Dave Kusek is a teacher, consultant, entrepreneur, digital music pioneer, author, speaker, mentor and Senior Partner at Digital Cowboys and New Artist Model. Dave was Vice President at Berklee College of Music in Boston for 14 years, where he created Berkleemusic.com, a hugely successful online enterprise for Berklee. Berkleemusic has since become the world’s largest music school reaching over 20,000 students in 170 countries.
Prior to that, Kusek helped develop the Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI), was co-inventor of the first electronic drums called “Synare”, and founded the first music software company in 1980, Passport Designs, which made it possible for musicians to record and produce their music at home with its award- winning software. His efforts, along with others, set the stage for the multi-billion dollar digital music market that exists today.
In 2005 he co-authored the best selling music business book “The Future of Music: Manifesto for the Digital Music Revolution” which predicted much of what has happened in digital music, including the iPhone, Apple’s SIRI, Spotify, streaming music and the decline of the recorded music industry.
Kusek was a faculty member at Berklee College of Music where he taught music business and a founding faculty member at Berklee Online where he taught The Future of Music and the Music Business.
Kusek has written for or been featured in the New York Times, Boston Globe, Billboard, Wired, Christian Science Monitor, Huffington Post, Associated Press, Boston Business Journal, MTV, CNBC, SF Chronicle, Forbes, NBC-TV, Nightly Business Report, NPR, Financial Times, and the Guardian. Kusek has been a speaker at Midem, Music Hack Day, Digital Music Forum, NAMM, AES, IEBA, MacWorld, Comdex, SXSW, ADISQ, Digital Hollywood and a featured guest on radio and television stations around the world.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The wild, wild West of Internet anarchy that was the first decade of the new century has a new sheriff. And she paid a visit to the 10th annual Future of Music Policy Summit with a badge bearing a 33-point strategy for restoring law and order. The summit concluded Tuesday after three […]
I have been arguing this point for years as anyone taking one of my classes at Berklee can testify. This past week, rapper Eminem and his former production company F.B.T Productions won a significant digital royalties lawsuit granting the artist and production company a 50% split of revenue from digital downloads and ringtones. Universal Music […]
My friend George Howard recently wrote a great article for Berklee’s Music Business Journal. In it he explains how music marketers can connect more closely with the fans that matter as they try and propel their band forward. Here is an excerpt from the article and solid advice for any marketeer. The complete text can […]
Believe it or not, the National Association of Broadcasters and the Recording Industry Association of America have announced that they want new digital devices like cellphones, iPods and music players to be legally required to incorporate FM radio receivers. This appears to be a twisted bargain to get the radio broadcasters to agree to pay […]
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Former Pink Floyd and T Rex manager Peter Jenner, now emeritus president of the International Music Managers’ Forum, talks online music, copyright and the future of the music industry. It is very satisfying to see the ideas expressed in our Future of Music book becoming mainstream concepts in the industry. >As physical sales decrease, how […]
From Hypebot. It’s no secret that the amount of money artists are earning from recorded music is declining. But by how much? And as digital sales replace physical and streaming music gains traction do the numbers shift in the artist’s favor? Infographic created by David McCandless of Information Is Beautiful from a spreadsheet of data.
The entire music industry has been driven by new formats, new music and innovation over the past 70 years. This has been fueled with the passion to be a star and receive the adoration of millions. Well, I think we might be seeing the beginning of a new music format. A format that engages audiences […]
I got this email from my friend Jill Sobule about inviting fans into the studio to watch them record. “Hello feller fans and friends, Wanna make a record with me? Want to see what it’s like in the studio? Wanna be a bad-ass and brag to your friends? Well…in Los Angeles on April 11th the […]
As a musician in the 21st century, you need to learn how to define your expectations. Otherwise, how will you know when you have achieved your goal, or even what to aim for? For a project, for a tour, for your career, and for your life – what are you trying to accomplish? Most people […]
If you’ve ever felt grateful for the list of titles and track lengths that appear when you pop a CD into your player, David Hyman’s Gracenote is the company to thank. It enters all that data so you don’t have to. After Hyman helped expand Gracenote from a tiny metadata venture into the world’s largest […]
Last week host of Networking Musician Radio, David Vignola interviewed me about Music Power Network and the Future of Music. Here is the audio interview along with a link to David’s site. Great resource for indie artists. Music Power Network provides a wide variety of music business education, tools, interviews and lots of resources for […]
Guest Post by MC Lars Back in 2005, my former manager at Nettwerk, Tom Gates, gave me a copy of Kusek’s “Future of Music” book. “Read it,” Gates said. “It might be interesting to you.” I read the whole book in a weekend and was inspired to write a song detailing the changes Kusek proposed, […]
Do you want to create a successful career in music? How you think about your future is critically important. Always be as positive as you possibly can be. Think about what success means to you and how you can get there. Define your goals and be realistic in what you are trying to achieve. Get […]
“The best way to predict the future is to invent it.” This is a great quote from Alan Kay, one of the creative geniuses behind the laptop computer and the mouse. Musician can apply this thinking to their own careers by planning for success in a dedicated and systematic way. I came across this great […]
I was hanging out with my friend Charlie McEnerney last night and asked him about his interview with Larry Lessig. Here is his post and a link to the complete interview from Well Rounded Radio. Check it out. In many music and entertainment circles, the name Lawrence Lessig needs no introduction, but for those who […]
Again and again, I have heard this sage advice when asking producers, label executives, and publishers about artist development. Take your time. The first and most important thing to do is to get the music right: love your music, immerse yourself in it, and live it. As an artist/writer, your coin of the realm is […]
From a fascinating article just published in the Atlantic. “The Grateful Dead’s influence on the business world may turn out to be a significant part of its legacy. Without intending to—while intending, in fact, to do just the opposite—the band pioneered ideas and practices that were subsequently embraced by corporate America. One was to focus […]
Ariel Hyatt, expert music publicist, discusses the important of building, maintaining and knowing your Community as an artist. The story of “What Are Records” and “The Samples”.
On my way to the TED conference last week, I devoured Jay Frank’s book Futurehit.dna on the plane. Jay has some great insights into the past, present and future of songwriting and hit making that we can all learn from. This is a must read if you are composing for the digital age and trying […]
Here’s a great post by Mike Masnick. “As you look through all of these, some patterns emerge. They’re not about getting a fee on every transaction or every listen or every stream. They’re not about licensing. They’re not about DRM or lawsuits or copyright. They’re about better connecting with the fans and then offering them […]
The music industry is being reinvented before our very eyes. Learn how it is developing from today’s entrepreneurs including Ian Rogers from TopSpin, Steve Schnur from EA, and Derek Sivers and how you can capitalize on the changing opportunities. MPN is my latest project and an online service for music business people and music and […]
It is great to see successful artists rally around causes bigger than declining record sales or online piracy. The Green Music Group, founded by Guster’s Adam Gardner and his wife, environmentalist Lauren Sullivan along with Sheryl Crow, Willy Nelson, Dave Matthews Band, Bare Naked Ladies, Linkin Park and Bonnie Raitt and others is organizing to […]
Another Wordle rendering.
Here is a composition of words created from this blog by the very cool website Wordle. Have fun and enjoy.
My friend and Berkleemusic student David Sherbow posted this list of income streams for musicians on his blog and it got picked up by Hypebot as well. This is a pretty comprehensive list of the different ways that musicians can make money. The artist music business model has been in flux for years. The record […]
Here is a list of 9 trends and challenges that were recently published as part of an overall report on Digital Music by Redwood Capital. You can download the entire report here. What I find most bothersome about all of this is that it is a very backward looking, rationalization and justification about the collapse […]
Here are 10 recommendations for strategies that can lead to success in music, and in life. Take them with a grain of salt. With this new decade comes the promise of digital music, the power of the entrepreneur and the tools to connect with an audience and deliver the goods. 1. Living a life in […]
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