wrote them. Although “work for hire” contracts are many times regarded poorly in the creative community, they are one way to get experience, a little money and a session credit which will shine on your resume while you are still young and developing. (I will discuss fully the pros and cons of engaging in “work for hire” contracts in the book.)

Some of you will want to seek advice from your university contacts. It’s a good idea in that these professors are generally genuine people and assess talent every day. The downside is that very few assess talent based in the popular arts and fewer still have experience in the commercial music business. Call them anyway. The academic path has long since taught them not to extend themselves beyond what they can support with facts and figures. Also, their genuine nature inhibits them from just making stuff up in order to win favor. You will find that young, starving or just untalented producers will attempt to win favor in all manner of slightly veiled seductions. If you don’t have antennas for this kind of charlatan, then choose a different profession/passion for your gifted child which actually requires credentials from mentors and teachers.

I hope this primer helps initiate your strategic thinking concerning your young performer. I will have the full book version with more helpful information available soon. In the meantime, consider subscribing to this site for automated email notifications of new posts which will hopefully be helpful and informative.

Try these links to learn about TAG (Talented and Gifted) Programs in Texas:

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Filed by Gary Powell at 11:34 am under Music Business Insight
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by Gary Powell

Historically, humans have preferred institutions for interpreting life. Between wars and inquisitions, we all know how well that turned out. I have always considered artists better interpreters than governments or religions. (Read “The Boys in Red” to better understand the role of institutions in the arts and sciences.)

Strolling through Austin’s new Blanton Museum of Art confirmed to me yet again that art is not the answer to existence, but it is the absolute question.

The ABSOLUTE ANSWER is always going to win a bigger audience
than the ABSOLUTE QUESTION.

Add in celebrity-driven drivel masquerading as art and it’s pretty easy to understand the smaller audiences for any art which actually asks something from its audience. The new millenium has birthed “shock art” as the new compelling art. Setting yourself on fire is pretty shocking too, but not very effectual in continuing the relationship with your audience after the smoke clears.

So, mush forward bravely with all your work. (The word work has been carefully chosen here.) Your discipline and insight will hopefully enrich both you and your audiences regardless of size.

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Filed by Gary Powell at 9:55 am under Music Business Insight
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