I recently interviewed a music publisher and music consultant from Nashville, Chris Keaton, for my podcast. One of the things we talked a lot about was the idea of finding mentors to help guide you on your journey. I'm a huge believer in the concept of mentorship and working with others, in order to learn more about the music
business and advance our careers. As I pointed out in my recent blog post, The Synergy Of Tribes, no man is an island. No single person has all the answers and all the information necessary to succeed. But, collectively, we do.
Chances are, whatever
it is you aspire to do in your career and life, someone has already done it. Unless you aspire to completely reinvent the wheel and revolutionize the industry, there are probably many people out there that have insight into what it is you're trying to accomplish. Why not connect with some of those people and learn from them?
How?
So the question of course is
how. How do you find people to learn from in the industry? Well, this isn't as hard as it may seem at first glance. In my experience, there are actually a lot of people working in the music business that are more than happy to share what they've learned with others.
There are of course people like myself who have both free and premium material that you can learn from. There are tons of free videos on Youtube of
musicians sharing their expertise. Many musicians have blogs where they share what they've learned with the music community at large. There truly is a wealth of information online for musicians to digest and learn from. You might have to do a little digging to find quality information, but there's a goldmine of information right at your fingertips on the internet.
Reach Out And
Connect
When I asked Chris Keaton on my podcast what the best way to find a mentor is, his answer was great. Just call or email them he said. A lot of us don't think to reach out to people in the industry because we assume they probably have no interest in helping us. My experience has been the opposite, there are many people working in the business more than happy to share their knowledge with you if you just
ask.
Of course, not everyone you reach out to is going to go out of their way to help you. Sometimes people are too busy or maybe you're not a good fit. Or maybe you approach them in the wrong way, without bringing anything to the table. But in general, I find that musicians and people working in the industry are a pretty awesome group of people who want to help each other
out.
Take Courses - Online Or Offline
There are of courses traditional courses at universities and colleges, that are a great way of finding and connecting with mentors. Some of my best mentors over the years, the people that I've learned the most from, have been teachers. Former guitar teachers, songwriting teachers and lyric writing teachers, have all made a
profound impact on my life and have been a huge influence on both the music I make and my approach to the business.
Unfortunately, we live in cynical times, and it's easy to assume that because someone is charging money for something that the education being given is somehow tainted or insincere. In my experience, this couldn't be further from the truth. If someone is going into an industry like music education as a career,
they certainly aren't doing it for the money. There are much easier, albeit less soul satisfying ways, of earning a living than teaching or playing music. If someone has chosen to educate others about music or the music business as their means of providing for themselves and their families, chances are their heart is in the right place.
