Not long ago I was contacted through the Local Music Journey website by Glenn, the creator of SongGIG.com.  The message encouraged me to take a look at SongGIG.com, a music video discovery service.  Glenn claimed it could be useful for my readers.  So I went over to SongGIG.com and discovered it and it's artists for myself.  I have to say, I really like the concept. 

For undiscovered musical talent YouTube is great, but it's over saturated with tons of videos in many categories that can make it hard to truly discover new music without specifically knowing what it is you're seeking.  On the flip side, if you are looking for new music and could at least narrow the parameters of your interests on a site that is only focused on music then you've just set the stage (pun intended) to make some fun, serendipitous music discoveries.

SongGIG.com is that answer, and it's free to use.  SongGIG is focused on making it easier for musicians, music professionals and of course fans to find what they're looking for, or make discoveries of music they didn't totally know they were looking for.  SongGIG allows you to search music by band name or artist name, you can even do an advanced search and select the genre of music you're interested in discovering.

If you're an artist SongGIG makes it easy to set up a profile with your bio.  Then you just need to shoot video of yourself performing your songs, post them to SongGIG.com and share them with the SongGIG community.  You can upload your own video or if you already have video on YouTube SongGIG makes it easy to embed your YouTube video to share on SongGIG.  That's what I did for my first SongGIG post.

It's free for both fans and artists to register and the site is super simple to navigate, which is refreshing.  SongGIG.com has one purpose:  to help users find undiscovered musical talent.

Here's a quote from Glenn, the creator of SongGIG:
"My daughter sings and it made me wonder just how new singer's get discovered or seen. There is YouTube, but there are so many videos on there and how does one get found on there? Unless you know what you are looking for. Some of the cream does rise to the top, but I am sure there are many great musicians on there that never get heard. I wanted to develop a resource for musical talent that is easy to navigate (think Apple simple) and for one purpose only."

The only suggestion I would give right now to SongGIG is is to offer Facebook "Like" buttons and one-click Retweet options on every song video web page on SongGIG.  Simple tools like this can help SongGIG fans and artists spread the word about their own videos or favorite videos (if they're a fan) to their social media audiences helping spread the word for the artists, fans and SongGIG.

Feel free to read about SongGIG straight from the horse's mouth.

Posted by:  Nick Venturella

Join in February Album Writing Month (FAWM), it’s free!

From the FAWM.org website:

“The FAWM challenge issimple: 14 songs in 28 days.

Ifit's inspiration you are after, then FAWM is your club. Each February, thiswebsite forges a collaborative community of musicians worldwide, from all walksand skill levels. We are taking on the challenge of writing an album's worth ofnew music during the shortest month of the year. We ‘fawmers’ are a motley mixof music professionals, students, homemakers, and folks who work day jobs butrock nightclubs. Got questions? Check out the FAQ.”


I’ve officially participated in FAWM once before, back in 2008.  I say officially meaning that I actuallylogged into the FAWM.org website and shared songs with the online communitythere in ‘08. 

Though I didn’t officially participate online in 2009 and 2010, I didpersonally pursue the challenge on my own. 

Each year I’ve attempted the challenge I’ve always gotten at least a few goodsongs out it.

The emphasis of FAWM is on songwriting, not recording or productionquality – recording your songs is simply a way to share them with the FAWMcommunity to get and give feedback.

FAWM is a worthwhile experience even if you don’t think you’ll be ableto write 14 songs in 28 days – just do the best you can, have fun and engage inthe FAWM community, you’ll be glad you did.

Plus, it will force you to work quickly while being open to more spontaneity,which is often new for a lot of songwriters…It forces you to write what I call,“first impression” songs, meaning you capture your initial song ideasimmediately as they happen and you really don’t have time to labor over theirdevelopment…just capture it and move on to the next one.  If you think you still may have troublecoming up with song ideas FAWM provides regular challenges and potential topicsto write songs about.  This can be reallyuseful for any songwriter who feels they’ve hit a creative block.

Probably the best benefit is the feedback you’ll get if you participatein the online community (be sure to give plenty of feedback as well – it worksbest that way).

So, are you up for the challenge?

Posted by: Nick Venturella (click my name to link to my first FAWM song of 2011)

Christopher Penn recently posted a blog/podcast about “Doing more with less.”  I love the innovative, resourcefulness concept behind many of his comments.

One of the things he references early in his talk is that technology by itself is boring, essentially it’s just a tool to achieve a certain outcome, but the person behind the technology--the one driving it’s use--can make something new, engaging and exciting with it.  Penn, goes on with an example about photographers and digital cameras...Digital camera’s are so technologically advanced that a skilled photographer who knows about light and composition can take a photo with a mobile phone camera that is as beautiful or more so than an amateur with the latest and greatest SLR digital camera--the reason:  the human behind the technology.

This got me fired up in a really positive way.  I love the idea of being innovative and resourceful, using whatever you have at your disposal to create something exciting and professional.  Essentially, my whole creative career has been based on this concept.  I’m a minimalist when it comes to equipment and tools of the trade.  In fact, I like overcoming the challenges of various limitations--limits on time, scope of a particular concept, or the materials and tools to which I have access.

Those limitations won’t stop me, they just make me more creative and innovative.  In fact, I would go as far as to say that I get a greater sense of accomplishment once I’ve completed a project where I’ve overcome the challenges of various limitations.

So the next time you give yourself an excuse to not do something because you think you don’t have the right tools I would encourage you to think again and ask yourself, “How can I do this with the tools I have access to?”

Posted by:  Nick Venturella

The Artist's Way (affiliate), Recommended Reading