Within the last several months, forum discussions, reader questions, and comments, have reminded me of some of the peculiar pressures and decisions facing young Christians who are trying to make a living in music of any kind.
I’m sensitive to these issues because, as a Christian myself, I wrote and performed what folks now call “Contemporary Christian Music” almost exclusively for over two decades when I was younger. Plus I led worship for about fifteen years in a denomination that couldn’t decide if it wanted to be contemporary or reactionary. So I can sympathize with today’s young Christian musicians when they struggle unnecessarily with some of the same issues I faced.
At the same time, I’m aware of the pressures and opportunities posed by today’s “independent music” scene. As a Christian who is a musician, how do you balance all the promotional, business, musical, and family aspects of your life while still “setting your sights on things above”?
To address these issues and more, I’ve started a new section on our SchoolOfTheRock.com web page. It is specifically targeted to Christian musicians who are unsigned, and therefore doing everything for themselves. We will be creating resources specifically for the site, as well as creating a directory of helpful resources on other sites.
Though the list of topics in the Independent Christian Musician section is small now, we wanted to give you a heads up, in case you were interested in such a resource. We’ve also started:
- A Discussion Forum you can sign up and participate in to get feedback from other musicians facing similar issues.
- A private Facebook group (that you need to e-mail me to join)
You can use the same Forum Signup page to sign up for both.
Who Can Join? – We believe the new content and features will help anyone who wishes to participate – we ask only that you exercise courtesy and remember that we operate only family-friendly sites.
Here are a few articles that should give you some idea of the sort of approach we are taking:
- Your Online Presence – What is the bare minimum you need to come across as a “contender” when folks check you out online?
- When Should you Play for Free? – A question that haunts every unsigned artist who’s trying to get some momentum and doesn’t have gigs lined up back-to-back-to-back.
- Exercise Professionalism – If you want venues, fellow musicians, and music business professionals to treat you as a professional, you need to act like one. Here are some tips.
- What the Bible Doesn’t Say About Gifts and Talents – A closer look at two scripture passages that are often mis-applied to music career choices.
In the meantime, here’s hoping that you life and music are blessed, and that both bless those around you!
Paul
Since I started the Discussion Forums for these topics, we’ve had hundreds of visitors, although I’m still posting 99% of the postings. You are VERY welcome to sign up and contribute to the discussion. But at least we can see that there is a great deal of interest.
We’ve also expanded to make room for topics that didn’t seem to need their own page when we first started.
Most of the topics are under the Independent Christian Musician forum here: http://schooloftherock.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=20
Again, some of those topics may seem redundant with the “Careers” section of our CreekDontRise.com here: http://creekdontrise.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=19, as well as the Songwranging forum here: http://creekdontrise.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=39. But when we started the CreekDontRise.com forums, we had no idea how much content on so many subjects would become available so quickly. So things didn’t get sorted out very well. We hope to do a better job of keeping things sorted by topic on this site.
Again, please let us know if you’d like us to keep our eyes out for additional resources on some topic. And you are very welcome to join the discussion at any time. Just use the Contact page here to sign up: http://schooloftherock.com/html/forum_signup.html