Blog

This week, my class took on the subject of branding. I love teaching musicians about how to create and use their brand because the right brand is a self-empowering message about the best of you and your promise of quality to your Ideal Audience--the people whom you are eager to attract. 

A brand is not about you-it is about communicating your promise to your Ideal Audience.  By helping to forge a powerful emotional connection with that audience, a brand becomes a tool that not only inspires you to be your best but also boosts your confidence and projects positive energy to those around you: a true win/win

Audience development is one of the major challenges facing classical musicians today and we are living in a world where the relationship between musicians and their audiences presents a tremendous opportunity to advance the field. That was certainly an important theme in the recent seminar at Yale on the Role of Technology in the future of music where the experts advised today's musicians to find their fans and leverage technology in order to forge a meaningful connection with that audience.

While musicians sometimes resist the idea of “pitching” to a target audience on the theory that it is antithetical to their authenticity and personal growth and is too limiting (until they realize how connected a brand is to one's artistic purpose), I firmly believe that identifying and connecting with the right audiences is critical no only for one’s professional development but also to solidify our field.  Thus, I include the target audience into my branding discussions so that my students begin to carve out the part of the audience with which they resonate. 

That brings us to artistic mission: 

The first month of my class at Yale has been great!  From our first few classes where my students learned how to think like entrepreneurs, got excited about their dreams and tapped into their personal values, strengths and passions, we then drilled down to translate those lofty dreams into manageable bite-sized goals and action steps.  The past 3 weeks, we have focused on planning-career planning, project planning, and financial planning. 

Planning is a TOOL, not a GOAL:  the point of a plan is to get you motivated to take action so that your plan will actually happen.  Let's see what happens when you engage in the process of planning and what that teaches you about moving forward in the direction that you want to go.

This week, I had the privilege of moderating a panel at the Yale School of Music on the Role of Technology and its impact on the field of classical music. Our three speakers contributed their unique perspectives on the impact of technology on the dissemination and promotion of classical music:

Greg Anderson, a 2008 Yale School of Music graduate and one half of the technologically and musically innovative Anderson & Roe Piano Duo who were pioneers in using You Tube and other social media to connect with their growing fan base;

Anya Grundmann, Executive Producer of NPR Music who champions classical music on NPR's internet radio platforms through a variety of innovative, award-winning programs; and

Jessica Lustig, Managing Director and Founding Partner of 21C Media Group, a leading PR, marketing and consulting group specializing in classical music and the performing arts  and the project architect of the YouTube Symphony Orchestra concert last March that attracted nearly 34 million viewers on-line and through mobile devices.

All three panelists felt strongly that live events are not going away and that technology is not a substitute for live events.  Indeed, by creating a compelling on-line experience, people will pay to see and hear music.  Moreover, they felt that the potential audience for classical music is huge and untapped.  The key is to engage audiences in the music and with the musicians.  And technology plays an important role in engaging audiences by getting them prepared for and excited about an event, connecting the audience members to musicians and having audiences participate in an event. 

So how can musicians leverage the power of technology?  Here is what our 3 experts had to say.

Many young musicians wonder how to go about creating a career in music.  They may have a general idea of what they want to do but they are not sure of the steps to take.  To help them see that it is indeed possible to create a successful career path in music,  I invited four recent alumni of the Yale School of Music (who graduated from YSM between 2004 and 2010) to talk to my students about their career paths and what they have learned about creating successful careers as musicians in today’s world. 

The panelists were:

Timo Andres: pianist/composer with a hit CD and an active freelance career as a pianist and composer;

Tina Hadari: violinist, member of the Haven String Quartet and founder of Music Haven, a non-profit in New Haven that provides tuition-free string instruction to underprivileged youth;

Paul Murphy: free-lance trumpeter and teaching artist with the NYPhilharmonic; and

Sam Quintal: violist and member of the Jasper String Quartet.

This wonderful group of artists showed my students that it is indeed possible to make one’s way in the world as a musician and that there are many different paths to creating career success.  Here are some of the top lessons that I gleaned from their remarks which center on the themes of knowing your mission and purpose, proactively creating your own opportunities and making your luck happen, nurturing relationships, taking risks, maintaing high standards and working hard at your career development.  Next time, I will share my students’ observations.

I am thrilled to be teaching a new class at the Yale School of Music entitled “Creating Sustainable Careers in the Arts” and we have gotten off to a great start.  I teach a combination of

•    How to create a positive mindset and project confidence;
•    How to be an authentic, powerful and unique artist; and
•    Entrepreneurial skills that will help you advance your music career.

Over the course of the semester, my students will learn how to adopt the mindset and learn skill sets and the processes necessary to become successful music entrepreneurs.  Here is why this is so important, no matter what kind of career you envision as a musician.

If you have taken the last two financial freedom quizzes, you will have a much better sense of your attitude towards

1. your financial literacy and the fear of not knowing how to manage your finances; and

2. your fears around not having enough options to make money as a musician.

You should also have a much better sense of what to do in order to become more comfortable managing your finances, as well as exploring new and different options for making money as a musician.

Now let’s tackle debt and spending.

Your attitude about money says a lot about how you make, spend and save your money.   How do you feel about your money?
A lot of people have fears around how to manage their money which can hold them back from taking the first steps towards financial freedom. ((Take the Financial Freedom Quiz-Part I,  to assess your attitudes and learn more about how to manage your money). Now it’s time to figure out how you feel about abundance and career success

Let’s start off the New Year with a topic that sends shivers down the spires of many musicians:  your finances.
What’s the first thing that you think of when you think “money”? 

“Dread.”

“I don’t want to think about it.”

“I don’t know where to begin.”

Your attitude about money says a lot about how you make, spend and save your money.  By using a combination of the positive mindset of an entrepreneur combined with knowledge of basic skills, you can start to conquer your fears around money and begin to forge a healthy relationship with making and spending money, with the goal of achieving financial freedom.

How do you feel about making money as a musician?  Start out by taking the Financial Freedom Quiz. 

With the year coming to a close, it is time for top 10 lists.  My contribution to the field is a top 10 list for Music Entrepreneurs on how to create career success.  This list reflects my belief that successful music entrepreneurs align who they are with what they do.

The short answer is be authentic, be unique, and master the skills that will enable you to create big dreams and make them happen. Not surprisingly, this list reflects the topics that I will be covering in my class next semester at YSM on Creating Sustainable Careers in the Arts.

Here are my top 10 tips for musicians who are committed to creating and sustaining authentic success:

One of the hallmarks of the music entrepreneur is having a positive mindset that allows you to have a belief in your unique gift, a passion for making a difference through music and the willingness to take charge and learn from challenges in order to create success.  In essence, a positive attitude is a form of positive energy that a successful music entrepreneur can use to inspire herself and others in order to create success.

I was therefore quite taken with a recent blog post in Music Career Juice on how musicians should not look to businesses as a model for how to operate but instead to aspire to be expressive energy grids – generating, transforming and distributing energy continually.  Since I teach musicians how to create career success, this got me thinking more about the kind of energy that one brings to a situation in order to be successful.

We have all heard about “negative” and “positive” energy.  Think of what it is like to be surrounded by a group of people who complain and bemoan the state of the world, which we hear a lot of these days in the world of the arts:  orchestras like Philadelphia declaring bankruptcy, fewer spots available in orchestras, the weak economy.  I could go on but I don’t want to add to the doom and gloom!  That’s what negative energy can do-bring you down.  And because energy is transferred, if enough people in the room are spinning out negativity, it tends to drag down others.
Let’s look at another scenario:

One of the great things about having a brand is that it can be used in so many ways.  A brand is fundamentally a marketing tool that connects the best of you with your ideal audience.  Your brand has a practical application as follows:

• Logo and tag line
• Website
• Promotional Materials
• Career Materials, including a professional bio, resume and CV.

Here are some tips on how can you use your brand to prepare a top-quality performance bio inspired by a recent class that I did for the choral conducting students at the Yale School of Music.

I have been doing a lot of work with students these days around branding and the results have been fascinating! 

First, I worked with the Choral Conducting students at the Yale School of Music to teach them the basics of branding and how to use a brand statement to write a professional bio.  Then I was at Juilliard to help the students create a brand statement that we then converted into an elevator speech. 

A lot of the focus of these classes is to help students discover how they are unique so that they can best present themselves to the audiences that will hire them. One of the best ways to do this is by looking at what you do besides music and figuring out what that says about you.  But first, some basics.

One of the reasons that I love working with musicians is that they chose to do what they do because of a deep sense of commitment and passion to the field.  Otherwise, why would they spend some much time practicing and honing their craft in a competitive and challenging field?

It is one thing to be in love with your art.  Yet many musicians have trouble taking the next step to figuring out how to  translate that passion into a  successful and sustainable career.

Where do you start?

I am in the process of finalizing the reading list for my course next semester at the Yale School of Music on “Creating Sustainable Careers in the Arts” and am including Ben Zander’s TED Talk on Music and Passion. TED Talks originated from a conference with the world’s thought leaders in Technology, Entertainment and Design around the theme of “ideas worth spreading”.  The talks have broadened in scope to include inspirations voices that anyone can access for free online on the ted.com website. I have chosen this particular talk because not only it is an inspiration for today's conservatory students to hear one of the world's great proponents of classical music but also because it contains some powerful leadership lessons that transcend music and apply to all areas of life.

The fourth point of the cycle of transitions is getting "there".  If you have tested out a number of possibilities and hit upon the thing that works, it is now time to do it.  Eureka! You are there! How exciting to hit upon a career path that aligns with who you are at your best! .  You may want this phase to last forever.  And perhaps you think that it will.

So what happens when you say "I'm there"?  Are you done?

Not so fast.

The main charge of this phase of your transition is to remember that it too is part of the cycle of change.  If you are lucky and your choice fits you to a tee, you will want to keep growing.  If, however, the new situation does not match the expectations, there can be a huge sense of deflation.  The trick is to manage expectations and to keep checking in with yourself to see how you can make this work.

I work with a lot of musicians and creative professionals who feel stuck and trapped in their current roles. This feeling of being stuck can be stressful and debilitating, especially if you think that there is something “perfect” out there if only you could figure out what “it” is. This is a classic case of the first phase of career transitions that I previously wrote about called "I'm done":  what happens when your dream dies or your job comes to an end.

The good news is that if you spend some time “reflecting” on who you are at your core-- the next phase of transition where you do the personal development work that you need to do in order to set yourself up for a successful transition--you will be in a much better position to move on. 

In my work as a career coach for young professional musicians, I often come across people who are thrown by having too many choices.  These are the passionate folks who want to try everything and find themselves confused and exhausted by having too much on their plates! That passion is a wonderful thing and it is  an essential element in creating career success but a haphazard approach can be exhausting and time consuming.

If you find yourself saying yes to a lot of opportunities because you do not want to miss out on “all that cool stuff” or because you are afraid of making the “wrong” choice, chances are that you do not know what direction to take.  [You may also have trouble saying no for fear of disappointing others.  If that’s your situation, it’s time to learn how to set boundaries so that you can start saying no to them and yes to yourself!]

Here are a few thoughts on how to focus your direction and begin to make choices that feel right for you.

“The only constant in life is change.”

Heraclitus

When you think about life, we are constantly changing.  This includes our career paths.  Many people believe that once you find your “perfect” career, you are set for life.  That only sets up an unrealistic expectation that leads people to feel frustrated that they have not found “it” and to ignore the marvelous process of growth and change.

I have been thinking about the phenomenon of change a lot lately in my work with young professional musicians.  These talented young people have a calling to create music and some of them have had a vision of what that vision looks like:  playing in a orchestra, creating their own small ensemble and touring and performing with close friends, enjoying the freelance life-style and playing with a variety of orchestras and groups.

So what can you do if you find yourself in this situation where your dream of old no longer matches up with who and where you are now? 

Greg Sandow is teaching a music criticism class at Juilliard this semester and has generously shared not only his views on what makes good criticism but also his syllabus which contains some endlessly fascinating pieces from historical music critics like George Bernard Shaw and Virgil Thompson! I love Greg’s take on how good music criticism starts with an objective description of the music and then moves to the subjective. 

What struck me is how important it is for all musicians to talk about music in a way that it is both intelligent and intelligible. When musicians can talk about the music they are making, they both demystify the music and translate their passion for it, thereby compelling us to see why  music is so vitally important. This is a key to audience engagement which is increasingly being seen as critical to the survival of classical music in the 21st Century.  Hence, the successful music entrepreneur of the 21st Century needs to know how to talk about music in a way that will engage and excite audiences.

One of the hallmarks of a music entrepreneur is having a vision and taking action to make that vision happen.  In my role as Coordinator of Career Strategies at the Yale School of Music, I have the privilege of working with an extraordinarily talented group of musicians, all of whom have worked hard to get to where they are.  Yet many of these students do not have a vision for where they want to take their careers.  Since having a vision is a powerful motivator for creating career success, how do you create such a vision for yourself?

In my experience, many successful musicians got their career inspiration from listening to other people and paying attention when they got excited about something that someone else was doing.   In other words, they met someone and realize, “That’s what I want to do.”  Then, they put their personal spin on the idea and that became their vision.