Musicians: Should you quit your day job?

…I can’t give you a blanket answer for that question, obviously. But I will tell you what’s important: day job or no day job, be sure to not treat your music career as just a hobby.

A career in the music business is in some ways similar to any other bootstrapping, entrepreneurial activity. It’s acceptable, even arguably smart, to start on a small scale backed by whatever type of conventional employment you can stomach.

Yeah, yeah, I know: working your day gig can take some spring out of your step, but it may also bring you key benefits like health insurance (don’t hit the road without that one, folks!)

Still, supplemental employment is no reason to treat your music as just a hobby. To succeed in the music business on your own terms, you’ll need to run your career like a real business – beginning now. Run your part-time business just as professionally as a full-timer would.

My friend Charlie Hunter, legendary manager emeritus of Dar Williams, Richard Shindell, et. al and current proprietor of The Roots on the Rails Music Train tells this story about a recent “overnight success”:

“If you caught the heart-tugging story on Oprah (Faith Hill recently recorded a whole album of folksinger Lori McKenna’s songs), you would think that Lori was a ‘stay at home mom’ who had only played a couple local clubs before her big, big break. In reality, Lori toured for years, released several CDs that were nationally distributed, and had serious music-business connections. She never, ever treated music as just a hobby.”

I’ve written more on this subject and others in my Insider’s Guide: How to Thrive in the Music Business: Ten ideas from Micah Solomon. If you’d like a free copy (it would be my pleasure!) as well as other goodies, please click here.

–Micah

Micah Solomon

President

Oasis Disc Manufacturing

http://oasisCD.com