I was signed up for a year and in that time I asked one question about Taxi and got a reasonable timely response. I never made a submission.
I didn't do anything with Taxi that year because my day job turned into freelance. Doing fabrication drawings(AutoCAD) for tradeshows, museums, corporate events, etc.
After letting my membership lapse for a time, I signed back up. This time with the intent to be more active. I watched last Monday's Taxi TV and since watched a few more past ones.
Not only do I find them interesting but very reflective in similarities with What I do in CAD and my experience in Community Musical Theater where I was one of the few who got paid ($100 per production [not per show] as a token of appreciation for building sets, changing sets during shows, and additionally onstage extra.)
So with this said.
Musical Talent is a dime a dozen but those who make it, show persistence in pursuit of being involved, stability and reliability, along with improving what they do. Community Musical Theater has no place for maybe show up for mostly unpaid. The show must go on.
In dealing with CAD there is a lot of mundane work that needs to be done and there is also plenty of uniqueness in the CAD work for trade-show, museums, corporate theater, and events.
Its certainly not uncommon for in the process of doing fabrication drawings A CAD person deals with input from clients, designers, company owners, the project managers, and ultimately even the shop or vendor that will be using the fabrication drawings. In my case throw in CNC programming and machine maintenance. And of course meeting deadlines, The shows are set in stone, they must go on.
And with this said,
In consideration of last Monday's Taxi TV topic and a few older and relevant to last Monday's show, doing cues to submit has got to be unbelievably easier than doing CAD work for the industries I worked in. While the payoff for doing cues is relevant to doing community musical theater, only it has a better probability of payoff if you are persistent and have some musical talent or at least a musical ear. In today's world being instrument skilled is not as important as it was in the past, given DAW and virtual instrument technology.
I personally have a hard time grasping music theory and have tried numerous times over 45 years to teach myself. At best I currently have "a clue". Does this stop me from creating musical pieces that are far more complex than doing cues?
No!
https://soundcloud.com/user-381042672/q ... her-gallop I'm sure a lot of what is there would be removed and altered in better ramp up and stinger. Would it hurt my ego to do so? No, because, like doing CAD it's not what I want, though I can still do what I want off to the side of what is needed for increasing the probability of getting paid.
So where Am I today? I have yet to make a submission but I also feel I need to get a better grip on cues & genres because that is part of understanding the opportunity targets.
For anyone who's now going to suggest a book or two, I'm currently waiting on the delivery of the three books frequently bought together (according to Amazon):
Writing Production Music for TV: The Road to Success -by Steve Barden
Demystifying The Cue: & Demystifying the Genre: - by Dean Krippaehne
I'm also educating myself on the different types of licensing and organizations such as ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, SoundExchange, etc.. Because it's part of the getting paid part whether it's work obtained through TAXI or other.
Why Am I doing this when I already earn decent from my CAD work? Probably for the same reason many others do in whatever their decent-paying non-music job is. It's gotta be easier than... and "easier than" is important at the retirement stage where reduced stress and enjoyment are benefits and SS just is not gonna cut it well enough.
So for those dropping out who have made submissions, perhaps you'll have better luck using what you'd spend on submission instead on lottery tickets.