Soon there will be no recording labels in existence. What are we holding out for then? No one is making any money in classical recording any more, except for members of a few orchestras with very deep pockets (and believe me, those orchestras are throwing money down the drain simply for the prestige value of recording for Deutsche Grammophone or other soon-to-be dead labels). Using recorded music as a marketing tool is the future, using it as a source of direct revenue is the past.
I read that, and much more, here. I suppose some of my colleagues will be annoyed with me, but I do think it’s time for us to get with the era we live in. It seems to me that we could rethink the recording rules we have.
Heck, as I’ve mentioned before, I can’t even get a recording of myself because of our strict rules!
You get mad high fives from me for being one of the few professional classical musicians I’ve talked to who think this.
I’m going to guess I’ll get in trouble for it, though. But whatever. I just feel we are so busy thinking we should get $$ for every single thing we do that we forget that a little publicity might actually bring folks in the door. And YouTube is publicity. So are sound files. But we can’t put one darn thing up without all sorts of permission from the powerful people. Or so I’ve been told.
Besides, there are a few performances I’d like to have copies of just so I can listen to them. Because I actually liked my playing, miracle of miracles.
Sigh.