April 3rd:
Patreon launch
Patreon is a way for independent creators to get their fans involved in what they do and to receive support from them too. After a whole year of having an inactive Patreon account that was not visible for anyone, I decided to take the plunge and go public despite the horrors I've heard. It is a way to finance that I haven't tried yet. I just hope it doesn't get me all bogged up with making music especially for it so i lose sight of what I really should be focusing on: getting my albums done. It is never a good idea to spread yourself too thin.
I am looking into Pledge music as well. But for now, no. Setting Patreon up took me the greater part of the day. I'd rather use my time doing mixing. Here is the link to Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/elisabethkitzing
Photographer to my team!
Delegating tasks is so important as an indie musician. I just signed up a great photographer to work with for my photos and videos! PTL! Laila Gustafson and I will be working together to get the best nature pics available for use on my homepage and videos and some of my books. So grateful! I plan on visiting her later this Spring. I am looking forward to deepening our friendship too! The fact that she is willing to help me film nature for my lyrics videos is awesome. This is gonna be great, saving me time and increasing the quality of the videos.
4th April
Stuff I do every day
Quiet time with the Lord while eating breakfast- check. We all need to get love in in order to be able to get it out. I try to reflect daily and meditate on power verses from the Bible.
Practice song and guitar set(s)- check
Update social media outlets- check (I should go live more often as the release approaches). And update Wattpad (doing now).
A quick plan for the day - check (but I really rushed through it.
I have been doing these things daily. It's great to do all this but because of the immense competition and the sheer amount of music being put out daily, an indie musician has to take care of his or her body too. You can't just do the moves. Living in the balance is crucial.
Keep the vision in place. If you lose your vision, you are wiped. In the Bible it says that without a vision the people perish. I don't think it's enough to make great music. You have to be on some sort of mission with it. For me, it is helping people stop, say no to unreasonable expectations and find peace of mind in being you, knowing your loved and valuable.
If you stop block planning, you miss opportunities
If you don't exercise, you get depressed and out of shape. And who wants to do Facebook Live when you feel out of shape and ugly?
Depression vs Superfans
Depression is something quite rampant among creatives. Read a good atticle on it.Find that here; http://indieconnect.com/musicians-depression/
Maybe the word depression is an exaggeration in my case, but I've been feeling it sporadically as the winter darkness, snow and sinus problems kept me indoors and lethargic.
I am in a mental rut and I know why. I thought about doing a intro video to Patreon and starting to do Facebook live again but I feel ugly and worn out after a long winter. Almost no training and too much good food plus sitting and mixing has made me lose my form and my legs are swollen. The Winter months have also affected my feelings negatively. I found myself pushing myself without incentives. For a while, I had hoped to be done with the album this Spring but no. Everything is taking longer than expected.
Some days you just want to quit. In fact, an ambitious indie musician on the rise will often feel like quitting. You have great music in your head and making it great takes time and money. You know that people want to hear your music, but that most won't pay for it. You are not done with your album yet and you are deathly afraid of releasing crap, so you hover over it too long, tweaking everything so it takes forever to get that first album released. Your fans become impatient at first and then most of them end up giving up on you and forgetting that you ever had an thing going. And by the time you get done those same people have already moved on to some other artist and you've lost them maybe forever. But there are a few superfans that just won't let up, thank God!
Superfans
I am not Drake, Ed Sheraton or Taylor Swift with tons of fans. I am just a little unknown me. I have a tiny, but beautiful following. I love those few who have stuck it out with me these three years, love my music and still believe in it. I call them "super-friends". They still encourage me and they still like my posts. They often share my posts and comment them in positive ways. They are a few in number, but without them I would pack up my bags and call it a day and get a day job. ANY day job would do. But I don't want to let them down. It's people like them that make me keep going. My husband, my siblings in the states, a woman in Scotland, a few families I hang out with on Mondays in our local home church group, a couple in Minnesota and a few individuals in the U.K. and Canada. It's a widely dispersed bunch united by Facebook, Messenger and Skype.
When I have a bad day, I have to say to my feelings, "Shut up and think about those super-friends!" and then I go and do the mixing anyway, despite my feelings. Today is the first day that really feels like Spring so I am going to begin to eat right and train again. I have to. I owe it to them and I'll feel better if I do. I owe it to my super-friends!
I believe a lot of this sadness that has been hanging like an intermittent cloud over me is not that I live out in the boonies, or that I don't know when I ever will get done with this first album, although those are factors. I think the greatest problem is not living in the balance.
It is in times like these that my super-friends hold me up. They don't know it but, for me, just knowing that they are there is amazingly helpful.
So, I am going to sit down and do the mixing - after I update Wattpad and I am going to incorporate planning and exercise into my days.
As an independent artist it is you own responsibility to keep a balance so you keep the depression clouds away. You need to set blocks of time for practice, promotion, music production, exercise, spiritual enrichment and fun/inspiration. You owe it to yourself and too your super-friends.
After I wrote this I went out to our outdoor gym and worked out. Then I took care of the wash. Oh the exciting life of an indie music producer! Now it's back to the drawing board (i.e. mixing).
Mixing
Because I redid the acoustic guitar (on the right side) yesterday, I have to edit it today. I can hear from the recording that I need to set up noise traps because there is some kind of strange frequency that came after I remodelled the studio. oops-
Mastering
I read this second step from Ian Shepherd. I am continuing to learn mastering as I go because I can't afford to let other people do it after this first album.
That's all for now...