Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

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davewalton
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Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by davewalton » Tue Jun 20, 2006 7:21 am

Hi,I got an email this morning from a music library telling me that one of my tracks has been placed into a "Feed The Children" infomercial type thing. This is my first music cue placement into the mainstream from a music library. The first airings start tomorrow on ABC Family and WGN. This is a music library listing from Taxi that ran in November 2004. I didn't get a call from the library until one year later. Now seven months after that a cue is placed into television for a total of one year and seven months after the initial Taxi listing ran. Things don't always happen fast. This ties into Jaysta's post about his music library placement (congrats on that again Jay). My original deal with this library was for two songs. It was a straightforward non-exclusive 50/50 deal on everything. They take the publishing royalties, I get the writers royalties and we split the upfront fees. I was easy to deal with and didn't fuss about the details. After signing the contract and submitting the original two songs in the format requested, I waited about a week. I called to thank them for the opportunity and also asked if they would be interested in auditioning more music and what their preferred method for doing that would be. After getting their approval and info, I sent a CD with 25 tracks. A week after that they sent me another contract for 15 of those songs. The "Feed The Children" cue placement was one of those 15 songs.My point is that this cue placement wouldn't have come about without a little initiative on my part. In this case, I followed their requests on the initial deal to the letter and didn't muddy the waters with other stuff. However, once I had satisfied the requirements for the initial deal and that was behind us, I started a new dialog about additional stuff. Now about a year after the initial library placement it's starting to pay off.Anyway, that's my story and I'm sticking with it! Dave

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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by Casey H » Tue Jun 20, 2006 8:34 am

Congrats Dave! Way to go! Talent, good business skills, and patience...One thing I noticed since hanging around this forum is that a lot more people have had some kind of deal through TAXI than I ever realized. All I ever used to hear was "Yeah, but show me one person who had success with TAXI". The problem is that all those folks were thinking huge deals for major artists to record their songs -or- record label deals. The explosion in the music library business has changed everything. As long as folks don't expect to initially (or even ever) make a ton of money, there is a lot out there.Good luck Dave. Buy us a drink with your first paycheck... Casey

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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by edteja » Tue Jun 20, 2006 11:31 am

It seems that the whole "secret" of success here is not much different than elsewhere. Be persistent, push yourself gently forward when the opportunity is there, and as Dave has pointed out several times, be one of the willing that people want to work with. Way cool, Dave!!Oh, I forgot the rule about ducking Casey when the paycheck comes in.
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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by jaysta » Tue Jun 20, 2006 2:47 pm

Hey,, Well done Dave!!, Congrats.... I see what you mean! In this Bizz you never really know!!Jay

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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by edteja » Wed Jun 21, 2006 1:31 am

Dave (or Matto or anyone working with libraries),In your experience, once you've signed with a library do you hear nothing from them unless they actually get a placement, or do you interact with them from time to time?
"In the future, when we finally get over racism, bigotry, and everyone is purple, red, and brown ... then we'll have to hate people for who they truly are."--George Carlin

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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by davewalton » Wed Jun 21, 2006 5:12 am

Quote:Dave (or Matto or anyone working with libraries),In your experience, once you've signed with a library do you hear nothing from them unless they actually get a placement, or do you interact with them from time to time?In my limited experience with this particular library, I don't hear anything from them unless they have something to tell me. So it's up to me to "push myself gently forward". I love the way you phrased that in an earlier post. It's so descriptive of how we should be conducting ourselves.As I mentioned, after getting the initial two songs placed into their library, I came around a little later asking about submitting more material, which they accepted. About 3 months after that I contacted them again and asked about doing some additional tracks, more focused to what they'd really like to have rather than me just sending in random tracks. We worked out a little arrangement for me to do an ongoing series of 30-second promo themes. Nothing pressing with a deadline, just a loose arrangement whereby I can submit these tracks with a high degree of confidence because this is what they're currently wanting from me.If I never contacted them after the first two-song deal I'd still have nothing more than a two-song deal. By the way... I caught the airing on ABC Family this morning and saw my clip. Holy cow, talk about depressing. Not the music or the placement or anything like that. The subject matter is, of course, "Feed The Children" so my music is playing in the background of a segment with starving children riddled with disease in the slums of Africa. No matter what our personal situations are, compared to that, life is good. Dave

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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by matto » Wed Jun 21, 2006 10:44 am

Quote:Dave (or Matto or anyone working with libraries),In your experience, once you've signed with a library do you hear nothing from them unless they actually get a placement, or do you interact with them from time to time?A lot of times I don't even hear from them if they get me a placement ...but I now do get calls or emails soliciting my work...From my side, I always try to stay in touch, usually via email. If I have no other business going on with a particular company at a given time, I contact them between 2-4 times a year. I might update them about what I'm currently working on, ask if there's anything they're looking for, thank them for a placement (I found out about when my royalty statements come in), tell them about a particularly impressive success (like a major movie or tv feature placement)...whatever makes sense at the time. It's business of relationships, so you want to keep those relationships going whenever possible. If you keep yourself fresh in their minds, they are more likely to think of you next time they have a need for something specific.Also I always send out Christmas cards.matto

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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by edteja » Wed Jun 21, 2006 11:41 am

Great stuff, guys. Thanks very much. When you can't be face to face, or even voice to voice, with the people you do business with, it can be hard to know when persistence becomes pestilence. And of course the flip side, also to be avoided is falling between the cracks. So your perspectives are incredibly useful.
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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by roughly » Mon Jul 03, 2006 6:09 pm

Congrats Dave on your placement....at least you can feel like you're making a difference in children's lives I have a question on the same lines as matto's touching base and touting any success. We (my cowriters and I) have thought about starting a newsletter that we could send to libraries who have our music or similar people. Maybe do an email every other month or something. Would this be a good idea? Or would it come off as a mass email that people would dismiss immediately? Is it better to write personal letters anyhow and the newsletter would seem boring or too pushy or something. This is an idea we've been throwing around and I'd love to get thoughts on it. Thanks!Theresa

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Re: Music Cue Placement - "Feed The Children"

Post by davewalton » Tue Jul 04, 2006 4:30 am

Quote:Congrats Dave on your placement....at least you can feel like you're making a difference in children's lives I have a question on the same lines as matto's touching base and touting any success. We (my cowriters and I) have thought about starting a newsletter that we could send to libraries who have our music or similar people. Maybe do an email every other month or something. Would this be a good idea? Or would it come off as a mass email that people would dismiss immediately? Is it better to write personal letters anyhow and the newsletter would seem boring or too pushy or something. This is an idea we've been throwing around and I'd love to get thoughts on it. Thanks!TheresaGenerally speaking, my goal is always to, as Traveling Ed so eloquently phrased it, to "gently push myself forward". As part of doing that, my goal is also to develop personal relationships with the people I work with. I want them to be my friends, not some distant business-relationship type thing.Whenever I contact anyone for the purpose you're describing, I always do it as personally as possible. Most times a friendly, brief email to them is all that is needed. This is definitely a personable business. Most of the people in this business are fun people and really enjoy what they do. Getting to know the people you do business with is both fun and rewarding in many different ways. For me a broadcast newsletter wouldn't do that. There's a definite difference between "Hi Theresa. How's things? Just thought I'd check in..." and "Welcome to the second edition of our newsletter". Dave

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