Hi Alador,

Welcome to JPF!

I have not read the other posts thoroughly, but I took a broad listen to your portfolio (a little to them all and none in particular, to get a feel for your songwriting) and checked out your website too.. l0ove the range of stringed instruments you have there. Looks a lot like my own livingroom :-)

To me, it sounds like you are in a great place already.. IMHO your songs displays good writing, both lyrics and music, good instrumental chops all over the band, great sense of instrumentation and arrangement (well, maybe except for the long intro the guys are raving about - publishers won't accept that when they listen to 50 songs a day). Overall your stuff comes across as very musical to me!

The recordings you have, sounds like live recordings. To me they sound pretty good as such, but for demos, they might not be tight enough in the production. And the songs doesn't sound like hits, but it doesn't look like that's been your game up till now either, after listening to your portfolio.

So, Im certain you have all thats necessary to get ahead. The place I think you could improve the most, would be to learn how to produce ypur own music. If you have done these recordings, you seem to know how to record a live band. To take it one step further, you should learn how to produce demos for commercial markets (sounds about like Radio, except vocals are even more upfront, instrumental solo's are edited out, and you go a little more easy on 'earcandy' stuff).

You also seem to sing all your own songs, and you absolutely sound wonderful! But for a marketable portfolio you'd want to have different voices on your work, to display the versatility of your songs and to support the imagination of other artists singing your songs (IF that's what you want). You sound like an experienced troubadour from the Dylan generation, and that's great, but you'd be absolutely amazed what great demosingers can do for the marketability of your songs.

The overall tone of your work seems to be Roots music, Singer/songwriter, Americana, and I really dig your instrumental work. One of the most in demand genres for tv/film are accoustic songs, so if you get into the producing ect., I would look into Taxi (www.taxi.com ) or similar places, to find outlets for your music. Your styles are very much in demand in the tv/film game, and I'd say some of these recordings are close to what they want. You can learn to take it further by getting some of Taxi's production critiques.

So, I'd suggest you consider the producing track, seek out great singers for your songs to add variety, try to get in the tv/film market with your accoustic stuff, play your current work live, and maybe write some 'hits' on the side (they tend not to be as musically rewarding, these days) :-)

I'd recommend Robin Fredericks book "Shortcuts to Hit songwriting" to get in sync with current hit song formulas, if you want to get in the charts game, and Eric Bealls book "The Billboard guide to writing and producing songs that sell" either way.

Variety ect can be included in a number of ways, though. Todays hit songs are produced in many layers, so all the elements need not be featured at the same time, as long as there are some strong elements to pull the listeners into your songs.

An example: One of the biggest country songs of the year in the US was "Big Green Tractor". It runs on an E-B-C#m-A progression throughout, so chords doesn't rule the game, thats for sure. But it has great lyrics, a nice guitar hook, and a popular artist to do the trick. It's just music, and it doesn't help to write a dissertation about it.

So, like the mentor choir out there always states, just hang in there, be persistant, listen/read/write, seek advice you trust, connect, cowrite and play win-win games.

Happy 2010