The Top 5 Best Cities for Young Musicians

Austin, Texas

Here's a great guest post from Alex Soare featuring the 5 best cities for young musicians.
--------------------------

What makes a city good for musicians?  Is it the amount of clubs?  The cheap rent?  The number of “Bassist Wanted” flyers on coffee shop bulletin boards?

In a word, yes.

It’s the confluence of several different factors that make a city a great place for musicians to live.  Some of it is tangible and some of it is just an indescribable vibe that makes musical folks feel at home in a place.  Whatever it is, some cities have it and some don’t.  

Just so you know, we disqualified New York and Los Angeles on account of them being overly-saturated and overly expensive.  Instead, we highlighted cities that allow you to be a slightly larger fish in a slightly smaller (and cheaper) pond.

1. Chicago, IL
If you don’t mind the rough winters, then you’ll love Chi-Town for its vibrant music scene and down-to-earth feel.  The city has the big world-class city thing New York has, but it’s decidedly more approachable for newbies, which makes it a great place for young artists to start out.

But the sheer size of the place means that there’s a scene for every genre. The hundreds of fabulous venues and the insane amount of music festivals (Lollapalooza, Pitchfork, North Coast, Blues Fest, Jazz Fest, and a full summer street festivals with live music) means there’s no shortage of opportunities to play and see live music.

And unlike NYC, the cost of living in the Windy City is do-able.  Cool, burgeoning neighborhoods like Logan Square and Pilsen offer creative types with a budget a great pocket of the city to call home.  Plus, in these funky hoods, you’ll be surrounded by fellow artists of all media, along with great restaurants and dive bars that actually offer drinks you can afford on your minimum wage day job paycheck.  

2. New Orleans, LA
The Big Easy is a very easy city for musicians to make their home.  After all, one of the major exports of the city is its own distinctive genre.  And because of that, the city has a unique and fervent respect for music and its players – their musicians are treasured, perhaps, more than any other group.  But just because it’s famous for jazz greats doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty more going on musically.  In fact, as the birthplace of Bounce, New Orleans has a flourishing hip hop scene in addition to active Latin music and metal communities.

For cheap, fun places to live, you’re not going to do much better than the Crescent City.  When you’re not working on your craft, you’ll be walking around, slack-jawed and dazzled by the city’s amazing food, stunning architecture and frighteningly friendly vibe.  And you won’t have to break the bank to rent one half of a cool shotgun-style apartment in young, artsy neighborhoods like the Bywater.  Let’s put it this way:  it won’t take long for you to feel perfectly at home in this laid-back, creative southern city that treats its musicians like some cities treat their politicians.

3. Nashville, TN
This world-famous capital of country music has, far and away, the most flourishing music scene in the nation.  According to a report published by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce, the city has a whopping 7.8 jobs in the music industry for every 1000 working-age residents, and working musicians earn 156% more than the national average for musicians’ earnings. Considering that Nashville’s cost of living is 11.1% lower than the national average, it’s obvious that this is the very best financial choice for musicians.

Just make sure not to count it out if you aren’t a country crooner.  Though that’s what Nashville is most known for, the city also claims to be the very birthplace of both blues and rock ‘n roll.  Both classic genres are still alive and well-represented in today’s Nashville…as are, believe it or not, hip hop, and punk music.  When you factor in the Southern charm, the amazing venues and the high concentration of fellow musicians, it’s clear that the city is a kind of Eden for young artists.

4. Austin, TX
While it might be located smack dab in the middle of a very conservative state, Austin is known for its liberal, progressive, and artsy atmosphere embodied by the slogan, “Keep Austin Weird.”  You’ll likely be greeted with live tunes in the airport (and even in some grocery stores), proving that this city wants everyone to know just how high music is on its list of priorities.  The Texas town has been the launching pad of hundreds of successful musicians as it’s long been considered an ideal place for young artists to sharpen their chops.

The city is also home to the seminal Austin City Limits show and several annual music fests, like the world-famous South by Southwest.  And if you’re a fan of warm weather, Southern barbeque and food trucks, Austin will be your own version of heaven.  This might also be the best choice for a budding musician who can do a techy day job, as many large tech giants, as well as thriving startups, call Austin home.  

5. Portland, OR
Portland is sometimes considered Seattle’s little brother, but it certain has established itself as a culture hub in its own right.  The healthy music scene has one foot firmly planted in indie and folk rock and the other in punk, but really you can find a bit of everything.  And less established  musicians will appreciate the large number of small venues and the gigging opportunities they offer.

What also makes it an excellent starting place for young musicians is the fact that community is such a big deal here.  It’s easy for newcomers to meet new people and jump into the music scene without feeling the alienation and anonymity that sometimes comes with moving to a new city. When you get down to it, the quality of life in Portland is pretty excellent.  There’s an astounding amount of accessible nature surrounding the city and it really is as ridiculously welcoming and friendly as it’s portrayed as in Portlandia.  

Just because you can’t afford to move to NYC or LA doesn’t mean you can’t relocate to a music-centric city that will help you launch your career.  These 5 cities are positively brimming over with opportunities for budding musicians who are looking for a friendly scene and friendly rent prices, both key factors in staying afloat while navigating the waters of life as a working artist.

Author Bio:  Alex Soare is a professional opera singer as well as the founder of Art Rise, an innovative social network for artists of all media.  His own experience as a working artist looking to network with peers and find jobs is what led him to create Art Rise.  He also enjoys sharing advice and tips that help young artists succeed. For more, join Art Rise today and connect with Alex on Google+.

----------------------------------

Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.

Music Licensing 101

Here's a guest post from Anna Durish, marketing and communications director for Rightclearing AG, a company that specializes in music rights clearances. Music licensing is an increasingly more lucrative source of income for many musicians and songwriters, but they usually don't know as much about it as they should. On the other hand, artists, bands, film makers and television producers who want to use someone else's song in their project usually don't know the first thing about how to go about it legally. Hopefully this post will explain all.

"What do the Beastie Boys, Vanilla Ice and Johnny Cash have in common? They were all accused of copyright infringement. What this means can be seen in the case of Vanilla Ice quite clearly. For his song “Ice Ice Baby” he adopted the melody of Queen's and David Bowie's “Under Pressure” almost identically, without having the legal usage rights to it. (Here’s the comparison of the songs).  Since the infringement was quite obvious, Vanilla Ice had to pay a significant amount of money to the creators.

Clearly this isn’t the way that music licensing normally works. That’s why this blog post wants to help you prevent such a disaster from happening by teaching you the basics about music licensing. Because it really isn’t rocket science!

When do I have to license a song?

Let’s start with a little example: Imagine you’re making a video about your holidays and the only thing missing is a piece of music to complete it. Quickly you add your favorite track and you’re done. So far everything sounds quite easy. But when does music licensing come into play? Depends on how you want to use the video. There are two different types of use:

• Private Use: If you only want to show the video to your closest friends and don’t intend to publish it on the Internet or another medium, let alone distribute it commercially, then you don’t need the permission of the creator. You don’t have to license the song.
• Public Use: If you want to show the video to people outside your private sphere by making it available for example on YouTube or if you want to sell it, you need the concession of the creator; you have to license the song. 

Which rights are affected?

To publicly use someone else’s work you have to acquire certain rights of use. There are two different kinds of rights involved: The master and the publishing rights.

• Master rights: The owner of the Master Rights owns the actual recording of the song's sound. These rights usually belong to the party that financed the recording. Often this is the record label if they don’t lie with the artist. 

• Publishing rights: The owner of a song's Publishing Rights owns the rights to the composition; usually this is the author of a piece of music. The author is also the copyright owner unless there is a written agreement by which the author assigns the copyright to another person or entity, such as a publisher.

If you publish your video without acquiring the usage rights, it can, to put it mildly, get quite unpleasant for you. YouTube for example can block your uploaded video or delete your account. If you are really unlucky the rights holder can take legal action against you and demand compensation. The rules apply to all sorts of videos and their public use not just YouTube videos.

How do I license a song?

Enough theory for now! Let’s get straight to the point and talk about how music licensing works in practice. Unfortunately this process is often very complicated and takes a lot of patience. 

• Selecting the song: First of all you need a song. Most of the time you don’t have the perfect song at hand and need to scour the Internet or your personal library until you find a track that matches your video. 
• Legal aspect: After having found a song you have to find out who holds the rights to it. They can lie with the artist, a label, a publishing house or a collecting society. Depending on the country, different publishing houses can hold the usage rights. 
• Request: Now you have to ask the rights holders if you can license the track. You need the permission of both the holder of the master as well as the holder of the publishing rights, which are often different parties. If you’re very unlucky one of them rejects your request and you need to start your search from scratch. 
• Pricing: Next you have to negotiate a price. There are many factors to consider, such as popularity of the song, distribution or type of project.
  Normally songs of very famous artists like Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, Muse, Queen etc. are very difficult to license or just unaffordable. But even for less famous artists the license can be too expensive. If this is the case you’ll have to start all over again with your search.
• Draw up a contract: Last but not least you need to draw up a contract with the rights holder, which implies that you either have some legal knowledge or are willing to pay a lawyer to work for you.
• Time factor: As you can see, this whole process costs you a lot of time, money and nerves. Depending on the track you want to license you might have to wait several weeks or even a year until you can license the song properly. 

Is there an easier way to license music?

Don’t panic, there is! Before you completely lose your courage, there are several online music licensing services trying to simplify the whole process and solve the problems mentioned above, like audiosocket.com, soundtaxi.net and rightclearing.com. Every page has its advantages and they serve different needs. To get you an idea of what online music licensing is and why it makes the process of music licensing easier, here’s an example of how rightclearing.com works. 

The site offers you a constantly growing sound pool of pre-cleared tracks. This means that it’s already determined who holds the rights to every song. To find a suitable song you can search via keywords or just drop a song in the rightclearing.com search bar and the system will find the most similar sounding pieces in the library. As soon as you have found a song the system will automatically calculate the price of the license. They also offer Creative Commons licenses, which, in some cases, can be obtained for free. After paying for the license an automated lawyer will draw up a legal contract. The licenses are valid worldwide and unlimited.

Thanks to online music licensing services like that you don’t have to wait for month or even years until you have your license. It often takes only a few clicks to legally add sound to your video.

Last but not least…

… this blog post has hopefully helped to clarify the topic of music licensing and answered some of your questions on how it works. Licensing music doesn’t have to be complicated and it definitely pays off in the long run. If you license your songs properly you are not only legally on the safe side, but you also ensure that the artist gets rewarded fairly for his hard work and creativity."

Thanks, Anna, for your insights!

----------------------------------

Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.

Follow me on Forbes for some insights on the new music business.

You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.