End of first year as a Taxi member

[mazz]

Robbie,Given that the screeners are bound by the listing, a track that sounds awesome for one listing might not be quite up to snuff for another. Of course, this is all according to screeners and they are people too, so there's always that variable. And, the owners of music libraries are screeners too, we can't get away from that in this business. What one person loves, another might be lukewarm about and there's no way to accurately predict that 100% of the time. That's why it's great to have a large and growing catalog of quality stuff, because eventually it will find a home.Hang in there.Mazz

[ciskokidd]

Ah yes, Chuck made a great point. I can't tell you how many times I have written a song for a particular listing - it gets returned - and I end up signing the song either directly or through a different listing!But I may not have even written that song if not for the listing in the first place, which makes it possible as Mazz says to have a large and growing catalog of songs.Listings can be frustrating that way. You think you have it nailed and then you get the return or in Chuck's case the return and the forward Cisko

[bigbluebarry]

Hey Robbie,First off, welcome to the forums. Second, congrats on getting 33 forwards in your first year. That's an accomplishment to be proud of.You've already gotten some great feedback on this topic already but I thought I'd chime in here and give you a little bit of my story. Here's a link to a thread that I posted back in January after all of my first year's submissions had been forwarded or returned - http://taxi.proboards.com/index.cgi?boa ... 11727Since the time that I actually wrote that post, I've had 5 deals happen. Of those 5, one was a direct result of a TAXI forward (if the TAXI admin reads this, I'll be sending you an email soon with the details ), one was a result of a connection I made here on the forums, and then the last one was a result of a connection I made at the Rally. The Rally connection deal led to me being able to submit directly to them and that's where the other two deals came from.So basically, 5 deals with 3 different clients. At the moment, I've signed 14 tracks are with a music library at MTV, one song with an artist, and then I have 18 songs that are "pending" with a 2nd music library.All of those songs were written for TAXI listings (both forwards and returns) with the exception of 5 tracks that I wrote over the last two weeks specifically for the MTV library that all got signed.So I'll echo what others have said. Writing songs for the listings definitely helped expand my catalog. And then once I got my foot in the door, I was able to submit a wider variety of material than what the listing called for. But had not been writing for the listings, I don't know if those songs would have ever surfaced. Some of them may have it, but I'm sure that some of them never would have. Simply because I probably wouldn't have had any natural tendencies to write those songs on my own. So keep working hard and don't give up. Learn how to detach your emotions from the listing results. It makes it easier to accept a return and it keeps you from resting on your laurels when you get a forward. That may sound like a cold way of looking at it, but in the end, this is a business. - Big Blueps - nice tunes, I think you're going to do just fine here

[k o star]

Wow... Thanks so much Big Blue & all the experienced Taxi members for sharing all these excellent info... This thread is so awesome, I'm gonna re-read it thoroughly again & again... too cool too cool ^_^-Kel

[rpittelman]

Hey all!Well guess what? It finally happened. I just got an email on Friday afternoon from a music library that I was forwarded to. They asked to hear 3 more pieces of music from me. I'll keep you all posted on how things turn out-Robbie

[silvercord]

Congrats Robbie..its happeneing!

[coachdebra]

And be sure to read and respond to your emails! Michael just sent out an email about members not responding to offers! I'd even think about using an email that is uniquely for TAXI submissions and that has little spam filter on it - so you're sure not to miss anything.

[ceedub]

Apr 6, 2009, 6:40am, rpittelman wrote:Hi allThis is my first post on this forum. I've read a lot on here about how long the process takes to get deals but I'm just curious to know if my experience so far is normal compared to what you guys have seen.I joined last April and got my first 3 forwards in the end of May. I've submitted now a total of 116 pieces and have had 33 forwards coming from 19 different listings (my last forward was in mid Feb). So far I have yet to hear anything from any of these forwards. I have renewed my membership already but I guess I just thought that I would have heard something on at least one of these forwards by now.I am in this for the long haul but I was just hoping to get some feedback from those who've been around here longer than me.Thanks,RobbieI'm in my second year of writing instrumentals for libraries and submitting to TAXI listings. Lots of forwards the first year, no TAXI-related deals. Several deals the second year. Deal offers were from listings 2-12 months prior.I'd like to add a question to this thread. For folks at this longer than me, when did you start seeing regular placements? (I'd like to see into the future.)Cheers.

[rpittelman]

Well, I guess one shouldn't get their hopes up too high until a deal actually happens. I've sent them 6 pieces of music in the last 2 days and so far its not good enough for them. He says it sounds too mechanical (aka synthy). He is requesting another 3 songs still but at this point I don't think this is going to turn into a deal

[k o star]

Just makes me feel like this is a humble reminder for us all not to get complacent with forwards...Gotta keep striving to better our works, no matter...Also waiting & working towards getting some substantial deals here...I wish U all the Best Rpittelman... hope U get a deal from this soon..-Kel