Throughout the past few years, Americans have become increasingly more aware of where things come from. Whether it be food from local farmers, coffee beans from other countries, or the support of small businesses, consumers are making more of an effort to cut out the middle man and pay those who do all the work what they deserve. 

Why, though, has the same not been done for musicians? 

When you sign your child up for music lessons at a big music business, you should be well aware that a 30%-40% cut is being taken out of what you pay and given to the music store - not the teacher who is teaching your child. The same thing happens when you hire a group to play for your wedding or special event. If you don't see musician bios on the website, the musicians who come to play for you are probably getting paid significantly less than what they deserve. 

It's understandable that everyone has to make a living, but some business owners are simply doing it WRONG. The people who have spent most of their lives working tirelessly to bring music to others deserve better than what is currently going on in our world. 


Here's how you can help bring the fair trade, locally grown movement to the music industry:

1. Take lessons directly from the music teacher: It's easy! Talk to your friends, and see who their teacher is. Go see local orchestras and talk with the musicians about lessons. If you want to take with a company, make sure it is run by actual musicians with actual music degrees. A great example of a "fair trade" music company is one that is owned and run by the teachers themselves. 


2. Hire the ensembles directly: Make sure when hiring an ensemble (quartets, trios, etc.) to look at their website for certain things. Make sure the quartet you're hiring is the quartet who is showing up to your event (not random high school kids - yes this happens). Do not make the mistake of hiring musicians from a website such as www.FREEWEDDINGMUSICOHMYGOSH.com- the musicians are probably not getting paid what they need to be paid, and you will not be getting the quality you deserve either. 
This is an example of an actual, real live, extremely talented string quartet. Hire this kind of ensemble!

3. Rent from Luthiers: While it is tempting to rent a violin for $8.00/month, don't do it. The instruments are very poor quality and are imported from Florida. Yes, Florida. Go to a luthier - someone who makes instruments! Your money will be supporting lutheirs as well as helping you to pay for a quality instrument.

Rent and purchase from here. Not www.1dollaramonthviolin.com

4. Support the Performers Directly: Hopefully you've been keeping up with all the negotiations among professional orchestras and their management. If you haven't...it's been a crazy ride. Of course, go see performances! Buy season passes! It's worth it. Those are world class musicians and you and your children and your grandchildren should experience Beethoven, Mahler, and Mozart as often as possible. BUT make sure you donate directly to the musicians themselves. Maybe even contact your local government and demand a new facility for the performing arts - not another baseball stadium. 

Donate to and promote these fantastic people. Not www.poormanagement.com.


So you started shopping at the farmers market, purchasing fair trade coffee, making your own wine, and supporting local businesses. I urge you now to do the same for music. 

So I was distraught. Here I was, an hour away from a masterclass and I couldn't even play through my piece without some monumental trip up. What was I going to do within this hour? Drone? Drill? Hammer? No. I was going to try something completely different. Something everyone told me never to do. 

I was going to drink some

Eight onces of black, bitter, caffeine infused bean juice. It was fantastic. I didn't touch my cello or look at it or pay any attention to Bach for that entire hour. I just drank my coffee. 

I'm the first on the program. Crap. Why did I drink that coffee? Everyone knows that caffeine is the downfall of every performance. Don't freak out. 

And so I took my bow, pulled it across the string, and played Bach without a single flub. 


Huh? 


So I try again for my next recital, my next masterclass, and my next orchestra concert. Never been better. So for those of you who believe you have to eat 33 bananas, meditate for an hour, and then warm up for 2 more right before your performance, I challenge you to try something different (unless eating 33 bananas is working for you). 

As a future nurse, I've decided that the caffeine has had a positive affect on my body before a performance. I used to get MASSIVE headaches before any performance due to my nerves and stress, and while I was told that coffee would just make me jittery, I've discovered that small amounts of it have improved my playing by dialating the blood vessels in my head, getting rid of the headaches, and allowing me to focus in a way I was not able to before. 

So go ahead! Experiment. 

I suppose my middle and high school years were not at all similar to those of my non-musical peers. I spent hours in pain staking practice sessions that involved me breaking every bad habit I'd accumulated from Ken Stanton schooling (boo). I managed to play with five different orchestras for multiple seasons so that I would have the most orchestral repertoire possible under my belt. I even managed to save up $2,000 on my own so that I could attend the Brevard Music Festival and spend even more time staring myself down in a mirror breaking bad habits - this time, I'd do it in a practice room in the woods. During those four years in high school, I auditioned 28 different times, played in three orchestras simultaneously, and only cried a couple hundred times. Maybe after all of this time and effort I would have something decent to put on my resumé, and I could totally get into Juilliard. 

It hardly made a dent. And I didn't get into Juilliard, but Kennesaw State University is still pretty close. ;) After all that, I'm quite positive that the only thing that got me anywhere in terms of the modest success I achieved is my self discipline.

Without that, I'm unsure how a musician or anyone for that matter could go anywhere. Sure, there's natural talent, but can that naturally talented musician go anywhere if he never seeks out ways of challenging himself through auditions or competitions or going to school? All musicians need an immense amount of self discipline to sit down in a practice room for hours on end and fine tune everything - you can't just use pegs. :P It also takes self discipline to set goals and to act on them as well. 

And while my resumé isn't bloated with musical goodies and I'm not sitting around in a Juilliard practice room terrified of someone coming to cut my strings while I'm not looking, I think the success I've achieved is a decent amount, and I would not have the ability to continue that success without the self discipline I've developed over the years.