Week In Review - 11 April 2014

For as long as I can remember, I have always been quite goal oriented and this year I set four goals for GME. One of those goals was to develop two new shows ... 'I'll Be Seeing You,' a wartime show and 'Totally Tina Turner,' a tribute show to the rock & roll legend.  On Easter Sunday, I'll be debuting I'll Be Seeing You at the Hayling Island Sailing Club, and on the 4th of July, I'll be performing Totally Tina Turner alongside Supremely, Diana Ross at The Exchange in Bournemouth!

Andrew Sisters

So, this week has been all about fine tuning the wartime show and I have sooooooo enjoyed researching the songs from WWI & WWII and I'm finding that I love the purity of the vocals on these songs. The Andrews Sisters' musicianship is beyond words with their intricate harmonies and pitch perfect vocals on such delights as 'Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy' and 'Chattanooga Choo Choo'! Vera Lynn seems to have captured the hearts of the entire country with her heartfelt vocals on 'Bless 'Em All' and 'We'll Meet Again' among many other WWII favourites.

The real fun was in finding WWI songs like 'Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit Bag' and 'It's A Long Way to Tipperary'!  I've included a few of the videos I used for research in choosing the set list for 'I'll Be Seeing You' in this week's newsletter. I hope you enjoy them as much as I have.

On Tuesday, I had a meeting with Martin Bargent, the Director of Brown Sugar Events to discuss working together on future projects. Their next event is 'The All Woman Show' being held on the 22nd of June at the Mountbatten Leisure Centre in Portsmouth. Having met Martin at the launch of the Portsmouth Venus Awards reinforces how important networking is in business. 

Next week I am having a mini-holiday with Neal at our place in Spain, but I will have to do some work finalizing the entertainment for Foodies Festival, Clapham Common. I've still got a few slots to fill for Clapham and I'm looking for solo performers, duos and bands who perform folk, soul, pop and/or Jazz. Please contact me if you're interested in performing for any of the Foodies events.

Neal & Me

Click here to view final running order for the Brighton event being held on 3, 4, & 6th of May. The Clapham Common event is the 6, 7, & 8th of June. 

That's it for this week. Have a fantastic weekend!

What's On! 29 January 2014 Edition

There is so much fantastic live music in and around Portsmouth. Please check out the events happening this weekend and support live music in our area by going to one of these shows!  Help us Keep Music Live! 

Move On Up Party Band,  Thursday, 30 January @ The Wine Vaults, Southsea - 9:00pm

 

The Jack Daniels Band, Friday 31 January @ The Auckland Arms, Southsea - 8:30pm 

 

Cheryl Cole Tribute, Saturday 1 February @ The Victory Pub, Portsmouth - 8:30pm 

 

The Fliks, Saturday 1 February  @ Alma Arms (Function Room), Southsea - Doors from 7:00pm

 

Something Else, Sunday 2 February @ The Admiral Drake, Portsmouth - 4:00pm

Nick Courtney Present Live Music, Tuesday 4 February @ Little Johnny Russells, Southsea - 7:00pm 

 To find out about other live events in our area, please visit Go On ... Go Out in Portsmouth's Facebook Page:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/289374424505803/

Promo Video / Showreel

Since I started my entertainment company a year ago, I'm really enjoying looking at the entertainment business from 'both sides now.' When creating a video from an artist's perspective, I want to include flashy opening and closing titles, full length songs and my contact details. From an agent's perspective, when I'm looking at a video that has been submitted to me by an artist interested in being represented by GME, I want the video to be unbranded (without the name of the act, or any contact details), no longer than 3-5 minutes in length, and the absolute best, show-stopping clip showcased within the first 4 seconds of the video.

No Branding: You can include a description of your act in the opening title ... 'Today's Hits Party Band', but not the act's name. Some agencies like to give an act they are representing a name that's unique to that agency. With my company, I don't mind if the acts name is in the opening / closing credits, but the closing credits of the video should not contain any contact information. YouTube footage is good, but I prefer Vimeo footage because it's much cleaner and doesn't cross link to other videos on their site like YouTube does.

3-5 Minutes Long: The same rules apply as with your 'Kick-A** Song' on this one. The promo video should be the length of a song and no more than 5 minutes long. You've got about 8-15 seconds to capture the viewers attention. Don't waste this time on the opening credits, get right to your best clip of your best song. If you've captured the viewers attention, they will watch more.

4 seconds:  Your first clip should be happening by the 4-second point and should have wowed me by 8-15 seconds. If it hasn't, that's a lost chance for getting representation. The same holds true for potential clients who are viewing your video. People are generally quite busy, and bookers, event planners, etc., are even more busy so make the most of having their attention!

The clips in the video should be 90% 'live' footage either captured from shows, or filmed in a studio. You can include a few still photos, in fact I recommend you have a still photo as your opening and closing title page, but the entire video should not be made up of still photos with your music playing in the background.

The most important thing to remember when putting together your showreel is to make sure your clips clearly show the viewer who you are as an act! Make it obvious that you are perfect for their event by knocking their socks off in the first 8 seconds of your reel!

Here's a link to an act I work with who have a fantastic showreel:

http://www.gloriamillerentertainment.com/vintageretro_acts/the_rockafellas.

If you have a great showreel that would be a good example to others, please include a link in the comments. I'd love to have a look.

Until next time ... happy music making!!

Elevator Pitch

Here's my elevator pitch:

Hi, my name is Gloria my company is Gloria Miller Entertainment and we believe that any event can benefit from a bit of glitz and glamour, and we provide this for corporate & private events, venues and festivals. We represent solo performers up to 10-piece bands covering all genres of music from the 30’s through today. We also offer interactive entertainment that is perfect for corporate training and team building. Gloria Miller Entertainment, have we got an ACT for you!

Share your pitch with me by including it in the comments section or uploading your YouTube video. Would love to compare notes.

Also, here's a great website to help you put your pitch together:

http://www.15secondpitch.com/

Contact Information - Vol. 3

Alright, I’ve been to your website, I’ve clicked on your ‘Kick-ass’ song because you don’t have it set to autoplay, and your kick-ass song has wowed me and I now want to contact you …

I cannot tell you the frustration of wanting to contact an act once they’ve got me pumped about their music, and then having to search for their phone number or email address. Yes, it’s great to have the typical ‘contact’ page on your website, but I encourage you to have your phone number and email address prominently featured on every page of your website, and on all your social media pages. Don’t make the person who is ready to work with you have to hunt for your contact details.

Even if you have a form set up on your ‘contact’ page for people to email you through your website, please include your email address too.  I personally never email acts through their website. I’m put off by it and I just move on to the next one. My husband asked me why I do this, and it’s because I use the emails I send as part of my follow-up system and I can’t do that when I’ve had to send an email through a website.

If you use a FB page to promote your music, make sure your phone number, email address and a link to your website is included in the ‘Short Description’ which is that box underneath your photo. Don’t make us have to click on ‘about’ to find your contact details! 

Same goes for Twitter! You need to have all your contact details on your profile, because this is the page people will land on if you have peaked their interest with one of your clever tweets. Again, make it easy for whoever wants to contact you to be able to contact you.

So, after I wrote this I went to my own web pages and realized I wasn’t exactly practicing what I was preaching. So to not be a hypocrite, I have followed my own advice and made it much easier for people to find my contact details. 

Take a look at my pages:

Website:  www.gmmbookingagency.com

Twitter:  https://twitter.com/Gmmbookings

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/GmmBookingAgency

I do hope this information is helpful!  Until next time, happy music making!!

Your Kick A** Song! - Vol. 2

In Volume 1 of this blog, Autoplay, we discussed that autoplay is baaaaaddddd!  I also touched a little bit on making sure that the tracks you choose to represent you on your webpages be your absolute best tracks ... in other words, your 'Kick Ass Tracks!'

Generally, you have about 8 to 15 seconds to impress someone at the initial point of contact.  Go to the main webpage that you use to represent you and really listen to what's happening in the first 8 to 15 seconds of your first track.  Has that time all been taken up with the intro?  Is there a better part of this song that you can edit your track to fade into that has the 'wow' factor?  Is the first song on your site your best song and are you showcasing the best part of your best song?  This applies to originals and covers.

I have been booking entertainment for 5 festivals this year and started the booking process sometime in February.  From that time 'til now, I have received a few 100 artist submissions expressing interest in performing at these events.  It has been this process that has fueled my starting this blog.  About 40% of these submissions never got heard because the first track on the webpage they linked me to was 15+ seconds of intro.  If I haven't heard what you sound like by 15 seconds, I'm no longer interested. 

Your first track on your webpage needs to be your Kick Ass song, and this song needs to represent everything about you and your sound in 15 seconds or less.  If you sing like an angel, or belt like Beyonce or if you're quirky like GaGa, anyone listening should now this by 15 seconds in.  If you have managed to wow the person you are trying to wow in 15 seconds, they will want to know more about you and listen to other tracks, watch video, etc. (this same rule applies to video demos ... you have 15 seconds max to impress).

If you would like help in this area, link me to your 'Kick Ass' song in the comments and I will have a listen and tell you my thoughts. I am here to help!

Happy music making!!

Next blog ... Your 15-Second Elevator Pitch!

Autoplay - Vol. 1

Scenario:

Artist has set up a lovely webpage and has setup their kicka** song to start playing automatically when anyone visits their webpage.

Artist has sent a link to this webpage with their kicka** song setup on autoplay to a very busy Agent who is looking through hundreds of submissions from Artists trying to fill a booking request.

Busy Agent has a few minutes while waiting to go into a meeting and decides to click on said link of Artist with the kicka** song setup on autoplay, and much to the Agents embarrassment, this kicka** song is now playing in the middle of the lobby of an important client, and the Agent can't figure out how to get the kicka** song to stop playing.

I can give you several more scenarios that all lead to this conclusion ... Autoplay ... Noooooooooo!!

GMM Booking Agency is small, but I get almost 100 inquiries a month from artists contacting me to consider them for the agency, or artists responding to my ads looking for bands.  I can only conclude from this that larger agencies are receiving thousands of inquiries a month.  Whenever I have a spare moment or two, I go through my ever-growing list of potential acts and have a nosy around their webpages, etc. When I am ready to listen (which sometimes involves me having to put headphones on) then I find the music link and play a track.  The webpages that autoplay when they load, I instantly close to stop the kicka** song from playing; then I move on to the next artist on my list.  The chance for that artist to be heard by me is lost.

Before becoming an agent, I had songs on autoplay on my webpage.  Now, I don't.  Give yourself a chance to really be heard by not forcing a song on a potential client or agent. Let us control when we hear you once we're on your page.

Next blog ... 'Kicka** Song!'  Tune in next week ...