What's Happening: Week of May 14, 2018

I have some new stock music in the pipeline since my last post here, so let me start with that.

My latest submission to my podcast intro collection is highly dramatic. So I'm calling it "Highly Dramatic Intro." My original idea was to call it "High Drama Intro," but I already have an item called "High Drama" and didn't want to risk getting confused later. It features lots of aggressive staccato strings and big legato brass, with percussion (of course!). I'm offering it in :30, :15 and stinger versions (no loop version on this one). Check out a preview of the :30 version.

New to my inspirational and motivational music collection is "Making The Difference." This is upbeat, motivational background music to help you convey positive messages in healthcare, lifestyle, political and other subject matter. It's a little over two minutes in length; here's a thirty second sample from the beginning of the track.



Both items are in curation at Pond5. Keep an eye on my Twitter feed for more information when I have confirmation that they are online and available to license.

My featured stock music item this week is Moving Ahead. It's a nice, bright soft rock tune that features a melodica/harmonica melody and is a good choice for healthcare, lifestyle backgrounds or character development montages in your family-friendly or rom-com projects. If you're interested, please check it out at Pond5.

Finally, here's a strange thing. Last time I was on the ASCAP site to register titles for the items now in the pipeline, I noticed I had royalty revenue for the April 2018 quarter. I'm not expecting performance royalties, because no one has licensed any of my stock music for broadcast (that I'm aware of yet). No cue sheets yet. So I looked at the report.

Apparently, ASCAP has worked out deals with various internet companies like YouTube, Spotify and iHeart to collect performance royalties on music. And that's good. On the less good side, my royalty total for all my stuff came out to exactly $0.01. And that might have been generous. At least they can't say I haven't contributed anything to their bottom line.

And so it goes. As always, I thank you for your support, whether it's licensing, streaming my album, EPs or singles, or just stopping by to read. Please feel free to stop in again, leave a comment or contact me using the form in this blog.

Until next time, take care.

B~)

In The Pipeline May 8, 2018: "Big Idea"

I've finished one of the tracks I was working on and submitted it to Pond5. I call it "Big Idea." It's a heavily-sequenced electronic track that's intended to bubble underneath how-to or explainer videos. Check out the sample below.



Assuming all goes well, I'll be tweeting soon that "Big Idea" is live and online, so keep an eye on my Twitter feed. If not, you'll hear about it in my next weekly update.

Cheers!

What's Happening: Week of May 7, 2018

As I write, clouds are gathering here in southwestern Ohio. Thunderstorms are coming later this afternoon and evening. I'm sitting on a quiet Sunday afternoon and contemplating the moment.

The photo at left was taken on a more sunny day earlier this week while I was out and about. I had just gotten a haircut (in fact, I got them all cut) and was enjoying the change of pace and scenery.

That's kind of where I'm at right now, changing pace (but not so much scenery). I've been spending the last couple of weeks working on different ideas and trying out new things. On the production music side, I'm thinking about creating some music to augment my podcast intro music collection. I'm thinking of maybe doing some minimalist, atmospheric things with electronics and percussion to use as backgrounds for dramatic audio and visual content. I don't have anything to share just yet, but hope to do so soon.

My featured stock music item this week is Dramatic Moments (60 Second). It's a sort of tension-building orchestral piece that resolves at the end. It's also available in a looped version that doesn't have the resolution. I hope you'll check them both out.

On the "music for your lifestyle" front, my thoughts are not so positive. I'm not depressed about it or anything, but the plain reality is that this doesn't seem to be a good time to pursue that side of things. For one thing, I'd like to be able to release stuff in different styles and genres. But since I lack an audience of any size for any of it, to an outsider it probably looks like I'm throwing stuff against the wall to see what sticks.

The long and short of it is, for now I'm putting new releases on hold. I may decide to throw a single out there from time to time, but it seems to make no sense to do albums or EPs. I'm not sure yet what I'm going to do about DistroKid going forward. Certainly I'll renew it for another year (it's coming up soon) but the prospects of it paying for itself frankly seem remote. I might be better off to put that money on the lottery once a year instead. If I do continue with releases, I'll probably stick to quieter material along the lines of Circadia.

I can hear thunder in the distance now, so I think I'll stop here and do something else for a while. I do appreciate everyone who stops by to read, as well as those of you who license my work or check out my releases on Spotify or Apple Music. If you're interested in more frequent updates and other infor, please follow my Twitter feed, since I'm more active there in short form.

Until next time, take care.

What's Happening: Week of April 30, 2018

Taking a break from heavy production . . .

After uploading my last group of items, I decided to step back from cranking out stock music and do sort of a strategic review. I analyzed my sales from the beginning of the year. I found out some interesting things:

1. Podcast intros and loops now make up almost 3 out of 4 sales from my portfolio. The last time I looked at several months worth of data, it was about 50-50.
2. Of the remainder, the next largest groups of sales were in the ambient and drone categories, plus a lot of specialty items that don't fall neatly into a specific category. The dramatic and corporate/motivational categories didn't really have a lot of sales at all.

Part of the reason for some of the categories lagging might be that I haven't promoted them as heavily on my social media compared with the podcast intros. So I think I'm going to try and give them some more exposure over the next few weeks to see if that helps. If it doesn't, I'm going to seriously consider going "all in" on the podcast intros.

Meanwhile, I haven't completely stopped working on stock music. I did sketch an outline for a trailer music item earlier this week. It starts with a soft introduction, builds to a climax, then a short, even bigger climactic coda, before resolving to an outro. I'm projecting it to be about two minutes. I plan to revisit it early this week, and may share all or part of a rough mix in my next weekly update.

My featured stock music item this week is "Epic Dramatic Orchestra - 60 Second." It's got a nice big, cinematic feel for news/events, politics and similar content. In addition to the featured 60 second version, there are also 30 second, 15 second, loop and bumper/stinger versions. I do hope you'll check it out.

That's pretty much it for this week. Thanks for stopping by and supporting my work. Please look me up on Spotify and iTunes/Apple Music, too.

In The Pipeline, April 24, 2018: "Critical Seconds"

"Critical Seconds" is a fast-paced, urgent 60-second piece with strings and lots of cinematic-style percussion. It's designed for scenes where seconds count. Here's a sample:



Stay tuned to my Twitter feed for updates on the availability of "Critical Seconds."