Essential qualities you need as a musician in the 21st century

Essential qualities you need as a musician in the 21st century

Today, I’m going to begin a series of essential qualities you need as a musician in the 21st century. These are not things you would be taught in music school, but they are absolutely essential. I’ve come to learn them myself over the past couple of years and I am still learning.

  1. You need to be patient

This was supposed to be the last one in the order in which I arranged this article, but I decided to make it the first, because of how important it is, and so that in case you don’t read this article to the end, you would have read this one first.

The fact that you need to be patient as a musician is pretty obvious. I mean, no matter how talented you are, a decent amount of patience is required for you to master your instrument (even if your instrument is your voice). You have to go through long hours of training and practice to be good at what you do. And that requires patience.

But, beyond mastering your instrument(s), you need patience to succeed as a musician in the 21st century. The music industry (and entertainment industry in general) is a very difficult and competitive one. There are millions of good musicians out there doing good music. It takes time to gradually build/ establish your identity as a musician as well as grow a huge fan base for your music. You need to be patient through the process and know that these things take time. There is no such thing as ‘overnight success’ in this industry (forget what the media tells you). You reap what you sow. So, if you sow years of dedication, you reap success in your career in the end. But if you get tired along the way and abandon everything, then that’s the end of your music career.

 

  1. You need to be Original

I hate to be the one to tell you this, but you are not the only talented musician in your locality. As I mentioned earlier, there are millions of good musicians out there. All talented, and all very good at what they do, and working very hard (maybe even more than you do) to get noticed. You cannot stand out in this massive pool of talented, hardworking musicians in the world today, if you just copy what everyone else is doing. Yes, you would need to learn and maybe be inspired by other musicians, but don’t copy them; be original. And if in the end you don’t become famous, at least you’ll be fulfilled. So, originality is an essential quality you need as musician in this 21st century.

 

  1. You need to be persistent

I’m going to be very honest with you, the journey to success as a musician is a very long and difficult one. You would be faced with discouragement at various times. Some of the things you would try might not work out well (even after putting your best into them). You would feel like giving up. But you need to be persistent. It is very essential that you develop this quality as a musician, especially in the 21st century. It is only when are able to persist through the entire process that you finally reach your goal.

I’m going to stop here today. Next week I’m going to continue with other essential qualities you need as a musician in the 21st century. In the meanwhile, I would love to hear your thoughts on the qualities I listed in this article. Please leave a comment below.

STAY AT YOUR POST

stay at your post

Today, I want to encourage anyone who might be feeling discouraged right now; stay at your post. Today’s article is not meant for only musicians.

Why am I writing this?

Last week, I went to see one of my mentors. I was feeling very discouraged about a lot of things; ministry, business, passion… everything seemed not to be working and I felt like giving up. While we talked, he said to me, “Sometimes, the only sacrifice you need to make to move God’s heart is to remain/ stay at your post”. That statement felt like drinking a cool glass of water after wandering through a desert on a hot afternoon. I was encouraged, I was revived.

You see, as Christians, we have been called by God to be His ambassadors and messengers here. We are to use our art or vocations (or whatever creative ability we have been gifted with) to proclaim the message of hope to this hopeless world. That is our primary assignment or calling. You can call it your ‘post’. Each of us has a particular ‘post’ that we have been assigned to. And God expects us to stay at that post and be faithful. Theoretically, that sounds like an easy task, but in reality, it is a very difficult one.

It’s difficult, I know

It is difficult to keep doing the same thing, when it yields no visible material result. It’s difficult to remain at the same position and watch others go far, but you can’t join them because more than just a vocation, you see what you do as a calling. It is difficult to be the odd one. It’s difficult when people think you are just wasting your life and being stubborn (or stupid). The pressure from society, family and friends weigh you down. You keep asking yourself, “is this worth it”? You feel like succumbing to their pressures, turn around, and just go the way everyone expects you to go.

But,

But I just want to encourage you to stay at your post. The people pressuring you, are not the ones God gave the calling/ gift/ direct instructions (whatever it is) God gave you. In the end, it is you that God would require an account from, not them. Remember the parable of the talents? Each of the servants were required to give account based on the number of talents given to each of them. Remember also the fall of man in the garden? It was Adam God demanded an explanation from because he was the one that God gave instruction, not Eve. If you yield to pressures and abandon your post, God will not require an account from those people who pressured you, He would require it from you.

So, my dear brother or sister (whoever you are reading this article) don’t give in to the pressures. Stay at your post. Your King is coming and He’s coming with your reward. Be patient, be faithful, don’t give up, stay at your post.

Benefits Of Lyrics Videos

Benefits of lyrics videos

At the end of last week’s article, I promised that we would be looking at the benefits of  lyrics videos this week. That is exactly what we are going to do today. So why do you really need to have a lyrics video for your song.

 

Alright, so the first one is FANS LOVE LYRICS VIDEOS

Yes, you read that right. Now if someone has become a fan of your music, it means the person really loves your sound. This also means that he/she would want to learn the words of your songs so they can sing along while playing your songs. This is where lyrics videos play a very vital role. They afford you the opportunity of teaching your songs to your fans, ‘word for word’ without being physically present. And fans really appreciate it.

 

  1. LYRICS VIDEOS ARE LIKE ‘HOW- TO’ VIDEOS

It’s no longer news that the second most watched type of videos on YouTube are what we call ‘How- To’ videos (tutorial videos that teach how to do specific things). The most logical reason for this, we believe, is that people usually need to watch a tutorial more than once to fully understand it well. The same is the case for lyrics videos. There is no way a fan would learn the words of a song by watching it once; they would usually watch it more once if they really want to learn. This automatically counts as more views for you on YouTube. Of course, I don’t need to tell you that the more views you have, the closer you get to monetization your videos (or even getting noticed by a major label).

 

  1. THEY OFFER OPPORTUNITY TO ATTRACT MORE FANS

YouTube is the world’s biggest streaming site and where billions of people discover new music. Having your song on YouTube not only increases your chance of being discovered by new fans, it also increases the chances of your song popping up on google search easily if you use SEO rightly. But you need video to be on YouTube (and these days, your video needs to be of high quality to attract views). Since shooting music videos are very expensive (we saw that last week), lyrics videos prove to be very efficient as well. Which leads us to the last one…

 

  1. THEY ARE AFFORDABLE

It’s almost unbelievable that despite the numerous benefits of lyrics videos, they are still very affordable, especially when compared to the cost of shooting a music video. In fact, making a lyrics video for a song is cheaper than the amount spent on producing the audio of the song. How crazy is that? You can get all the benefits listed in this article and more and yet you don’t have to break the bank.

Now, I know you might be wondering where can I get lyrics videos, so I can access all these benefits? Jeplune Music Studios, makes professional lyric videos for artists at affordable rates. Chat them directly on Whatsapp now, to start your own video.

 

Well, that’s it. Hope you’ve learnt something new about the benefits of lyrics videos. Let us know in the comments what new thing you learnt. Or you could share other benefits of lyrics videos that we left out in this article.

What Exactly Is A Lyrics Video?

what exactly is a lyrics video?

Last week, we looked at 3 inexpensive things you need to promote your song. But some of you might be wondering, what exactly is a lyrics video? So, I decided to take time this week to educate you on this very important tool for song promotion, which surprisingly is not expensive.

So, what’s a lyrics video?

A lyrics video is a type of video which focuses on the music lyrics. The words of the song are displayed as the song is played and they could be animated in a variety of creative ways. The background of video could either be a plain or motion background that may or may not relate to the song. In some lyrics videos, the background changes at different sections of the song. For instance, a different background could be used for the chorus, while another used for the verses, etc. These days, lyrics video backgrounds could be very complicated, even as complicated as having special effects; it all depends on what the artist wants. Also, music videos which have the lyrics displayed, either at the bottom of the screen or at specific times within the video, are sometimes also classified as lyric videos. But lyrics videos differ from real filmed music videos. Usually, all it takes to make a lyrics video is a skilled video editor. In recent times, lyrics videos have been utilized by record labels to generate more content for their artists.

Now you may ask, “what’s the difference between a lyrics video and a music video?

Well, like I said, a lyrics video focuses on the music lyrics. A music video, on the other hand, is a short film, shot and edited specifically for a song. It could be either for promotional or artistic purposes. The process of shooting a music video is often similar to that of shooting a movie. The artist, together with the director, first develops a concept for the video. This determines whether or not extra actors would be needed for the video or whether the services of a dance crew would be needed, etc. The concept also determines the location(s) where the video would be shot. Shooting a music video involves a crew of skilled professionals such as the director, camera men, sound guy, make-up artist, editor(s), etc. In the end, the cost of making a music video is about 5 times that of a lyrics video and sometimes, depending on the concept and location, the cost could get up to 30 times the cost of a lyrics video.

So, which is better between the two?

Both lyrics videos and music videos are useful for promotion of a song/ album or the artist/ band. However, because of the huge cost of making music videos, music artistes and music bands often resort to making more lyrics videos than music videos and it has gotten them lots of fans. Country superstar, Tailor Swift, is one living proof of this fact. She released a huge chunk of lyrics videos a few years ago, and see where it got her today.

So, if someone asks you, what exactly is a lyrics video? you  now know the answer to that question and you can even differentiate between a lyric video and a music video. Next week, we would look at the benefits of lyric videos.

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