I was asked recently, “Why did you guys produce your own recording? Weren’t any record labels interested?”
Yes, but….. Other than recordings made by some of today’s biggest pop stars, it’s a “new day” when it comes to working with record labels. “Back in the day”, when most of our orchestra members were making a living playing and recording, most genres of music were produced and distributed by record companies. The labels fronted the money for the projects; paying the musicians, the studios, and all the post production expenses, including promotion and distribution. The labels took the financial risk that the audiences would buy the vinyl records and later the CD’s. This had been the standard through most of the 20th century until the combination of computers, digital recording, and the internet brought a huge change to the industry.
Recordings gradually became available in download formats; making them more conveniently stored on our computers, phones, and other mobile devices and could be copied and given away for free. The sales of CD’s has dwindled away as fewer and fewer people even own a CD player. This has reduced much of the profit, especially for genres such as Jazz, which has a very small audience. The addition of companies that basically distribute music to the public with little or nothing paid to the artists, has helped produce an environment where the public expects music to be a free product rather than intellectual property. Copying music files, burning CD’s etc. is not looked upon as theft by the public.
All of the above changes have led record labels away from production toward distribution, leaving the cost of recording to the artists and independent producers. Jazz artists have come to view recordings simply as expensive promotional materials, hoping their production and distribution will lead to income by attracting live performance opportunities. Given the present circumstances, the more expensive studio and large ensemble recordings are much more difficult to produce, logically leading to more live recordings and smaller groups.
When we looked at our options for recording "Nothing Hard is Ever Easy" with The 14 Jazz Orchestra, we had all these factors to consider. It came down to accepting that distributing the recording through an existing record company would not give us any chance of recovering our expenses. We saw that our only chance to at least a partial recovery would be to produce, distribute, and promote the music ourselves. We are hopeful that sales will bring in enough to provide starter money for another project.
We are looking forward to January when the print media and radio promotions begin. We are hopeful our music and the performance quality will spark an interest in the jazz community and fans will support us by purchasing downloads and CD’s.
Dan Bonsanti
Yes, but….. Other than recordings made by some of today’s biggest pop stars, it’s a “new day” when it comes to working with record labels. “Back in the day”, when most of our orchestra members were making a living playing and recording, most genres of music were produced and distributed by record companies. The labels fronted the money for the projects; paying the musicians, the studios, and all the post production expenses, including promotion and distribution. The labels took the financial risk that the audiences would buy the vinyl records and later the CD’s. This had been the standard through most of the 20th century until the combination of computers, digital recording, and the internet brought a huge change to the industry.
Recordings gradually became available in download formats; making them more conveniently stored on our computers, phones, and other mobile devices and could be copied and given away for free. The sales of CD’s has dwindled away as fewer and fewer people even own a CD player. This has reduced much of the profit, especially for genres such as Jazz, which has a very small audience. The addition of companies that basically distribute music to the public with little or nothing paid to the artists, has helped produce an environment where the public expects music to be a free product rather than intellectual property. Copying music files, burning CD’s etc. is not looked upon as theft by the public.
All of the above changes have led record labels away from production toward distribution, leaving the cost of recording to the artists and independent producers. Jazz artists have come to view recordings simply as expensive promotional materials, hoping their production and distribution will lead to income by attracting live performance opportunities. Given the present circumstances, the more expensive studio and large ensemble recordings are much more difficult to produce, logically leading to more live recordings and smaller groups.
When we looked at our options for recording "Nothing Hard is Ever Easy" with The 14 Jazz Orchestra, we had all these factors to consider. It came down to accepting that distributing the recording through an existing record company would not give us any chance of recovering our expenses. We saw that our only chance to at least a partial recovery would be to produce, distribute, and promote the music ourselves. We are hopeful that sales will bring in enough to provide starter money for another project.
We are looking forward to January when the print media and radio promotions begin. We are hopeful our music and the performance quality will spark an interest in the jazz community and fans will support us by purchasing downloads and CD’s.
Dan Bonsanti
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