Making music

I last posted about my music-making process back in November 2020. Below, find everything I have learned since.

Find an overview of my past releases on the About page, Bandcamp, or (soon) Mirlo.

posting music

distribution

I don’t like DistroKid because they charge you monthly, forever. I prefer to pay CDBaby once per release and be done with it. Either of them will send the music to all the places you know.

alternatives

I also post to Bandcamp, obviously - even if I don’t love how they’ve been bought and sold so much, or how they laid people off.

I also post to Resonate, Mirlo (my new favorite).

promotion

I am definitely not the person to ask about this. My distribution channels consist of 1) my quarterly newsletter and 2) texting my friends. That’s it.

release shows

For the release of (Music for) Twelve Goodbyes, I hosted an album release party. Here’s what that entailed:

• talking to a friend who helped me make a little flyer for it
• talking to a friend who connected me to someone willing to provide really nice speakers - and this person was also willing to deejay after my performance
• talking to a friend who was willing to host the show (expecting about 30 attendees) at their (quite large) apartment
• preparing my music by 1) combining my Ableton files into a single arrangement; 2) exporting the midi from one-ish instruments per track, printing sheet music, and setting up midi so I would play those tracks live
• practicing
• getting food and drinks for the day-of
• setting up speakers and lights and chairs
• printing little programs for people with a song list and bandcamp download code
• performing (although tbh I thought of it more as a play-along)
• profit (well, technically a loss)