Entries by newartistmodel

4 Ways to Make Band Practice More Efficient

When it comes to band practice, practice only makes perfect if you use your time efficiently. Many bands get together with the initial intention to practice for a few hours, but get distracted and goof off, resulting in little or no progress. And other times we end up just playing what’s comfortable instead of pushing […]

5 Creative Band Merch Ideas Your Fans Will LOVE

Music merchandise is a great way to make money as a musician and express your personality as an artist, so it makes sense to have some creative band merch ideas that will make you stand out from the sea of band tees out there. Of course, there are those standard band merch items every musician should […]

What Authors Can Learn From the Music Business

Recently, I was interviewed by Joanna Penn, self-published author and indie advocate and educator for writers, about the music business and the changes that have occurred in the music industry which preceded the shift in digital publishing: Physical to digital formats and now streaming and micro-payments; musicians choosing to go indie instead of joining big labels; […]

How to Make Free Music Make Money

Technology. It’s provided a lot of really cool opportunities for musicians. I mean, now you can create incredible quality music with your laptop, you can release that music to the world with the click of a button, and you can connect with a global fanbase from your home. But – and this is the big […]

How to Use Facebook Ads to Build Your Email List

Social media is great for musicians – it gives you the ability to interact with your fans and promote your music to a well-targeted audience. Even with all of the benefits, social media sites come and go. However, one thing seems to remain constant – email. This is why the most important asset you’ll ever have […]

3 Resources for Designing Awesome DIY Images

Images are one of the most engaging types of content. It’s been proven time and time again that social posts that include images will usually get more likes and comments than plain text posts. With that in mind, most everything you put out there to raise awareness for your music – from blog posts to […]

Better Live Shows… With Music Theory

Try these music theory tricks at your live shows Booking a gig is just the first step. NOW you need to focus on putting on a great show that will draw a big crowd and get you booked again. It’s easy to feel frustrated with your live shows and the sound your band is getting. Nothing […]

Music Theory Tricks Used in Hit Songs

Try out these music theory tricks Songwriting is often simultaneously one of the most magical and frustrating parts of being a musician. Sometimes, the best songs seem to appear in our heads without prompting and demand to be written down before they disappear, while other times great songs take forever to finish and are nothing […]

How Music Theory Can Improve Your Songwriting

Songwriting is often a mysterious, transcendental experience when it is going well. It can also be one of the most challenging and frustrating creative experiences in music. Often, songwriting seems almost like a spiritual place we must magically arrive at through some sort of weird set of unexpected and inspirational circumstances – but it is […]

Why You Should Learn Music Theory as an Adult

Music theory is wonderful, exciting, and enormously useful. But for many musicians who received any kind of music theory education growing up, the experience is usually exactly the opposite. Music theory classes can feel one step removed from strict math classes where the concepts never really seem to apply to “real life.”  But have no fear – […]

5 Ways to Get More Twitter Followers for Your Music

Image via Depositphotos Twitter is a great channel for promoting your music and engaging your fans online. However, for it to be effective, you need to get more Twitter followers. First off – what you should not do. Don’t buy followers unethically online and risk getting your account banned, or buy ads to promote your […]

7 Smart and Creative Ways to Sell Out Your Gigs

Image via Stocksy First thing that comes to mind when thinking about promoting your music is probably social media, right? Social media breaks down so many barriers for indie musicians to reach and communicate with an audience – and that’s awesome!  But sometimes it’s easy to forget about the in-person, experiential facet of music. That […]

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Know Your Craft

Know Your Craft So here you are again. Sitting with your instrument trying to learn or create another song – but the process is taking forever! Every new song you learn or write feels like starting from square one with a totally blank slate. What can you do? Well as it turns out, theory can […]

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Get the Music Out of Your Head

Get the Music Out of Your Head We all have found ourselves hearing something in our head that sounds so great that we have to play it and get it down on paper. However, once we find ourselves there, the next step of actually getting what we are hearing into a form that we can use often […]

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Break Out of Your Old Music Habits

Break Out of Your Old Music Habits One of the greatest challenges any musician faces is the plateau. We all know what it is like. You finally start regularly practicing, you make some strong progress with a few things that you always wanted to learn, and then all of a sudden…you stop improving. Every time […]

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How to Jam and Play with Anybody

How to Jam and Play With Anybody Trust Your Ear  One of the hardest barriers to jumping in and playing with other people is the perception that there is a “right” and a “wrong” way to play music. This perception has come from a lot of places, but it is often very misleading. Some of […]

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The Quest to Become a Better Musician

Time, Tonality and Harmony We all want to improve as musicians, but it can be hard to identify clear ways to improve. Just starting to practice on a regular basis can help you enormously, but it can also be a real challenge. Many times it’s hard to decide what to practice when you finally sit […]