A Saxophone Teacher And Music Producer's October Update
It's been four weeks since my last blog so here's an update on what I've been doing since then and what the future holds in store as Christmas looms.
ALL THINGS SAXOPHONE AND CLARINET
For the first time since the start of the pandemic back in March 2020, my total number of clarinet and saxophone tutees now matches those I had before COVID. After what had been a quieter-than-usual August, since everyone was able to finally go on holiday, September saw not only my younger students come back for regular clarinet and saxophone lessons but some new faces as well, and there are already new enquiries in the pipeline too which is fantastic!
Unfortunately, despite looking after and maintaining my woodwind instruments carefully, I also realised that the last time I had my instruments serviced and repaired was in 2019. When COVID started, it became difficult for all of us musicians to get our musical instruments checked over and I began to hear from other people how ridiculous the queue was so I thought to myself "it's fine, I don't need to get them serviced yet, I can wait until the queues go down".
I'm now at a point where I'm being offered opportunities to perform and I can tell my woodwind instruments are not at 100% so I recently grit my teeth and called my local store. They quoted January, which is better than March that another shop quoted me. The problem is, having gone in with them last Friday so the technician can have a quick look, I have four saxophones and a clarinet that, while they still play perfectly well, all need a thorough servicing and replacement of a few pads, springs, and tightening of screws. I'd best get saving!
STOCK MUSIC PRODUCTION LIBRARIES
September saw me decide to do my annual 'let's find some new stock music libraries to apply to' search. I managed to find eight; three have accepted, two rejected me, and three I've yet to hear from, though they did say it would take at least a month to check the application. I've been pleasantly surprised by this result so far. The pandemic meant that TV and film production slowed a lot during 2020 (even to a halt at some points) which led to many music producers and musicians having spare time to compose but also meant stock music libraries weren't seeing many sales either. This led to a surplus of new music with nowhere to go. Production libraries have, therefore, been quite strict with applications, some closing their doors entirely while they catch up with the backlog.
Over the past couple of weeks, on these new production libraries that have accepted me, it's been a case of uploading my huge catalogue as quickly and efficiently as I can, which takes time when you're only one person who also teaches, practices, produces music, and needs to make time for family and other things unrelated to music.
LOOKING AHEAD
Still, despite the juggling, things are looking positive and I've found myself thinking ahead to 2022 and about what it has in store. Having seen a really encouraging interest in them, I'm continuing to arrange and upload more video game music videos to YouTube which sees more subscribers each week.
The infrequency of these blogs will probably continue from now on but I don't want to say how irregular as it could be anything from two weeks to two months so I'll sign off by saying, see you in the next one whenever it appears. Don't forget, though, that you can keep up-to-date with me on twitter and youtube.
P.S.
If you are looking for clarinet lessons or a saxophone teacher near you, I offer face-to-face music lessons in Wells, UK and online music lessons to anyone worldwide. I have 1000+ royalty-free stock music production tracks available to buy and am available for hire for original music compositions. Feel free to get in touch!