I recently completed a ten-day course via Zoom about how one can use Facebook ads to expand one’s circle of musical supporters.
It was a very worthwhile AND affordable undertaking — only $100 for 25+ hours of instruction which included many opportunities to ask questions and get help.
I came away from the learning experience with many new ideas… and a few reservations.
The first thing I liked about this training course was the opportunity to spend time with a hundred other musicians from around the world who also wanted to learn how to expand THEIR listening audiences.
I felt both reassured and inspired to see that I am not the only musician with challenges, questions, concerns, anxieties, insecurities, ambivalences and dreams.
Deep breath in.
Deep breath out.
The man leading the ten-day course was himself a musician who had formed a band with several high school classmates and toured around the USA for several years.
They ended up working with very good producers, recording a bunch of powerful songs, selling tens of thousands of CDS, gaining millions of views on Youtube, and becoming successful without the services of a manager or a record label.
Then he got married (to someone he met as a result of his band’s performances), started having children, and realized that he didn’t want to tour any more.
He wanted to stay home with his burgeoning family.
So he began coaching other musicians on how to increase THEIR musical audiences and advance THEIR careers.
And he appears to be successful doing this as well…
Another deep breath in.
And deep breath out.
This whole process reminded me of a classic song written by the Gershwin Brothers in 1927 — “Nice Work If You Can Get It” — which was one of nine songs Ira and George created for the movie A Damsel In Distress, which starred Fred Astaire, Joan Fontaine, George Burns and Gracie Allen.
It was also one of the last songs George finished before he died — much too young at the age of 38 — in 1937 (as Hitler rose to power in Germany and opened the Buchenwald concentration camp near the city of Weimar…)
All of the the successful Jewish songwriters, performers, directors, producers, designers, movie moguls, etc. were very aware of what was unfolding in Europe in the 1930s…
Jewish composer Kurt Weill — one of the Gershwins’ peers — for example, had fled from Germany to Paris in 1933 and then moved to New York City in 1935.
I can only imagine how ambivalent the Gershwins, Harold Arlen, Yip Harburg, Irving Berlin, RIchard Rodgers, Larry Hart and their Jewish friends and co-workers must have felt about their extraordinary success in America while Europe was hurtling into war and genocide.
Fred Astaire (whom some biographers claim had partial Jewish ancestry which he chose not to share with the public during his lifetime) was the first person to perform “Nice Work If You Can Get It.”
I wonder if Ira’s lyrics might have been inspired in part by the opulent lifestyle he and his brother and their family were enjoying in Hollywood at the time — living in big houses with swimming pools and tennis courts and huge lawns (perfect for fancy parties under rented tents) — while much of the world was still struggling to dig its way out of the Great Depression.
Life is full of strange historical juxtapositions…
Yet another deep breath in.
And deep breath out.
Let’s return to my recent ten-day course in music marketing.
All of us participants wanted to learn how to share our musical gifts with more people.
And the guy leading the course was showing us how…while simultaneously grooming us to want to sign up for even more coaching.
I became increasingly aware during the ten-day-process that he and his excellent support team were both educating us AND laying the groundwork to pitch us more intensive/expensive coaching opportunities at the end of our time together.
I found myself simultaneously admiring their marketing system AND being somewhat repulsed by it.
The first step involves reaching out to potential new fans using short (20-30 second) videos which one can make using one’s cell phone.
Then for as little as $3 per day one pays Facebook to share these videos with Facebook users who have in some way indicated that they are fans of a particular genre of music (such as reggae, hip hop, pop, rock, R&B, folk, musical theater, etc) and/or a particular recording artist (such as Ella Fitzgerald, The Eurythmics, James Taylor, Coldplay, Earth, Wind & Fire, Rosemary Clooney, Bob Marley, etc.)
Then one begins interacting via FB Messenger with the folks who respond to one’s ads by sharing a link to one’s own songs — and if they like THAT, one continues interacting with them to get a better sense of their musical taste, if they have ever gone to a live concert, if they have ever bought merchandise (such as T-shirts, hoodies, a mug, a poster, a CD, a magnet), if they have ever supported the career of a favorite musical artist with monthly donations, etc.
All of this seems OK and possibly quite exciting — especially if total strangers from around the world respond favorably to one’s marketing outreach and genuinely like one’s music.
On the final day of the training, however, some of the woman musicians started sharing about interactions with new fans which had begun well and then turned into scary stalker situations.
One person in England, in fact, was in the midst of talking with lawyers and protective services while she was simultaneously participating in our ten-day training program.
Argh!!!
The shiny, happy, everyone-can-learn-how-to-increase-one’s-fanbase-using-these-simple-practices vibe of the training sessions became much more nuanced and grounded and real.
Another deep breath in.
And deep breath out.
Having had a few days to reflect upon the training session, I have concluded that sharing authentic interactions with people who like one’s music seems do-able and not-too-morally-bankrupt (although the astounding and somewhat terrifying amount of data that Facebook collects about each one of us in order to be able to sell these specifically-targeted ads is something that deserves much more discussion and regulation…)
However, if one is successful in jumpstarting these authentic conversations with new fans (with whom one is careful not to share too much personal information such as street addresses or phone numbers so that they are less likely to become stalkers…) via FB Messenger and continues to run ads, eventually one becomes unable to keep up with all of these human interactions…
So the next step — not taught in our ten-day workshop but available as a much-more-expensive coaching opportunity — is how to automate one’s responses using chatbot programs.
This is where my reservations really kick in…
Would new fans understand that they are interacting with very sophisticated, well-programmed chatbots?
Or would they think they are actually interacting with me?
And does this transform an authentic interaction with another human being into yet another cynical marketing campaign/ploy?
I am currently thinking a lot about this potential developmental step in my career.
And I am also realizing how many of the music industry people whose free videos I have watched on YouTube are using a similar chatbot-powered system to interact with me in a seemingly authentic way when I leave grateful comments on their websites.
Hmmm.
How misled have I felt after realizing that I have been getting auto-generated “thank you” messages from them after giving them my email address?
A little…
And then how disappointed/exploited have I felt when I have started to receive a chatty barrage of pre-programmed email messages from them inviting me to continue to interact with them (and eventually sign up for some sort of in-depth, paid, educational experience they are offering)?
Somewhat…
But it doesn’t stop me from continuing to learn from them via their free YouTube videos.
So maybe potential new music fans (who have only interacted with a chatbot version of me) would be remain similarly engaged with my music if they found some authentic value from it?
My final misgiving about this generous ten-day training program was that it never mentioned climate change and the environmental impact of using email and Facebook and Spotify/Pandora/YouTube/Amazon/Apple/Etc to share one’s music with the rest of the world.
The training session existed in a bubble of denial untouched by the increasing reverberations of climate change.
And it was being led by a late twenty-something (or early thirty-something?) father of two small children whom I hope is giving SOME thought to the future on behalf of his daughter and son…
One final deep breath in.
And deep breath out.
What have your experiences been with marketing to other human beings… and with being the target of marketing by other human beings (and/or their chatbots)?
What are your thoughts and feelings about the environmental impact of our amazing digital communications?
Thank you to the photographers at Pixabay for their lovely images.
Thank you to Doug Hammer for his wonderful piano accompaniment AND his significant production/engineering skills.
Thank you to the Gershwin Brothers for their terrific, timeless songs.
And thank YOU for reading and listening to another one of my blog posts.
You are always welcome to visit my website, and you can find me singing (with Doug Hammer playing his Schimmel grand piano) on Spotify, Pandora, Apple Music and other digital music platforms.
amusicalifeonplanetearth 
This was a good post, made better by you openly sharing your skepticism on the product. Your comment about Fred opens up a large room of thoughts. Good luck with your chosen path (whichever direction you decide). Not a bot.
Thank you for reading and listening and commenting so swiftly! One thing I love about WordPress is the e-conversations with real human beings which begin to unfold. I am very reluctant to tarnish the authenticity of my interactions with other human beings by using chatbots. But maybe that it a necessary step to increasing my base of supporters? I am curious to see what I decide to do… And I am glad you are not a bot!!!
There seems to be a “downside” to a lot of ups. I’m sending this to my cousin who plays the long horn.
Yes. One of my favorite ideas, given to us (I think by Chinese philosophers?) is yin and yang. Every happy thing contains a bit of sad and every sad thing contains a bit of happy… Every optimistic thing contains a bit of pessimism and vice versa. So it may be inevitable that this clever technique to increase one’s base of support as a musician has both positive and negative repercussions! Thank you for reading and listening and commenting AND forwarding my blog post.
I enjoyed this post and how you expressed questions about the marketing methods you were being taught.
Yes. Sometimes skepticism can be very healthy. Thank you for reading and listening and commenting!
Thanks for sharing your gifts, and exploration of digital marketing. I appreciate how consciously you live Will. I had a long career in sales, including some digital marketing at the end. I really don’t like being on the receiving end of the those automated processes. Most of them feel too intense in the quality and quantity of trying to move us along their automated pipeline to sales/ success. Maybe you could network with some of the other musicians and each share what has and hasn’t worked? Yes digital services can be fairly intensive energy use unless one is generating their own “green” energy or buying renewable. Life can be very complicated unless one is willing and able to live simply and offgrid. Thanks for caring. 🙏
Yes. Life can become quite complicated as soon as one starts thinking on several different levels at once. I agree that “Most of them feel too intense in the quality and quantity of trying to move us along their automated pipeline to sales/ success.” The automated stream of messages I get from certain marketing folks have a strange quality of folksiness tinged with desperation… Ahh, life — full of complications and contradictions to be accepted or maybe even embraced! Thank. you for reading and listening and commenting to yet another of my blog posts, Brad. And welcome back home!
Thank you Will. I hope you find a marketing approach that suits you.
Thanks for your post! I also took a marketing for creatives course recently. It was broader than what you are talking about and (thankfully) didn’t discuss chat bots which for me would be a turn off too! The environmental aspect of this is for sure something that should be considered…
Yes! And your beautiful work certainly deserves a very wide audience! Thank you for reading and listening and thinking and commenting!
Great post! I hate chatbot convos. I’ve only seen it done well ONCE because I knew from the get-go it was a fake convo seeing if I wanted more downloads and info. I don’t know how she did it, but she did it well.
I could see an auto response going out at the beginning, but true engagement is real and authentic. A live person talking to another live person.
It’s a delicate process to use correctly.
Thank you, Dawn. I think you may have articulated a key element — which is somehow being transparent right from the start (maybe with a brief explanation that one is using a chatbot so that one can still have enough time to continue making music?) about the interaction. Or maybe one can aim for a mix of authentic, genuine responses combined with clearly acknowledged (see above) and playfully crafted chatbot conversation cascades? To do it well (if that is even possible) would indeed be a delicate process…
You’ve really got me thinking on this. 🤔 Especially since I’d like to grow my readership. I want everyone to know they are loved for the moment they click that follow button. But, I definitely want authentic engagement. I’ve been sending audio messages on dms, which I learned from Instagram expert Sue B. Zimmerman. I really like being bold and saying hi from the start.
Jane wrote in her comment, “I feel that people feel when there is no heart energy in interactions….” That may be the secret — to bake some authentic love and respect into as many interactions as possible. I like your idea of audio messages (learned from Sue B. Zimmerman). One can convey a lot in the tone of one’s voice — and one can be transparent about it being a pre-recorded message (of thanks, of welcome, of greeting, etc.) Are dms “direct messages”? I don’t use IG yet…
Yes, sorry. DM = Direct Message. When I see I have a new follow that’s an actual real person, and not one of those fake looking accounts, I say hi in a short message. It’s been nice actually reaching out via voice. And, I feel they really appreciate it too. One even said I’d made their day just by reaching out. Wow! One simple little act of authentic connection did all that.
Hurrah for making another person’s day!
Interesting post, Will. About the musicians and creative people–it makes me wonder how many did not escape from Germany and Occupied Europe. We’ll never know, of course.
As far as the FB stuff, I wouldn’t want to get anything through Messenger, especially interactions with a chatbot. I don’t have any answers for you though. Good luck!
Yes. I definitely wonder about all the ideas and playfulness and creativity which is lost as a result of wars — and also as a result of health crises like HIV/AIDS or COVID-19. I almost never use Messenger in my life right now — it just seems like yet ANOTHER conduit for communication which I would need to stay on top of (in addition to email, FB posts/comments, WordPress posts/comments, LinkedIn posts/comments, etc. etc. etc. I will keep taking deep breaths in. And deep breaths out as I muse and mull my next steps… Thank you for reading and listening and commenting!
You’re very welcome, Will. Wishing you all the best.
So much food for thought in this post, Will! Thanks for sharing your experiences. I can relate to the situation where you feel you are being led, or actually manipulated, into more of something: more courses, more commitment, etc.
I don’t understand chat boxes or how they work, but a few years ago, my daughter was convinced she’d made friends with “Taylor Swift” who was returning her FB messages and asking for her phone number and home address. It took a while to convince her that it was not Taylor Swift….it felt like a close call. I believe you are talking about something different, but the lines between reality and image can get blurry in so many of these online situations.
Chat bots are used to give a very convincing impression that one is talking with another human being. They apparently (I don’t know for sure because this is the next, more expensive level of training) can be created using huge and complicated flow charts of how different “conversations” might unfold and then scripted at each step of this potential “conversation” with one’s own vocabulary, voice, idioms, etc. so that they feel very convincing/authentic. And obviously they can be used in all sorts of ways — some more nefarious/dangerous than others… Hurrah that you were able to convince R. not to share her phone number with anyone — even (and perhaps especially) someone pretending to be Taylor Swift. What a world we live in!!! Thank you for reading and listening and commenting!!!
This was interesting. All advertising is a form of manipulation–some worse than others. And when I experience it, as with your narrative, it comes in stages, until arriving at the question “Where do I take this?” Or “how far can I go with this and maintain my self respect?” Good luck thinking it through. It’s complex and a dilemma…
Yes. I have often felt that advertising is simply manipulation/contamination of another’s sense of satisfaction. Let’s make you feel like you are not tall enough, rich enough, smart enough, thin enough, blond enough, handsome enough, young enough, happy enough (ad infinitum) so that you will be inspired to buy our product as an antidote/cure. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. THANK YOU for reading and listening and commenting!
I love your recording of ‘Nice Work…’, Will. I adore George and Ira Gershwin’s songs!
I can completely understand your reservations about the way the course ended. I personally wouldn’t want to be interacting with a chatbot instead of the real you and like Merril wouldn’t want messages through Messenger.
I have been commenting on a WP blog this weekend belonging to a writer I follow who is going through similar problems to you. She self-publishes her books and needs to up her sales and find more readers/buyers. The big publishing houses don’t publish anyone these days unless they are already famous so writers have to spend a fortune on marketing. Ugh!
Thank. you, Clare! The Gershwins wrote some great songs together (and a few great songs with other collaborators, too). Ahh, marketing! I think I may be overly sensitive to the phenomenon of advertising due to having worked professionally as a child and teenager making commercials and voice-overs for a wide variety of products. I DO however like the idea that there might be 1000 people on planet earth who — for whatever reasons — really resonate with my music-making and who would actually enjoy being part of my creative path (and might even enjoy helping to support my music-making). We shall see what unfolds… Deep breath in. Deep breath out.
Always enjoy your music, Will. Thank you for this peek behind the curtain. You raise some interesting questions; a chatbot is a new phenomenon for me. But I have confidence that you’ll arrive at a wise and ethical decision. Interesting that you talked about FB and regulation today, when a federal judge just threw out the FTC’s efforts to do just that. Deep breaths in and out at all times! Cheers!
Thanks for reading and listening and commenting, Annie. SInce many participants were musicians based in the UK, there was a lot of conversation during this ten-day training session about different rules/allowable practices in the UK/Europe compared with the USA. It sounded like UK/Europe might be in the midst of some significant regulatory efforts? I’ll have to read more about our FTC’s current attempts regarding Facebook… And you might have experienced more chatbots than you know — now that I have a better sense of how they can be used, I am noticing them being deployed all over the place instead of actual human beings. Deep breath in. Deep breath out.
What an interesting post, Will! I knew nothing about all that, and I’m impressed with how you’ve thrown yourself into learning new skills. (The song was great, too!)
By the time I decide (or not) to try out this marketing strategy, Facebook may have already changed its rules and guidelines. Everything in the world of computers seems continually to evolve — often unnecessarily so! But I AM curious to learn how folks are doing business right now… THANK YOU, as always, for reading and listening and commenting!
Pingback: The Tea Trolley Ladies – The Glue That Kept The Office Together | strategic teams
THANK YOU for mentioning me at the end of your lovely blog post about how valuable tea trolley ladies used to be in organizational settings. May Australia’s current lockdown in response to the Delta variant be short and decisive and successful!
What an interesting post, Will and I love your song.You raise many thought provoking questions on marketing and how it is approached today. Chatbots? I feel that people feel when there is no heart energy in interactions….my mind goes to landing pages and collecting email addresses, as an example. It all smacks of disconnect. You are looking to expand your audience with your creativity expressed as music. I know (no pressure) that you will find a way that truly connects, because that is who you are. ❤ always Xxxx
Thank you, Jane, for reading and listening and responding so heartfully. I agree that “people feel when there is no heart energy in interactions.” Your comment is already inspiring me to re-think parts of my new website — which I wrote entirely in the third person in order to be more “professional.” But I may have unintentionally removed some of the heart from my written text descriptions by using third rather than first person… Deep breath in. Deep breath out.
Keep breathing and singing, Will, You’ve got this…. ❤
This was a very thoughtful, or perhaps I should say thought provoking, post. You raise many good points based on your ten day seminar. Regardless of what path you choose to take, or not take, you had a great learning experience. That’s a good thing! I often think of the Jewish composers who left Germany in the 30’s. Their music still remains some of the best. Best to you, Will.
Yes. The parallel between some songwriters living in Hollywood while some of their peers were escaping (or not!) from rising fascism in Europe — and the life of privilege that I and most of the musicians taking part in this workshop are leading while climate change and human over-consumption of resources is destroying invaluable ecosystems and webs of life all over planet earth — jumped out at me. And over time the very enthusiastic manner in which the workshop was led — regularly sprinkled with examples of musicians who had taken their advanced training and were doing very well as a result — began to feel less like reality and more like hype/marketing. It was when I was starting to feel like there was a bit too much enthusiasm and not quite enough reality that some brave women participants starting sharing (in the chat comments section of our Zoom teaching sessions) how many times they had been intimidated, harassed, stalked, threatened and even flashed by male fans — most of whom had seemed like decent human beings when they first identified themselves as a fan/follower of the female musician. Then everything got very real and sober as the (male) presenter of the ten-day workshop listened respectfully and acknowledged that this WAS a significant challenge in the process of cultivating new fans/followers/supporters — and that he and his male bandmates had in fact experienced the honor and challenges of their (mostly) 12-25 year-old female fans transferring a lot of emotions onto them and their songs, tracking down their home addresses, wanting to show them tattoos of their song lyrics, and much more (he had shared at one point that he met his wife as a result of her first being a fan of his band). So, although it was probably not on his syllabus, he ended up acknowledging that the process of nurturing a fanbase of support can get very emotional and complicated. too. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. I could go on and on… Lots of food for thought! THANK YOU, as always, for reading and listening and commenting, Jennie.
Oh, boy! There are too many red flags flying. Do the pluses outweigh the minuses? Only you can be the judge of that. At the worst, you had a good learning experience. Best to you, Will!
Thank you, Jennie!!! Just learned about a new dead zone (due to extreme heat?) in the ocean which may affect our basic Co2/O2 exchange equilibrium — so I am taking a break from thinking about ethical marketing practices and re-focusing on political/environmental priorities for the time being…
Sounds like a good idea!
The travails of marketing, Will and thank you for sharing your experience. You have much more patience than I do. Once I start to feel the unease, I then tend to feel unhappy and at which point I would not have finished the course. It feels to me as if they are using a traditional marketing cycle here which involves a positive start that becomes a negative encounter that then turns into feeling bad you might miss out on this amazing product which finally morphs into a commitment to the up selling.
My exposure to automated responses or calls to action would be when I have clicked on an ad for something I was interested in that turns into some nice videos explaining the product followed by some very nice testimonials. Then you have to read through the same material before committing to the product. When you don’t commit, you get bombarded by a million and one follow up emails advising you every which way you have one second to opt in to secure this amazing deal when an hour earlier all you really wanted to know was the cost. Then it goes on for days…
I am fairly certain I have interacted with chat bots when needing to sort out an issue on-line. The interaction seems to miss something. I am sure chat bots are happening in a certain on-line word game I like to play too. Standard questions/responses/sentences seem to appear when conversing with certain new players. It’s either that or they are typing from a script. As my wife says, she never accepts a player she doesn’t know. That being said, I have met some awesome people and we have been playing games with each other for many years now.
Thank you for reading and listening and then leaving a thoughtful response! You describe very well a certain process many of us have experienced — “a million and one follow up emails advising you every which way you have one second to opt in to secure this amazing deal when an hour earlier all you really wanted to know was the cost. Then it goes on for days…” I am glad that you and your wife have met “some awesome people” playing games online. Maybe the occasional chat-bot-like responses have been from people who speak other languages and are using some sort of translation device? Deep breath in. Deep breath out.
Your comments about the success of Jewish artists in the States during the depression and WWII moved me, Will. I celebrate their successes. So many creative people were lost in Europe around that time. I’ve often thought with relief about my own grandparents coming to the U.S. in the 1890s, having escaped that terrible time, although there were troubles in their lives they left behind.
Marketing has always been difficult for me, as a photographer and writer. I’m not much of a consumer and don’t react to online ads. If I’m interested in something I’ll look for a website that looks more professional. I have advised students against giving out personal information, but I know these are different times and young people live online. I hope you’ll take a measured approach and wish you well with it. I have enough people reading my blog these days that I’m just keeping up with the ones that comment or that I have found a connection with in some way!
Yes. It is wise to remain grateful for all the things/relationships/blessings we have right now — such as folks reading our blogs and even leaving comments — before exploring possible new avenues for outreach.
Sounds like you had a most interesting time. It is always sad to me when music moves from the love of the heart of the musician and into the world of commercialization, where the bottom line takes precedent. Some musicians do seem to hold their authenticity in spite of it all.
You describe the process/challenge so beautifully — “when music moves from the love of the heart of the musician and into the world of commercialization (where the bottom line takes precedent…)” You have a wonderful way with words. I agree that some musicians do a great job of remaining their authentic selves. Some, of course, are simply a marketing concept to begin with — so it is unlikely that they will ever reveal much authenticity!
I agree! In the commercial world… if they have a hit, they ride that horse over and over until it dies.
Thank you Will. That is why it is so refreshing to someone who is truly authentic.
An interesting and informative post. Enjoyed your upbeat musical selection. Thanks for sharing. I also enjoy the real-person exchanges across the WordPress blogosphere. As an indie author, I would like to extend my reach but dread the thought of using an automated chatbot responder. I would prefer to contract the services of a virtual assistant, if my operating budget allowed.
Hi, Rosaliene! You are very welcome. And thank YOU for checking out my blog! Chatbots are kind of the opposite of the WordPress, which I find to be refreshingly, idiosyncratically authentic. I am still mulling my next steps…
This is an interesting post. Your comments about these talented musicians of the past are very sad. This is why I like to write history as a story told about people and what they faced in specific circumstances is always much more powerful than facts, no matter how horrifying those facts might be. WRT climate change, mankind has dug himself into a hole and we have crossed a line as a species. As a result, digitalisation is the only way we can go for the foreseeable future. The plus side of digitalisation is that people can stay at home instead of travelling around causing masses of pollution. The production of digital equipment creates a problem, but this problem is being worked on and solutions are being found. Looking at what has happened over the past few years and what is continuing to happen on our planet, I wonder if it isn’t already to late.
Yes. I, too, wonder when I listen (yet again) to the latest observations and conclusions and predictions by various scientists if it isn’t already too late… Deep sigh. Less travel via fossil fuels and more staying at/near home would be a plus if we can maintain these new habits/practices post-Covid! I had hoped that this recent experience of COVID infection would awaken a new respect for scientists and the scientific method (as it relates to the MUCH more significant and complicated challenges of climate change) — but here in the USA honoring COVID best practices and doing what is best for the common good have become politicized and polarized. Sad facts such as a Covid-minimizing/denying Republican congressman getting infected and dying before he could take office seem to have little or no effect on the non-mask-wearing, vaccine-resisting members of our citizenry. Another deep sigh. Yet we can’t give up hope that unexpected positive changes may occur… THANK YOU for reading my blog post and leaving such a thoughtful comment.
I didn’t know about the congressman’s death, but I do know that the vaccination has become politicized in the USA. It is a great shame. Donald Trump did a lot of harm to the climate change programme by reversing protective laws and withdrawing from the Paris Convention. Sadly, the rest of the world follow the USA.
Yes, indeed…
Perfect song choice for this insightful post. You’ve found a nice balance between the musical and intellectual. I love how smoothly your words blend with the song you are singing. It’s a very unique approach, Will!
Ah, yes. The tug and pull between our artistic urges and crass commercialism. I feel your pain. Wouldn’t it be great if kismet happened for us all and there was no need to advertise? And the stories the female artists share are scary. I’ve often thought twice about being “out there” in the world. But the urge to share my writing has always won. Here’s to more people discovering your talents . . .
Thank you. for reading and listening and then leaving such a thoughtful, supportive comment. I would be happy to return to a world with much less advertising. I often think (sadly) about the vast amounts of creativity and innovation and research which have been devoted in the past 100 years or so to convincing/cajoling/tricking/enticing our fellow human beings to desire/purchase stuff/experiences that a) we don’t need and b) often harm ourselves and/or the larger ecosystems in which we all co-exist! What a tragedy — not just for humans but for entire ecosystems — advertising has been…
This is a great idea to have Facebook adds. Your song is so beautiful ..thanks for sharing.
THANK YOU for listening! I love your photos…
Pingback: Nice Work If You Can Get It (pt.2) – amusicalifeonplanetearth