TEM126: Cathy Heller on getting a major record deal yet still failing, being analytical about your approach to the music business and persevering until you close the gap

Cathy Heller is a hugely successful singer-songwriter, the owner of Catch the Moon Music and the mother of three children under the age of six (!) living in LA.

What You'll Learn:

• How getting two different major record deals in LA still didn’t lead to any commercial success for Cathy
• How cycling through “real” jobs for two years helped her realize that she had to be true to herself and make music for a living
• The very thorough research method she used to get her songs successfully placed on television and film
• The various things she offers today including her own agency, an online course and a podcast “Don’t Keep Your Day Job” which is all about reverse-engineering your dream job (which led to a book deal with a major publisher)
• Why intentionally writing for commercial success is not selling out
• How the key to commercial success in business is making something that someone else wants
• Why self-perception is such a powerful thing and can easily derail even the most successful person
• How ever though a stadium full of people listen to each episode of her podcast, she really is only talking to one person at a time
• A songwriting exercise she does to help get ideas out (which is applicable to anyone doing anything)
• The importance of sticking with something until you can close “the gap”

Links:

• sixfiguresongwriting.com
• The Access Program
• Catch the Moon Music
• Ira Glass - The Gap
• Tunefind
• Zync Music
• TEM on Instagram

Show notes for all episodes of TEM including topics discussed, links to all books and websites referenced can be found at:

http://www.andrewhitz.com/shownotes

1. Help me get to my goal of $50 per episode on Patreon by pledging as little as $1 per episode to support the show: https://www.patreon.com/tempodcast.

2. Thanks to everyone who helped me get to my goal of 50 ratings on iTunes! I appreciate it very much!

And finally, a huge thank you to Parker Mouthpieces for providing the hosting for TEM.

Produced by Andrew Hitz

TEM125: Time for Three's Ranaan Meyer Quotes (TEM Short)

This TEM Short features thoughts on my favorite quotes from Ranaan Meyer in TEM124.

Quotes:

• "Yeah, so I decided, based on what I had heard and sort of my professional evaluation of what we had done ... Of course I'm being sarcastic because I had no idea what I was doing, but I had the audacity to say, ‘Well, we're never going to play background music, and we're going to have a flat fee of $1,500.' And this was back 15 years ago right when we started, and like I said, we're college kids slash just out of college. $1,500 for a trio, that seemed like all the money in the world, and Nick and Zach were kind of uncomfortable, but they said, "You know what, Ranaan, if you really feel like you can go get that, go get it.”
• "I always encourage people ... I mean, obviously not everybody goes to Curtis, but there are opportunities wherever you are in school, out in the professional world, to look for communities where you can be surrounding yourself with a place to fish. That's crucial. You want to fish in the right pond. So look for those places and then gun for them.”
• "There's definitely this thing that happens constantly in our career which is, we were just playing at a show recently for a presenter, and I made the mistake of saying, 'Yeah, so-and-so recommended us for this, right?' and then one of the people that worked said, ‘No, who are they? I don't even know who they are.' I knew for a fact that the person that I mentioned definitely was the first introduction from them to us, but by the time we had arrived there, so many other people had taken credit for us being there. And that's good for us. I mean, that only makes us feel good, and loved, and all that stuff. But the point was is that, people want to take ownership of you, of what you're trying to sell. They want to believe in it, and when you get people to believe in it, that's when you've really succeed to the point of not having to sell yourself. And ultimately, selling yourself is getting them to believe it."
• "I'm a big believer in stepping stones. It's very rare in life that all of a sudden at the snap of a finger or the drop of a hat you are on top of the world with everything you possibly could ever imagine for your career. It's a process, and I think it's really good for young artists, or just up and coming artists, to realize that. So, as long as you're going on the trajectory that you want to see for yourself, you should consider yourself a success at all times.”
• "If you're interested in more than just picking up your instrument and playing it in tune and in time with a musical feeling behind it, then this is an amazing world that will open up so many doors."
• "As a more mature young man, I now have at the top of my notes, whenever I write down the things that I need to do on my daily schedule, et cetera, in big, old, capital, bold font, DELEGATE WHEN POSSIBLE. And I think this is a really important thing to discuss because ultimately that takes a lot of maturity."
• "I think it's important to work really hard, to work really smart, and then dream, Man of La Mancha, dream the impossible dream. You know, really, really think about it and imagine it happening because if you can really see it happening, there may just be that opportunity.”

Show notes for all episodes of TEM including topics discussed, links to all books and websites referenced can be found at:

http://www.andrewhitz.com/shownotes

1. Help me get to my goal of $50 per episode on Patreon by pledging as little as $1 per episode to support the show: https://www.patreon.com/tempodcast.

2. I'm up to 60 ratings and 41 reviews on iTunes. Help me reach my goals of 75 ratings and 50 reviews by taking just a couple of minutes on iTunes!

And finally, a huge thank you to Parker Mouthpieces for providing the hosting for TEM.

Produced by Andrew Hitz

TEM124: Ranaan Meyer of Time For Three on advice for young musicians, seizing opportunities and why you have to dream big (TEM Rewind)

Ranaan Meyer is a bass player and founding member of Time for Three, one of the busiest chamber ensembles in the world.

TEM Rewind is a new format that will appear sporadically throughout 2018. Some of my favorite interviews were in the very early days of TEM, before many of you were following the show.

This conversation with Ranaan is from the very first episode way back in 2015 and is absolute gold.

What You'll Learn:

• Why all it took was one band member who really believed in the band and was willing to bankroll it to get them on the road to success
• How from day one they refused to play background music and never performed for anything less than $1500
• How even as college students Time for Three was very serious and methodical about who they networked with and how
• Why once you get people to take ownership of your product they then do the selling for you
• Why you need to be set up correctly and know the right questions to ask before you potentially waste a lot of time and money showcasing at something like APAP
• The difference between booking yourself through the commercial market versus the presenting arts market
• The three words that Ranaan writes in bold at the top of every To Do list he ever makes
• How a power outage before a Philadelphia Orchestra concert led to Ranaan wowing 5,000 audience members and the entire Philly Orchestra before Time for Three was even a thing
• The importance of dreaming big because it just might happen if you do
• Why it’s imperative to try get to a place in your career where you can delegate some tasks

Links:

• APAP
• Le Poussin Rouge
• Zach De Pue Playing Bach Next to an Airplane

Show notes for all episodes of TEM including topics discussed, links to all books and websites referenced can be found at:

http://www.andrewhitz.com/shownotes

1. Help me get to my goal of $50 per episode on Patreon by pledging as little as $1 per episode to support the show: https://www.patreon.com/tempodcast.

2. Thanks to everyone who helped me get to my goal of 50 ratings on iTunes! I appreciate it very much!

And finally, a huge thank you to Parker Mouthpieces for providing the hosting for TEM.

Produced by Andrew Hitz