Moving slowly through the maze

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

Sometimes I feel like a white rat in a maze. But sometimes progress is visible. After three years of serious effort, I'm starting to get music into real production library catalogues (film/tv)--not to be confused with "royalty free" or "buyout" operations....

Don't EVER let anyone tell you that things happen fast in the music industry. If things really move fast, I could even see some money in 12-18 months time ;) Just as well I've kept my day job...that and climbing the steep curve back up to professional music standards has kept me very very busy which is why the extended silences.

My music getting into catalogues is a mix of piano, keyboard and orchestral: using my Chinese cheapie keyboards, or GPO, or occasionally Bandstand, or a combination. The one common thing is that all of it is Notation Composer stuff. Written in, played in, notation edited in, printed out, sequenced out using Composer. (Audio production of the output sound varies from very minor fiddling with Steinberg products to more complicated production using Cakewalk (Sonar) Music Creator--which incidentally is another cheapie.)

I have to give thanks to the bughunters on this forum: I confess that I normally travel one or two releases behind the current because right now I can't actually afford to have things fall over or even hiccup. The day job is leaving very little time and I need to move fast when I've got the music time available. So I cheer the support that comes from the enthusiastic users and triers-out, because travelling a little behind their activity front, I reap all the benefits! Seems unfair...

If'n'when bits of the music actually get used I'll try to announce, but it's likely to be after the event!

[Sherry Crann (sherry)]

Howdy Tim,

Congratulations! This must be a very exciting (not to mention tremendously busy!) time for you http://www.notation.com/discus/clipart/happy.gif

Do keep us posted on how things go, and perhaps a snippet or two of music, if it's ok to do so.

Cool!
Sherry

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

Now how could I refuse such an invitation? But "snippet" is the operative word, I'm afraid, as the only final on-net stuff is at CDBaby but I think you get a 2-minute listen so that's reasonable tho' the quality is fairly low.

So, three snippets all quite different:
"Autumn's End", an oldie, much to my surprise, on the Medeli MC710: http://www.cdbaby.com/timfatchen (#9)

"The Freshet". GPO Steinway piano:
http://www.cdbaby.com/timfatchen2 (#13)

"The Kitchen and the Sketcher", GPO acoustic bass and two harps (!)
http://www.cdbaby.com/timfatchen2 (#5)

All worked out, MIDI-recorded and sequenced on Notation Composer. What then happens is a topic for another day.

Incidentally, I am hoping to see a lot more of the Le Moulin du Bruel music end up doing the film and TV rounds. Ask me in two years time!

And a brazen plug: the Le Moulin du Bruel playlist will be on iTunes in a week or two as well as CDBaby, so buy!!! buy!!! (blush...sorry...)

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

Just to give the brazen plug an extra shine:

Le Moulin du Bruel music IS now on iTunes which is much faster than I expected. Mind you, it's under "Pop" rather than Easy listening or New Age or Neo-classical or even Classical but hey, you can have it fast or right, pick any one ;)

http://tinyurl.com/5889mz
will take you to the playlist. It's amazing where Notation COmposer leads after a while!

Tim

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

Just an update. Another production library picked up a huge amount of my stuff after I wrote the preceding and then followed:

---The library told me VERY LOUDLY to do what I should have done long ago, join my local PRO (performing Rights organization). That meant:

---into the taxation maze, US/Australia tax treaties, the ATO/IRS, notarised copies of passports, form W-this and W-that, long discussions with our accountant etc. That meant...

---Become a business (well I already am, in dayjob, but become ANOTHER one) because in Australia if you are a member of the PRO, the taxation office immediately assumes you're about to squirrel squillions of hit record dollars away in the Maldives (I wish), doesn't matter that your actual music earnings have moved from one to two capuucino equivalents per week. And that means...

---I can claim expenses but not until either the music income passes level X and/or the dayjob drops below level Y. But the expenses can be accumulated against that wonderful day!

So THAT all means... I have contracts with production libraries. I have a brand new Australian Business Number! I have certificates on wall stating my membership of PROs etc!! I've had about 4 weeks of total derailment!!! And the music is earning zilch!!!! I've finally, formally, become a professional composer/musician!!!!!

Such is life ;) I'm still chuffed!

Tim

PS: Some of the library music is up on myspace (http://www.myspace.com/timfatchen) still:

[Djim Tio (djimtio)]

Hi Tim
Congratulations on your becoming PRO after all !
In Holland ( where I used to work and live for over 40 years )we called it an eel-trap ending up in the Hall of Fame AND the Tax Offices ( of course )!!
Be happy and keep on making good music.
Regards
Djim

[Sherry Crann (sherry)]

Howdy Tim,

Congratulations indeed!

To help Tim move up to "3 cappucinos per week WITH a biscotti", I'll happily recommend purchasing his music http://www.notation.com/discus/clipart/happy.gif I have his "Tidewater" and "Le Moulin du Bruel" CDs, and they're both well worth the asking price. They're available at CD Baby (http://cdbaby.com/cd/timfatchen and http://cdbaby.com/cd/timfatchen2). As a bonus, the email you'll get after ordering is a good enough chuckle to lower your blood pressure a few points http://www.notation.com/discus/clipart/happy.gif

ttfn,
Sherry

[Djim Tio (djimtio)]

Hi Sherry and Tim
How can one ignore a recommandation from the Lady of Beanfield Castle ?
Actually I am now downloading the Tidewater MP3,hoping to add some crumbs
to your ( welll earned ) biscotti.
Regards
Djim

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

Thanks Sherry, Djim (blush). THe support means a great deal. This is a very stop/start progress but things are increasingly heartening.

Tim

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

Three steps forward, two steps back. The day/night/weekday/weekend job has taken over my life again, as it does from time to time, and the stress levels from about last week in October to now have been huge. OTOH seeing what's happening around me (and to my pension fund) I can only give thanks for being heavily in work right now. But the music has ground to a crawl, and I still can't convince the US IRS that (a) I exist (b) I do live in Australia.

Timing as always is immaculate. Deborah and I are in Austria in January: by the time the Australian dollar tanked we'd already paid most of the serious expenses, so we're going and 'll make SURE we enjoy it cos who knows when there'll be any money to do it again?? Among other things we'd booked into Salzburg for a couple of days--turns out to be the middle of Mozart Week. So, we thought about going to hear the Vienna Philharmonic on 27 Jan--until I worked out that tickets for the two of us would cost the equivalent of...$1600. Um...Recession? What recession??

There are some student concerts on that we might go to, a couple less zeroes in the ticket cost. I can't help but think what instrumentation/software I could buy for $1600...EWQL Platinum for starters!

I hope all our American friends can hang on until the current mess sorts itself out. We had bad crunches here (Oz) earlier which eventually resolved, and we're due for a crunch middle of the year (which is why the Oz dollar is low despite the economy still moving reasonably). Tighten belts and hang on. And Mark, that's a _great_marketing idea! I'll try spreading the word yet again!

Tim
http://www.myspace.com/timfatchen

[David Jacklin (dj)]

Hi, Tim:

Tough times for all, I think, except heads of banks. Oddly enough, as times get tougher, I find I have more time for music, as my theatre productions are scaling back to more manageable efforts.

Do find a way to take in some of the Mozart Week! You'll regret it if you don't. Rush seats or online discounts or something. There are usually ways to find reasonably priced tickets for these things.

In Canada, the minority Conservative government has announced they will completely cut off all funding for the arts. Canada already has the lowest per capita arts funding of any G8 nation (U.S. included). That won't make a dribble of difference in the federal budget but it's gone down well with the hockey crowd. However, it might actually drive prices for arts events down as the organizations realize they have to start selling to the general public, not just the high-brows.

This week, though, the majority Opposition parties have decided they've had enough and formed a coalition to defeat the government, so, knowing he couldn't stave off a defeat, the Prime Minister simply had the Governor General call a halt to the current session of Parliament. Five weeks since a Federal election and two weeks since the Throne Speech and Parliament is prorogued until end of January!

(Yanks: Sorry about all the Commonwealth political terms, but Tim, being an Aussie, will know what I'm talking about.) http://www.notation.com/discus/clipart/happy.gif

Best place for politicians to be, as far as I'm concerned: at home, away from the House and not passing laws.

All the best,

David

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

David, no reasonably priced online for the Vienna Philharmonic in Salzburg on Mozart's birthday! there were a couple of dozen seats left when I looked, seven weeks down the track. No, we'll get to something. THing was, I was never a mozart fan when learning: crystalline, breaks when dropped. Beethoven now, bounces. And Vienna was his city. Though we'll probably end up at the Magic Flute in Vienna!

I won't even start on arts funding in sunny SOuth Australia. lets just say the removal of peanut-level funds which led to the immediate collapse of all but three of the local theatre companies is a mere trifle...

Times might well get tougher for me, increasing fights with increasingly powerful and increasingly ideological and strangely green government departments, can only end in me exploded and giving up. But I should try to hold on another couple years and clear the last mortgage.... ;) I have to get more songs under publishing contract...then one day they might even start earning synch and royalty income. At $0.66 a throw no doubt...

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

More updates: a bit more music going into production libraries, as far as I know nothing's been used yet. I finally finished a setting of Sidney Lanier's poem "A Ballad of Trees and the Master" which has already been picked up by a local professional singer and which is going to cause some flutters because it beats hollow all the settings I've heard so far!

Notation Composer strikes again: used to write the music (no fuss) Used to generate the vocal score and the lead sheet. No fuss. Used to hurriedly transpose everything a tone down at the singer's request and re-generate the score and lead sheet. No fuss. ALso, with Garritan Personal Orchestra, used to produce the instrumental realisation which is temporarily available at
http://fawm.org/songs/6402/

We did get to Mozart's C minor mass by mistake, in Vienna Cathedral, en masse as it were with the Cardinal presiding; full orchestra, choir, two pipe organs, cast of thousands as it was actually Sunday Mass. Complete with a good Lutheran hymn which made me blink slightly. Fascinating to listen to the literal buzz of the harmonics of their biggest bell beforehand.

I now have a small but growing Egyptian fan club ;) I'll bring out an album on iTunes I think, "What I did on my holidays". You can catch the Cairo Marriott Crow, the Strangeness of Salzburg, and the River Nile at night at Esna Lock, on http://www.youtube.com/flyingtadpole And other strange holiday activities are temporarily on http://fawm.org/fawmers/timfatchen/ (until June 2009). Yes I did indeed fall into a pyramid. But I survived. I keep mum about that.

I continue to use Notation Composer as my sole notation and almost sole sequencing software. Why change to something less adequate?? ;) And it's still the ability to play music in for hundreds of bars and then press a button, and have it so accurately notated, AND keep the performance quirks which give extra life distinct from the formal, ready-to-publish notation.

Still Cakewalk/Sonar Music Creator for sound engineering. When does the new Composer launch, Mark?

Tim Fatchen
http://www.myspace.com/timfatchen
http://www.myspace.com/flyingtadpole2

[Sherry Crann (sherry)]

Howdy Tim,

I loved the Marriott Crow number! And it was nice to put a face and a voice with your name, though I'll probably now "hear" you singing all your posts ;)



ttfn,
Sherry

[David Jacklin (dj)]

Hi, Tim:

You lead an interesting life!

My home internet connection is way too slow to download Youtube stuff, but maybe I'll take a laptop to an Internet cafe somewhere and have a listen.

Actually, I'm back on line after nearly a week off, as they've finally fixed the phone lines in my neck of the woods.

David

[Tim Fatchen (flyingtadpole)]

Well, it's the middle of the year and everything has crunched as I expected it would (earlier). Still. We run in survival mode. And hey, the forum accepts me on to it (Sherry!!!) PROVIDED I come in through Notation COmposer rather than my normal browser...

Music: well, the cappucino earning rate has dropped back but there's still the occasional one. The contracts from last year may or may not have done something, one only ever knows when royalties appear, which they haven't. At least they talk to me occasionally ("Dear [Insert-name-here], We need you to sign your life away again on the following forms and post them back last week...")

I have a sort-of-commission to write a music, um, event? opera? happening? No doubt this will fall over too but it's generating some saleable music and very intriguing as we go. This time I'm running it through the 50 songs in 90 days challenge where as a basically classical writer I fade into the background just like a large fish in a tree.

Again, this is entirely Notation Composer for writing and sequencing, using usually Garritan personal Orchestra samples. Worktapes and background can be listened to and read via the 50/90 challenge pages, http://5090.fawm.org/fawmers/timfatchen/
we're currently into twelve-tone scales ("The Sorcerer") which I think is causing some head scratching in what is largely an acoustic folk singer/songwriter group...

It would be nice to progress faster, but that's never the way!

I still want the next version to appear, Mark, Sherry. Yes I know in the middle of a recession is the worst possible time. BTW I applaud Notation Software's recession pricing policy. I try to promote at this end, but it's hard to get anyone to buy anything of any sort!

Cheers
Tim Fatchen

[Sherry C]

Howdy Tim,

I just visited your 50/90 page (http://5090.fawm.org/fawmers/timfatchen/), and it looks to be a hoot! I'll have to visit tomorrow when I've got a bit more time to sit and listen to the songs.

That's a whale of a challenge you've taken on there. Waaay beyond my capabilities.

Have fun :)
Sherry