19th July Blog update

I am writing this weeks blog update from the beautiful country side in the Ferrara region in Italy. When you are reading this, Sliotar’s show here will be done already, but as I write this, I’m still adjusting to the heat in anticipation for the show. It is 38C outside, and I am hiding in the small bar at the place we are staying, and loving the air-conditioning 😀 We are here to play at the wonderful Bundan Celtic festival. Last year we played in front of 16000 people! So our expectations are high, but I will report more one the show on the other side of it 😉

Once we are done here, we will be heading to Czech republic. Sliotar has long history in the Czech and we tour there every summer for the past 112 years. By now we have a lot of friends on the road and seeing them has become one of my favourite things about the traveling, that and the music of course 🙂

Traveling also is a great opportunity to learn new things. So here’s my take away lessons from the week.

1. Most things we perceive are not as hard as me make them out to be. It was always in the plans to start posting Vlogs (video blogs), but I had been putting it off for ages, basically because my own internal excuses. But once I got the first one out, I once again had to ask my self, what was I thinking 😀 So expect more of those in the future.

2. Rolling your clothes army style saves a lot of space in your luggage.

3. The importance of communication in any relationship, personal or work. I will write more detailed post about this subject soon.

4. The success in “quitting” something is in removing the desire.

And without further delay, let’s get straight in to this weeks blog posts:

This weeks song “Good Old Songs” talks about how the idea of fame sometimes becomes more important that the music it self. The blog post is a rant on its own 🙂 Check it out here:

Good Old Songs

I actually feel quite strongly about this one. So many artist are complaining about how we have devalued music, how people expect to get it for free. But I often find that the same artists are not willing to try to find other types of value in their music. Read all about it here:

The value of free music

Success in music business take a lot of sacrifice and often you only see the results years to come:

Quick tip 136 To succeed tomorrow, you need to sacrifice today

So this blog post was my big news of the week. Read all about it here:

Getting ready for the road like never before

I ran few interesting experiments in the past few months. What I learned was that the unit price of your music has very little to do with your income. And for those musicians disagreeing with me, let me just say this, I tested this! So until you have done so as well and ended up with different results, do your self a favour and learn from my experiment:

Quick tip 137 Unit price v income

Here’s why I think you should keep a close eye on what Apple is up to and how it might affect your visibility online in the future:

The future of SEO for musicians

We all are good at some things, and not so good at other things. Figure out what you are good at and make the most of it:

Quick tip 138 Concentrate on your strengths

So here we go, my first of many Vlogs. Check it out here and let me know what you think:

Vlog 1. Packing

Most home recordings are recorded way too hot. Read all about it here:

Quick tip 139 Record levels in DAW

Building your fan base should be your number one priority in music business, all the rest come after:

Quick tip 140 Stop trying to skip ahead

Here’s the second Vlog, this one is just after I arrived in Italy:

Vlog 2. Arrived in Italy

Here’s a great Italian Celtic band called Cisalpipers, check them out!

Share love, music and art part 4

And that wraps up this weeks blog update 🙂 Now I am off to enjoy the rest f the festival. Have a great week, and I will talk to you more soon!

J.P.

The author J.P. Kallio is a singer songwriter
To get EIGHT of his songs for free go HERE