Working with Agents ....................................................................................
Unless you are working full-time for a company, you’re going to be considered
a freelance musician by most people you deal with — which can be both good
and bad for your working relationships. On the bad side, if the company can
find someone cheaper than you who is just as good, or merely adequate, they’ll
probably go with that composer. Another bad aspect of being a freelancer is
that a disreputable company might decide not to pay you for work completed,
or cut the project off just short of completion and steal your composition.
Unless you’ve got a great lawyer on your side and a lot of time on your hands,
these cases are almost always hopeless for the freelance composer.On the good side, as a freelancer you get to choose your own work hours and
most often work from home. You have to own your own equipment, of course,
but that also means you get to work on the equipment that you’re most com-
fortable with. Also, if you get a hinky feeling about a company that you’re
working with, and you can afford to withdraw from the project, you have the
choice of dropping them and approaching a different company for work
instead.When you hire an agent, a lot of the bad aspects of freelancing change. For one
thing, a good agent will find work for you and, having a stake in whatever
money you make, will only approach companies that have a good reputation.
So, no more getting ripped off. Secondly, many bigger production companies,
such as Disney, absolutely will not work with anyone or any company not
represented by an agency. Most television stations also only work with an
artist or company through an agent.There are, of course, horror stories about musicians’ agents, but most of
them have to do with choosing an agent without checking his or her reputa-
tion first. The best way to find an agent is to find out what agencies represent
some of the musicians or composers you admire — easily found by a quick
search on the Internet. Start with those agents first and see where that gets
you. Many times, even if these agents turn you down, they’ll refer you to a
another agent that might suit your needs better.Songwriting ...................................................................................................
Just about everyone has written at least one song in their life, whether it was
as a three-year-old making up new lyrics to “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” or,
later, playing around with chord progressions and making up lyrics on the
spot to accompany the resulting instrumental. The fact of the matter is that
writing songs isn’t very difficult. However, writing good songs, or at least songs
that other people outside of your immediate family can truly enjoy, can be
very hard.220 Part IV: Orchestration and Arrangement