THE BIZ CLASS

Artist Development 101

What is Artiste Development ?

Essentially it is everything you need to do to build, promote, and enhance your music career.

Today, when most labels consider signing a new act, they are looking for artists that already have a solid independent foundation, a story, and the songs and image necessary to make it to the top.

You may ask yourself .... How in the world are we going to accomplish all that with little or no money or connections? The answer is very hard work, and a little knowledge and expertise. It sure wouldn't hurt to have the advise and counsel of an Artist Development expert either. You must set your goals, lay down a good music marketing and promotion plan and follow it. In a sense, in today’s music industry environment, every artist has an equal chance of getting where they ought to be, as anyone else provided they have the songs, and image.

In the Nigerian music industry, structural issues are crippling business for Labels and Management firms. So instead of signing up new acts, they are downsizing on their numbers, some even have closed shop. And so very few have the fortune of professional Management or Label Backing . For an artist who is not involved with a manager or an artist management firm, producer, or label that actually has a budget for artist development (which is not likely) you have to stick to that independent route and develop yourself.

Developing Yourself

As an independent artist you must approach your music career as a business. After all, if you want to make a living at it, that's exactly what it is. The responsibility for developing yourself as an artist, and developing your records is on you.

_{A music artist must start somewhere, that’s usually locally, but it’s better to not just dive in without a plan. But begin you must. Create a plan with some ideas and set goals as to what you need to accomplish weekly, monthly, and yearly. Start small and make it progressive. Reach bench marks and keep at it.}

^{Image is everything. Image is the complete package - artist name, look, performance, merchandise, and style, to how that brand is marketed. A stage name can be a descriptive statement of the image you project. Be unique and interesting to look at in some way....build your own unique persona for stage and public appearances.}

^{You may be a truly great talent, but without getting out there and consistently marketing yourself, networking, meeting the right people, maintaining your image, and being humble, your talent will only get you so far.}

^{Listen to various and the best of materials, especially the ones that have the sound the you want to sound like. Practice and practice and practice. Longevity in the music business means learning new things, constantly creating, and always improving.}

^{Use the Net to your advantage. Properly use the tools of the Internet to build your online brand.
Create a web site. Buy your own artist name URL for your web site, keep it simple, easy to remember, make sure it loads quickly and is easy to navigate. Almost everyone lives on planet Facebook today, you could to use that and other networking websites to your advantage.}

With the astronomical amount of competition out there in the Music Market, it is essential that your music, image, and marketing efforts rise above all the rest to even stand a chance. Trying to develop yourself and effectively implement all the strategies that are necessary to stand out from the crowd may be a difficult task. So it is advisable to seek the counsel of an Artiste Development expert.

Intending Artiste development professionals, Label execs, Managers should bear in mind; nearly everyone has the same opportunities available to them for massive global exposure. The difference maker has to be the right guidance to the right opportunities at the right times. A lot of the emerging artists are young and very talented but with no guidance. As we get older we learn the ropes but by then the window of opportunity may have passed.

Artist development comes through carefully evaluating the artist, his or her strong points and weak points and where the greatest opportunities for advancement in the industry may lie. Then the key is exposing that artist to the right people within the industry who can mold, shape and carefully develop the strong points, advance the weak points and prime the artist for the right exposure to the right people at the right times HL

" I'm not a business man i'm a business, man! let me handle my business damn!" Jay Z

HIT SELECTAH : DJ Jimmy Jatt

Who would know more about hits, than the guy who’s made a living and a name spinning ‘em to the rest of us? Who’d know more about hits than the Cool DJ Jimmy Jatt? However you choose to define a hit, whatever your take is on making one, this is what Jimmy has to say about it all:

"There are two angles to look at it, a hit song could be a song that is widely accepted, that you know has massive acceptance, everybody is grooving to it. A hit song for me would be a great song, might not cut across to everybody at the time but you know its going to be played years later and you know its never gonna die. There are songs that were made 20yrs ago, they were not exactly platinum selling songs, but they are evergreen, they are never gonna die. That’s my own definition of a hit song.

I think in trying to do a hit song, you have to have the quality in mind. These days I think a lot of people take the shortcut they just want the hit of the moment. They get a hit and within the next six months its dead. I’d rather you do quality songs, that might not necessarily hit the roof right now, but it will guarantee you food on the table for a whole lifetime, that is 10yrs, 20yrs it will be there.

Like I always tell people music is meant for different purposes, you might want to score a hit at the dance floor, or you might just want to do a song that is inspirational, anytime people are down it gives them hope, it gives them something to look forward to. But it’s your own musical direction that determines what kind of work you’ll do to make a hit. It’s not the same thing that works for this artiste, that will work for the other one. If one kind of artist does a kind of music, his formula might differ from everyone else’s. Its not the same way someone who is playing adult contemporary songs would work for a hit that someone who’s playing reggae dancehall, or any other style would apply; it doesn’t work that way. There’s no laid down rule of what you should do to score a hit; you just have to check your direction.

For me the tempo doesn’t really matter, it doesn’t always have to be fast, I play music as low as 60 bpm (beats per minute) on to 140, 145 bpm.

A whole lot of Nigerian music are leaning in one direction. Maybe because a formula has worked with one person, so everybody is going that direction and I think they’re too monotonous.

I think one or two songs from M.I’s album might blow this year though. Yea, it’s rap music, but there’s a balance. It’s not so hard core and it’s not weak like some weak ass songs out there. There’s a song out there called ‘Alhaji’, I don’t know who sang it, it’s crap, but it might blow.

A whole lot of us complain about the type of music being churned out right now, but when its time to buy, do this people get up to go and buy the kind of music that they want if its on the shelf? That’s how you hear people selling 10,000, 20,000 copies in a country of how many millions of people, it cos people don’t get up to buy" HL