Eps 26: It cost money to put my song on the radio and that hurts my feelings
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Arthur Taylor
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Now, I would recommend that before getting played on radio, send your songs over this e-mail, regardless of genre. Now, do not get me wrong, I am not saying that getting your song played on radio is easy. It is important to point out there is a lot more involved in the radio promotion ladder process than getting played by a few smaller stations.
The best way to get your songs played on radio is by approaching the stations suited for the stage of your career. To get your song played on the radio, either you or your radio promotion company approaches program directors/music directors at the radio stations. If you get the chance, meet with the radio station directors, they are the ones who can make or break your career.
The program directors meet weekly for a music session, so you do not need to contact everybody, but it cannot hurt to approach radio promos from every angle. These are typically the folks who are responsible for getting, choosing, and playing new music. Record labels pay for relationships so they are the first ones that will show up when a record comes out.
I am also not saying that you do not need the help of labels or additional promo help to get on radio. This article is all about getting your music to radio without any money, without promoters, without labels, so let us talk about it. First off, you are not going to get your song played on the radio if it does not fit into the format of radio.
If you are not touring, getting more press, and selling an increasing amount of music, the major stations are not going to want to play your song. This puts you at risk for producing excellent music that will never be heard. Putting out music in a manner that prioritises frequent releases over larger, cohesive offerings hurts your chances of finding media coverage and an audience for your work. You should not feel like getting played on non-commercial radio your music played over the airwaves is somehowless than getting played by commercial stations.
The major stations are judged by the capacity of them playing your music in order to boost their ratings, and not by the quality of the actual song. When you are a Canadian, and you want your music played on Canadian radio, you may just get the best possible chances, as they are required to play a certain amount of Canadian content . College radio stations are great places to get started, as they are generally open to playing more up-and-coming, less mainstream music. Some artists might never be played anywhere except on college radio, but still flourish with a music career.
Some artists treat the release of new music as placing quarters into a slot machine, hoping that every new song is successful. Treats may mean flying your artists out to play free shows on stations in an effort to get more spots on the radio playlist. In that sense, getting songs played on radio is kind of like accumulating blocks.
When music is broken down into singles, that advertising and creative power is greatly diminished, even when released songs are part of cohesive sets. Music released in conjunction, as on Put, gives blogs, radio stations, and mainstream press reasons to cover and promote artists that have invested time in making albums and EPs.
I could write an entire article about it, and I might, but for now, let us dive in and see how our songs are getting played on commercial radio. We use the phrase often, they are playing my song, without always remembering that, although we might have emotionally adopted a song, it is still legally owned by the songwriters who created it, and by the music publishers who are marketing it. The Edmonton station got back to me the next day after I sent them it, telling me that they loved the song, and they were going to bring it into their music sessions.
If you are going to hire your own musicians and vocalists and make a raw record of the song under the rights, you need only permission from the music publisher. An ASCAP licence does not grant you the rights to record the music under copyright, or alter the lyrics to the copyrighted work and use them in commercial radio commercials or promotions.
ASCAP represents tens of thousands of copyright owners and millions of songs, and the ASCAP license would grant you the rights to perform them all. Whether your music is performed live, on radio, transmitted, or played on CDs or videos, your ASCAP license covers your performances. While ASCAP does not license the rights to dramatic or grandiose performances or the music of ASCAP members that are theatrical in nature, ASCAPs licensing does allow for the non-dramatic performances of songs in theatrical works.
ASCAP does not license performances of single songs within the largest music repertory in the world. If you are seeking permission to perform any particular song or set of songs in public, contact each individual song music publisher.
Most hit songs--the ones that charted well, sold well, and that get blasting off cars in summertime--cost millions to make sure they are heard, played, and bought.