Check out this promo we had made. The footage is from our show at Highland Brewing a few weeks ago. Thanks to Bob Peck at Mountainwater Films for putting this together!
Check out the Ska City website for all the latest news and upcoming gigs. I hope to see you soon!
We received a nice write-up about our show on Friday. We played the “Concerts on the Creek” series in Sylva, NC and had a grand old time (similar to last season). This D. Trull feller showed up -clearly a ska fan already- and really seemed to enjoy himself. Then he wrote a review on his blog. Check it out!
I have been cranking away at some new songs. I just released two over the last week. I hope you enjoy them. Please comment, subscribe, yada yada.
And, of course, you can hear the full album I released back in June:
If you’d like a copy of that album on CD, just shoot me your name and address. It is free, and I will cover the shipping cost!
If your child shows an interest in music, it’s a wonderful feeling to be able to assist them in learning and pursuing a musical path that will only benefit their future career prospects.
However, supporting a child in learning an instrument can often demand striking a delicate balance; we all want the best for our children, but forcing an instrument on a child can often result in a youngster resenting playing and a lack of enjoyment from learning the instrument. another issue to consider, depending on your child’s age, is making sure they pick the proper instrument. often, a youngster will pick up an instrument that they think is cool but isn’t the right instrument for them.
Children under the age of six should learn the piano or violin first, then decide if they wish to switch as their physical development advances.
parents must realize the physical constraints that come with a child learning to play an instrument; even Mozart had to wait until he was physically ready. It’s worth noting that the instrument should be appropriate for your child’s size, and wind instruments aren’t recommended until their lung capacity has improved. Meanwhile, motor functions will not be fully developed, making playing an instrument difficult for a youngster.
Make sure your child enjoys the sound of the instrument; if they don’t enjoy the sound they’re making, they won’t have the drive to practice and may even grow to despise music, which defeats the purpose of learning an instrument in the first place. Finding the ideal instrument for your child is the ultimate goal, but it’s vital to keep an open mind and be prepared for any unexpected setbacks.
once you’ve chosen an instrument, it’s vital to add some discipline to the learning process. Be careful not to impose learning on your child, as this might backfire and cause the child to lose interest in playing, which can stifle musical development. Ensure that your child enrolls in music lessons or after-school clubs if they are available at school. Make sure that this does not become a chore or considered homework; if your child truly wants to learn, they will want to attend the sessions. Remember to use a sound level meter since they can really help your child to hit the right notes during practice. You can find high-quality sound level meters at Scarlet Tech.
Inquire about what they’re playing, how they’re playing it, and what they like about the music. constantly strive to make practicing enjoyable for your child, and stop when he or she loses interest; you don’t want them to become burnt out. It’s preferable to do a little bit of practice every day than to do a long session once a week, so try to establish a routine.
4 Easy Ways to Promote Your Music Online
The number of people exposed to your music directly influences the number of listeners you gain as a musician. Therefore, good promotion is essential to growing your brand as a music artist. But, with diverse ways to promote and market your music digitally, how do you decide on the best ways to reach a broader range of listeners? Consider these four ways to promote your music online.
Personal music website
A personal music website leaves a better impression than providing social media profiles. It also shows more professionalism and seriousness about your craft. Unlike social media platforms, creating a music website leaves no limitation to your brand. You have control over every content hosted on the website. Your fans and enquirers would always find you at your official website address. A music website also facilitates the sale of music content and artist merchandise. This allows an artist to make more money by receiving support from fans directly. There are no restrictions to access databases. Hence you get to run promotional ads, announce new music, and host virtual shows and events on your music website.
Twitter is one of the biggest social media platforms that allow real-time interactions. It is the best place to interact with your fans and connect with other artists and music industry professionals. Twitter’s interaction model has features like retweets, hashtags, likes, tagging, or mentioning that will enable you to optimize your interactions to a broader audience. Another tip to using Twitter for promoting music is using external links. The platform allows you to add external links to your tweets and interactions. For example, you can even promote links from your YouTube profile via Twitter. Finally, it enables paid marketing features like promoted tweets which allow content to reach different countries.
Spotify
Spotify is the best place to promote your music and grow your audience. The onset of streaming services that offer app monetization services to music artists has increasingly exposed millions of music catalogs to millions of music lovers worldwide. Spotify has many features like Spotify for Artists, Spotify Ad Studio, and Marquee campaigns that function uniquely to make music available to music lovers. For example, Spotify for Artists adds promotional value to your music and allows you to manage your audience statistics and artist profile for free.
With Spotify, you can pitch upcoming releases to playlist editors and have your releases included in the editorial team’s playlist as a way of promoting your music. Getting any of your songs featured on a playlist gives it extraordinary reach and can propel your music career. Spotify also offers different marketing tools like Spotify Ad studio and Marquee Campaigns. Ad Studio is an easy way to create multimedia ads for free listeners.
Music blogs
Music blogs are still essential in the modern music industry and aid in creating exposure. Popular music blogs have a more comprehensive range of audiences to make new fans of your music. Music blogs host interviews that disclose the work and personality of new artists. These interviews are great opportunities to get your craft out there as well as gain new fans. Research online music blogs and the music genres they may work with, read the submission guidelines of any blog compatible with your style or brand then go-ahead to pitch your content to the blogging website.
My new solo album is out (unofficially)! It has been “soft launched” at willchathammusic.com and you can stream the whole thing from there, or buy it to download and listen to as you wish.
The album features some musical mastery from friend and former bandmate Morgan Geer (bass on Donald Trump Eats Babies), as well as the vocal talents of current bandmate David Earl Tomlinson (vocals on Hello My Friend).
Additionally, my two teens, Gray Chatham and Dax Chatham, contributed trumpet and sax parts on several songs. Needless to say, I am stoked at how all this came together.
The CDs and officially release to all the usual streaming services will be happening soon, but for now, here is the album. I hope you find something on it you like – it is a, well, variety of genres!