What the blog title says. Art as a professional medium is constantly taken for granted and not appreciated as a talent or craft that helps push society forward. It’s hard as fuck to get support when it comes to your art. Art’s a broad term, so the focus will be more so on the art form, music, especially since I do music. As a musician and being involved in the music community, I see that most up and coming musicians look for validation and basically want permission to be successful.
Examples would be…
- Searching for a record deal
- Searching for fame and notoriety
- Trying to make “music for everyone”
- Trying to get any and everyone to buy your music
- Constantly trying to keep up with the joneses and following trends instead of starting your own
This seems to be typical of some musicians who want to be loved and accepted by everything under the sun. Not a good look at all. Instead of waiting for validation and permission to be successful by people, we just need to give ourself our own validation and permission to succeed on our own terms. We as musicians need to just make music that we’d enjoy before we think about who else would enjoy it. I’m confident that if you make music that makes you happy, then your music will be at a point where it will make others happy. From that point you can build a real fan base.
As far as the succeeding on our own terms part, us musicians shouldn’t be afraid to make a living doing what we love. I know I want to make a living doing what I love. People have to realize that artists’ have to eat. We have to pay bills, put food on the table, put a roof over our head, etc. Our parents told all of us as kids that “money doesn’t grow off trees.” That’s a true statement right? With all that being said, artists’ have to learn how to monetize. Your website should not only promote your music just for the sake of promoting music, but also to market yourself as a brand and a business that people can love and support. You do this by selling merchandise, selling products through affiliate programs; products that are beneficial to your customers/fans, offering services that will make your customers/fans’ lives better, etc.
If your music is awesome and you think it’s worth money, then charge people for it. Sell your music, but also offer free music too. People download all day, everyday, so giving away free music shouldn’t be something you feel funny about because at the end of the day, if your music is like that and people really want it, they’ll take it anyway. All I’m saying is as artists’ we shouldn’t be afraid to think like entrepreneurs or even be an entrepreneur ourselves when it comes to our art. In other words be an artistpreneur!
Source: Artists Shouldn’t Need Permission to Succeed
