Archives for July 2009

Dear Passengers, How much effort is enough? How do you know when you've given the music business your best shot and it simply wasn't enough? I saw this very issue debated on our forum. Somebody was ready to give up on songwriting because he felt that he had given it all he had, and the wall was too high for him to get over. I had three reactions to what he had written. 1) He was frustrated and wanted his friends on the forum to talk him out of quitting. 2) How badly did he really want to be in...

Read More

Dear Passengers, It is said that, "a man's wealth can be measured by his friends." Assuming that's true, I am fabulously wealthy, indeed. I never imagined how many of my old friends would come out of the woodwork when I started TAXI seventeen years ago. Several of them showed up at the Country Songwriting seminar I did in Nashville last week, and it was great to see them all. One of them has been a friend since the '70s! One of the "responsibilities" — if you can call it that — of having so many friends that are also TAXI...

Read More

Dear Passengers, I've been having one of those weeks where "signs" are everywhere. You know what I mean... little signs that keep pointing to things you shouldn't or can't ignore. For me, the signs have all pointed to the same thing - songwriters, artists and composers missing opportunities that are staring them in the face. The first sign was getting a call from a top Film/TV publisher telling me that 70% of the TAXI members she contacted with deal offers didn't respond. When queried, the members told me they weren't sure if the deal offer was real or legitimate, even...

Read More

Dear Passengers, Aristotle once said, "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit." Every year, our members who come to the Road Rally, stop me and tell me how stoked they are that they came. They can't wait to get home and use all the new songwriting and production tips and techniques they learned at the convention. Their heads seem as if they are about to explode! It's incredible to feel their energy. But I often wonder how many of them can sustain that level of energy and commitment once they get home....

Read More