My 1st TAXI year / TAXI as a hobby

[jaywilliams]

Hey Tom thanks for sharing your experience with us.

I really appreciate the time you (and many others) take to listen and provide Feedback in the Peer to Peer section, it helps a ton.

Your 1 out of 7 forward rate is pretty darn good, so I have a feeling if you keep at it eventually you'll hear one of those coin jingles in your own pocket.

If there's any way you can make it to Rally do so, and ditto for increasing your production/submit rate.

Best of luck!

Jay

[mikehamm123]

Glad you stayed.

Taxi has definitely been great for my musical growth and enjoyment. its pushed me to do things I wouldn't have even attempted.

however I have yet to make a sale, which leads me to think I'm in some sort of dead zone--forwardable, but not sellable

[mikehamm123]

[/quote] I guess one can produce things pretty well that fit the listings, but they're possibly simply not quite as current sounding as needed by the supervisors. Tom
[/quote]

Sometimes it takes a long time to make a sale from a submission, I'm told. Not always a quick turnaround.

So, patience is good.

Best of luck to you!

[ttully]

Well...not to discourage you....

BUT, I have hundreds of tracks that have been sitting in libraries for years and years that have never been used.

That does not mean tracks that YOU write will sit for years!!!!!


Tim

[admin]

Don't let Tim's post discourage you at all! Even our members who regularly make six figure incomes from their music would tell you that only 20% of all the music they have out there earns income. It's the Pareto Principle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle

When you become successful, you too will have hundreds of tracks in the wild that don't earn any money, but 20% of them will! And if you think that you can figure out what the 20% are (genre-wise), and skip creating the unused 80%, good luck with that! It's just the way it is. Don't overthink any of this stuff. Just make lots of music. And keep it simple! Simpler tracks get used more often!!!

Michael

[ttully]

Yes...

I have to completely agree with Michael.
About 20% of the libraries i have tracks in, produce 100% of my placements.
Many of those placements have been generating income from the same shows for over 10 years... and still going....
as well as still having those old tracks being placed in new shows.

Tim

[Paulie]

Remember, you are at the very beginning of this musical journey. Patience is an absolute must. The forums are invaluable, the best way to improve your music is to share it here with your peers to get feedback. Become a student of the styles you want to write. Search out tv shows that use the styles you like and then watch and take notes. Find the artists in these genres. Immerse yourself in those styles and -- very important -- stay current.

"I have yet to make a sale."

Do NOT become discouraged. Forwards are just a step toward the goal. Take those forwarded tracks, do a "Save As..." and then create another track from it. That's the easiest way to work smarter, no need to start over with a blank canvas if you have a track with the instrumentation and mix that got forwarded.

Also, consider finding a collaborator. I'm in a lot of libraries thanks to just a couple of other Taxi members that I collaborated with. Some have gotten me into new libraries and I've got some of them into new libraries. Collaboration is a very solid way to improve your music and your chances for success.

Good luck!

Paulie

[jaywilliams]

...Forwards are just a step toward the goal. Take those forwarded tracks, do a "Save As..." and then create another track from it. That's the easiest way to work smarter, no need to start over with a blank canvas if you have a track with the instrumentation and mix that got forwarded.

Obvious yet valuable suggestion, thank you Paulie and yes I'm so glad I scour these Forums for little ideas like this that can pop up anywhere!

[jdkotaska]

Hi Tom,

Glad to hear you're making improvements and getting better! Just out of curiosity, how were you recording without a DAW and what DAW are you now using?

[jdkotaska]

Hi Dean

I use Audacity for recording, editing (also for editing recorded MIDI), and "mastering", MuseScore for composition and MIDI-playing, and a Yamaha keyboard synth for live playing/MIDI-playing. I use Polyphone to create own Soundfonts if needed. Audacity can do a lot of things (plugins...), but I am very aware that it is better to have everything in one place (=DAW).

I have installed Cakewalk some time ago.

Tom

Ah, yes. Sounds very similar to my own beginnings. I have since upgraded to Logic and can't imagine ever trying to go back. I paid a small amount for an online course on Logic via Udemy.com to help me learn how to use it and it was worth every penny. They might have something similar on there for Cakewalk, too. If not, there are plenty of alternative sites that do that and, of course, YouTube is always a great option (although maybe not so streamlined for learning the ins and outs of the entire package). But anyway, enjoy the grind and keep on keeping on!