For all the glass-half-empty opinions that get expressed about the music industry, there are good things happening for those who see the glass instead as being half full.
Last November I was at the Frank Brown International Songwriters Festival just over the border into Alabama. I recorded an interview there with singer/songwriter Marla Cannon-Goodman for what would end up being Episode 615 of my weekly “Now Hear This Entertainment” podcast. Something that she said really stuck with me since it’s nine months later and I’m still holding onto it.
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“We go out and do shows now because we need – we love to, but also – it's a necessity because streaming has invaded our space so much and songwriters are not getting paid.”
Let’s look at just the first part of that statement; specifically, just the first seven words. Fittingly, I’m out west right now, having been here for (pictured above) the 2nd Las Vegas Songwriters Festival, and she was too!
While a lot of people want to focus on the bad news, the good news is that there are, in fact, plenty of songwriters festivals out there for folks like her to go perform at.
It has been more than 15 years since I went to a songwriters festival for the first time. I remember how enamored I was with it when I attended. Full disclosure, I was there with a client of mine and so I immediately wanted to find similar events that we could get her to play at.
Back then there were festivals, but nowhere near as many as now, and so you had to know someone to vouch for you to hopefully get in, not to mention tell you about it in the first place.
Granted, the internet wasn’t new, but nowadays there are so many songwriters festivals and when coupled with the emergence of social media – and, yes, I’ll say it, AI – they’re not all that difficult to find. Of course, that’s not to say that they’ll take just anyone. Some are big, some are small, some want Nashville songwriters only, some want songwriters from all over, and, well, you get it. The criteria vary greatly from one to the next.
To see a major entertainment capital like Las Vegas support such an event here (and it sounds like the third edition will take place in August of 2027) is a great sign for songwriters festivals.
I fear that when John Q. Public walks in during a songwriters festival performance somewhere that isn’t ticketed, they simply assume there’s live music and that the performer is doing a cover song. That’s where the storytelling aspect is so vital. The light bulb moment happens when the words, “I wrote that song” are spoken into the microphone.
This is all to take nothing away from the a-list entertainers who record and go perform these songs live. But it is so unique to hear someone on the stage playing that hit that you’re singing along with and find out that he/she is the one who actually wrote it.
Time and again I have guests on “Now Hear This Entertainment” who tell me that when they were young, they had no idea that the recording artists weren’t necessarily the ones writing the songs themselves, not to mention having had any awareness that one can make a career out of songwriting.
In the aforementioned testimony from Cannon-Goodman, it might not be make a living out of songwriting royalties – heck, listen to Episode 525 when Blue Foley said that he'd had 23 singles in the last year but didn’t get a penny from any of it – but going out on the road and doing all these songwriter shows can sure put food on the table.
Late last year I interviewed Brice Long, who has had over 175 of his songs cut with artists such as Garth Brooks, George Strait, Chris Stapleton, Hank Williams Jr., Randy Houser, Josh Turner, Reba McEntire, Lainey Wilson, and more. He echoed the prevalence of songwriter shows, telling me during our conversation on Episode 610 that, “we play a lot of songwriter rounds… a lot of shows all over. I think I played like 84 shows last year.” It should come as no surprise when I tell you that he too was here performing this weekend in Las Vegas as part of this songwriters festival.
One of the songwriters that I interviewed here this weekend will have already played at another songwriters festival by the time our NHTE episode is released.
It might not completely solve the challenges of streaming, but songwriters are able to get some relief through performing at songwriters festivals, all while audiences win at the same time.
A Member of the Recording Academy, I have been helping indie music artists, authors, actors, entrepreneurs, podcasters, filmmakers, small business owners, and more for over twenty years. What challenges are you having in your creator career that I can lend some insight to? Connect with me so you can take advantage of all my experience, and I can help and keep you moving forward.