Sunday, April 26, 2009

Dear Folk Star Manager

Greetings,

Thanks for bugging me for the last seventeen weeks over and over ad infinitum, trying to secure a booking for your self-proclaimed folk star artist. Sorry I have not gotten back to you sooner, but frankly I was hoping you'd leave me alone awhile, since I am engaged with a project at this time.

I do understand that since I did not communicate this, that you have been persistent, and I am fine with this.

However, when I did finally respond, I asked a question of your self-proclaimed folk-star, a question that is rather important to me with respect to the audiences I represent.

It's an easy question, and of course there is no "right" answer. I don't expect anyone to invest a ton of time in it. Seems to me it adds a spark of fun, a refreshing spark.

You wrote back to say how silly it was for me to ask a question of your super-busy-important folk-star, and what a waste of your time it would be to play this "guessing game". The funny thing is though, you took a stab at answering it for her. The even funnier thing is, when she wrote to call me a liar, she gave the same answer you gave. Weird, huh? She said, basically, this is a stupid game, here is my answer, I don't want to play at your venue, go away.

Now frankly, I cannot imagine why it is silly or inappropriate for me to aska question of someone who would like to be hired for a gig. I understand it is not a traditional question, but I am not sure why that makes it a waste of time. Both of you found time to answer it while you were chastising me for not simply booking or dismissing an unknown performer.

Anyway, the reason I asked the question is that frankly I do not want to hire a performer that puts the money before the spirit of music. Our audiences deserve better. All audiences deserve better, for every audience is the best.

Anyway, I liked your answer - that the "best" audiences, in your opinion, are attentive. Had you been able to answer in some sort of positive spirit, the next question would have been about your minimum fee - that is, how much do we need to pay you to book you? You see, we run on a non-profit basis, and our work and our approach to Making Music More Accessible(tm) has been supported by the likes of REM/Athens, Billy Joel, Dolly Parton and the Dave Matthews Band. To name a few. David Wilcox, Andrew McKnight, Dave Crossland and many others have played our venues.

And we do not charge the audience for a ticket. We raise the funds, and pay musicians to help us Make Music More Accessible(tm). We encourage Audience Inclusion(tm), and we help make it economically feasible for artists like your folk-star, that make their living with their music.

In her message, your folk-star said to me that she was not sure why I had gone to such trouble to "make up" a story, or something like that. Well, Miss Manager, dialogue is how humans clarify, when they are interested in the spirit of communication. Either of you could have asked. Of course this means you would have to possess a certain level of respect for someone like me, and for an unknown. You would have to possess a certain curiosity; a certain understanding that things are not always what they seem, and things are always always changing, evolving, growing, becoming... You would have to understand that This is precisely what Time is for.

I would guess that if those big stars whose names you like to drop had asked the question you would not have come back so negatively.

But maybe you would have. Maybe, in the end, it is like you said in your message to me: "I do not do this for altruistic purposes..."

Thanks for sharing.

I love that part. It's like saying "I write and sing altruistic songs, but I do not do this for altruistic purposes."

This folk star thing, I don't get...

Best of Now, always,

Greg

Thursday, April 2, 2009

Do the Math...

Every day many members of the popular art audience move into facilities that conveniently, for artists engaged in Audience Inclusion, double as Community Venues.

At the same time the popular art audience takes another hit.

Do the math...

Look again.

There's a fine line between Compassionate Consideration of One's Fellow Beings and Condescending Consideration of Poor Other.

They're all your band of angels.