JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum So Where Does Your Song Rank On Ourstage?

Well Brian I would never intentionally do anything to hurt JPF or screw up a forum. If that is the case then do what you must.
Delete me and anything I have said that hurts this or any other thread, post, or forum.
That I have my own opinions are just that, my opinions.

This all started because someone made some accusations about Ourstage, I thought I was defending them.

HEY!! MY SON'S BAND, THREE TALL PINES, "STILLHOUSE ROAD," IS #1 ONSTAGE BLUEGRASS RIGHT NOW!!!
COOL!!
Joanne!

More good news from Joanne.
Those guys can play. Congrats. I hope they stay on top.

It definitely saves on extra clicks to find out how your songs are doing. I only wish it included all songs you have entered for the month...it only shows me three out of seven.

But yes, very cool feature.

Cool Joanne! If they get to your house to play or nearby, let me know, so I can tell Kathy Eckert, who lives down the other street near you. She and her late husband, (my growing up best friend), used to always go to the Philadelphia Folk Festival. She loves all kinds of good ole American music, including of course, Bluegrass! She would get a kick out of it, I know.

Wishing your son and his band all the best!
John

Three Tall Pines absolutely Rock! They deserve it. Number one with a day left to go, they've got a good shot.

My bluegrass song reached the top five but has slipped lately, 19 yesterday. Oh well.

Hey Bill -
it sure is my pleasure to share good news.. Hope I can keep coming up with things to share
thanks
Joanne

Hey John -
I remember that sad time for you. Hope your friend, Kathy is doing well.
TTP does have some gigs coming up in RI ... i'll keep you posted ... or you can check their website
www.myspace.com/threetallpines

Thanks for your well wishes. Joanne

Hey Mike!!! -
I told Joe to be sure to check out your bluegrass!!
I am leaning about ourstage ... still in the dark ... one day to go for ???? what???? if it's something good ..hope they can hang on!!! Lots of info on this thread .. i'm gonna spend some time surfing through and get up to speed.
Joanne

When you realize what writing a "hit" country song involves......I mean writing one and getting it placed are two separate accomplishments. You still may have a "hit" on your hands but unless it's placed, cut, released and pushed it won't be recognized as a hit. You have to listen to critiques as well as accolades in this biz. You can choose to agree or not. I've been writing and recording for over 20 years and I'm still learning everyday.

Paul,

Smart writers keep learning. When I talk to those with many big hits, they are the first to say they learn more about writing and the business constantly and that it's always changing so what worked even a year ago doesn't any more. These hit writers are very practical artisans that are sort of like custom furniture designers or architects. They can use their talent to give the clients exactly what they want. If you find that distasteful, keep writing what you want, but don't lament that no one else cares. Either you're serving the commercial market, or you're serving your ego. Either way, you have to live with the results.

Brian

Mike, Thanks for the supportive words. Looking for to checking out your website once I get through the thread.

Also, these thread is huge and has so much good info, thanks to all the people who built it. It is going to take a while to get through all of this info but I am sure it is worth it.

Is it really just that black and white? I would love to write songs that resonate with the public, but maybe I don't have it in me, or maybe I do -- I have only been writing for 1 1/2 years. My take on OurStage is that if you can consistently place your songs in the top 10%, then maybe you've got something.

Of course, I realize that OurStage rewards good performances of good songs. Until I can get someone else to perform my songs (or suddenly, I get better) I know that I don't stand much of a chance. I understand that and accept it, but I still hold out hope that I can slip a song or two in there that might do pretty well. I plan to keep trying.

Kevin

It's a great tool for me. I had some initial success, with my first two entries ending at #22 and #34 in April. I thought, Great!! What I'm doing is working!!

This month I entered those same two songs and five others. One is at #220 and the rest are between 300 and 700 with very little movement, including the one that finished #22 in April (which, truth be told, has now dropped to about #1000).

What makes it a great tool, is that it gives you a good reality check. In my case, it forced me to come to terms with the half-assed aspects of my recordings. There have been lots of takes that were "close enough". There have been arrangements that when all was said and done, just didn't have any "sparkle." There is MIDI that is just -slightly- out of sync.

This really came to the forefront when I started judging other people's work. The "home productions" have a lot more errors, arrangement issues, pitch problems, etc. when compared to (what sound like) "studio productions." I think that what I'm hearing is not the difference between home production and professional studio production per se, but the difference in where people are setting the bar for themselves.

So, what made me think that if I can hear "close enough" in other people's songs, no one would notice that in mine?

While the fundamental appeal of the song itself is a major factor, the importance of a well-executed production cannot be understated. It's been said many times before, but I'm finally seeing where that bar is set as far as my own work is concerned.

Thanks, OurStage!

Kevin, the comment has to be in the context of you desiring to have commercial success. It's like opening a paint store. If you put the pain in a container that works for your customers and makes them happy and they buy it, you're serving their needs as your customers. If you put it in some type of container that they hate, simply because you like it that way, then you're serving your ego and you're not going to do very well. Same with music. If you WANT to pursue selling music, you HAVE to give people what they actually want. It's not a social experiment where your goal is to change the entire worlds perceptions. Sometimes that actually happens by accident.. (i.e. someone does something very different but people catch on to it and love it) but I think it rarely happens when 1 single person plans it that way. I know a lot of folks who take that approach.. most aren't selling CD's or getting gigs or airplay.

I actually appreciate weird approaches to music. That's because I do this for a living and it's a specific area of interest. If I go to McDonalds.. most of the time I want a hamburger and fries. Sure, they could stop serving those and instead serve soybean burgers exclusively. They might feel that is more politically correct or healthy. And that's great. I just would't go back there nor would most other people who eat there. Instead, they give us what we want, even if it's not the healthiest or most environmentally/socially positive thing they can do. And of course they sell a LOT of hamburgers.

Music is no different. To you, it's your life and heart and soul. To most, it's just another choice of hamburgers or soy burgers.

Make your choice and be happy with the results. Don't like the results? Change your approach. But many want to do it their way only and then want to blame everyone else for their failure.. (the labels, the radio stations, the public.. blah blah blah). I see how people vote in our awards each time. It sometimes boggles my mind that they choose the clearly inferior song over the clearly better song.. but it's their choice and I learned from that. I see it happening in real time and I have to accept the fact. I actually think sometimes what makes really cool art of any kind (including music) special is that only a few people get it.. when it becomes the accepted norm, people who like unique art will run it down. If you have a type of music that is unique, artists and the like will praise it's originality and awesomeness.. once the masses adopt it as well, those same folks will insult it and say it's a sell out and it sucks. But it's the same exact thing as before.

Aren't humans great? = )

Brian

emdub123: I listened to a few of your tunes at OurStage. here are a couple of quick observations (or opinions):

A Long Way From Home: There has been lots of talk about long intros -- and that is even more critical at OurStage. You don't get started singing until 0:35. maybe try the start the "intro" at 0:29 and be singing in 6 seconds.

A Broken man: Lower in volume than the 1st tune and the vocals are a little "buried". Bring them to the forefront a little more.

As with everyone else, you have to really do a strict 15-20 second test and see if it grabs the listener. Great songs don't have to, but it seems that if you expect to do well at OurStage, the first 15-30 seconds are really critical.

Kevin

Hi Kevin,

Thanks for taking the time to listen and give feedback! I appreciate it. Until recently, I never gave long intros any consideration. Not only is it an issue in my recordings, my wife also commented that I do it in my live show. I very often go through the chord progression once just to get the groove going before I start the vocal. Not too pro, I'm afraid...

Hi Y'all...I really want to try Ourstage...and I've written
asking about a children's song category. Are you hearing many kids songs on there...? (Ourstage did write back and tell me
they'd think about it....so it's still possible)....

If I did put any of them up...would I just choose the closest
feel...i.e., country...or folk etc..... Would any of you be willing to give me an ear...to figure out where to place them? ....

very best....and thanks!
Kaley....

Miss Willow's Fence Row
http://cdbaby.com/cd/kwwg2

Hi Kaley, if it were me I'd pick folk.

Kaley,

I think they'll add a Children's category eventually. Probably sooner than later I bet.

Brian

Well, Three Tall Pines is going into the semi-finals at number one in Bluegrass, congrats! My song "Wait in the Valley" is at number five in Bluegrass, and Everett Adams' "Just Another Day, is eighteen in Bluegrass.

How about the other JPFers, which of y'all is in the semi-finals?

I saw Jenn Cristy at #3 in Pop. She's amazing live and blew the town away at our Cincy show last summer. She left being a back up singer for Mellancamp to do her own thing. I am glad she did!

Brian

I also see in Comedy:

#1: Greg Tamblyn (he won our JPF Novelty Award with that song)
#2: Zircon
#8: Everett Adams
#11: Mark Kaufman

I've only checked Pop and Comedy.. I am guessing based on early in the month we have over 200 finalists.. so many I can't keep track these days..

Just checked covers for 2 I knew were entered neither made the top 20.. though both should have..

#69: Jane Jensen: Miss You (I think that performance is far better than anything in the Top 20.. play it and see if you agree with me)

#119: Big Jim Merriless: I think he should have been in the running for the top 20.. but he's at least been there before.

Being on dialup means I can't take part in the judging (just takes too long), do you think that hurts my chances in finishing higher in the standings. Also I have to upload my songs at a lower quality, that hurts too.

What the heck? I'm #1 in Comedy.

Do they reshuffle the decks on that top 20 once they start the quarterfinals? Quite a surprise this morning.

Mark: Take a screen capture of it!!! Of course, I expect you may have a few more #1's down the road.

Kevin

Well, the boys and I managed to squeak into the quarter-finals in Traditional Country with "Time, Peace, and Pain." I think we're running about #18 right now. This is the first time we've ever made the quarters, so we're kinda excited.

I have heard some really good tunes from fellow JPFers along the way.

Eric

My highest one is #20 in Spoken Word. I guess that may qualify me for quarter-finals(It's really more of a comedy song). Congratulations to all who made the quarter-finals. As I made known I'm focusing on the comedy genre where I've seen some JPFers. Everett, Mark, and Andrew congratulations. I've judged 95 battles in the QF there and all of you are in my top 5. However, I honestly think Greg Tamblyn has these best that's there. Hey Everett, how'd you do in Bluegrass? I've liked everything I've heard from you. Andrew and Everett probably have the best chance of doing well outside the comedy genre because of production and performance. Best wishes.

My song "The Lighter Side Of Poverty" started out at #22 in male singer singwriter and ended up at #155 out of 963 entries. I ain't complaining. That ain't too bad. I'll run it again next month. Ben

Congrats to all of you.. I was going to try and list all the JPFers that are finalists but frankly there's just too many to do that and too little time around here.. but suffice it to say that the quarters are teaming with JPF members in nearly every category.

= )

Brian

Everett,

Your success should DEFINITELY put to rest the idea in anyone's mind that it's just those who can vote for themselves that do well. You can't even vote at all and you're rocking in several categories. The truth is that either people like your stuff or they don't. The results are a simple reflection. Sure, they can be off in some cases, but no over and over and over. If your songs are consistently rising to the top 1/3.. you're doing something right.. if they are always in the bottom 1/3 you need to re-examine your work. I am not talking just 1 month, but over several months. It's a good tool to reconsider things like 45 second intros and weak vocals. I am not saying you can NEVER find success with those things, (heck one of my favorite rock songs ever is Long Time by Boston with a nearly 3 minute intro) but if you're just repeating a guitar progression for 45 seconds, I'd definitely reconsider if you're not doing well.

Congrats again.. let's hope we get some folks in the semi finals!

Brian

I just uploaded an instrumental guitar medley of two Public domain old time fiddle tunes on the solo instrumental channel for August. It will be interesting to see if it gets tagged. I know for a fact that the songs are P/D. One of them is over 200 years old. Ben

I am not sure what the rules are on that. Does it say if you can post public domain stuff outside the cover category? It seems the channels should indicate what is permitted. The default should probably be originals only written by members of the band or the artist involved. But they may not make that distinction. I think if there's a "traditional" channel that would be okay. In Solo Instrumental, I'd probably flag it.

Brian

My experience my first month on Ourstage:

I've been signed up with Ourstage since April but, due to a busy schedule, didn't actually upload anything until this month.

I'm not a performing artist but I do enjoy composing and recording instrumentals so I uploaded a short piece - Prelude (We Three Kings) - and entered it in the instrumental competition. I didn't actually get it entered till July 14th but I figure that's enough time for it to get a fair shake judging wise.

My impressions so far:

1. Due to the sheer number of entries in most categories and the structure of the competition; I believe it would be very difficult (if not impossible) to game this system.

2. The only minor downsides, in my opinion, are A. I doubt there are very many people judging that are not entered in the competition (at least in the early rounds). So, in essence, we have the choir judging the singing contest. B. The 15 second minimum "listen time" allows nauseatingly repetitive, loop based entries to do much better than they would ever do under "real world" circumstances. Many of these entries would be at the bottom of the heap if judges listened long enough to realize that it's just the same catchy loop (probably straight out of Acid), over and over and over and over again.

These, however, are minor (and I believe unavoidable) nits on what is otherwise a very slick setup.

3. I think for the most part, the judging process gets it right. I do believe it's a "give or take" outcome, meaning that your entry generally ends up about where it should, give or take. Over the long run it might place higher or lower but Ourstage seems to do a pretty good job of defining the range. To me that makes Ourstage a very useful tool.

I had some free time last week and, in total, I judged about 270 battles in the instrumental category. There was one song I judged several times that I do believe - based on the competition - should have placed in the Top 20. That was "Labyrinth" by Andrew Aversa (aka zircon). The quality of that piece is outstanding. It has a perfect groove and is one of the few entries that made me want to listen to it all the way to the end.

I also judged Mano's entry (Getting Started Part 1) several times and I'm not at all surprised that it's doing so well. It was the best "by far" in the battles I judged.

My entry ended up at #46. Considering the overall quality of the competition, I think that's probably pretty accurate, give or take.

4. The semi-finals and the finals are probably a little more likely to produce winners who have a lot of Ourstage "friends" voting for them. However, success in the real music world depends just as heavily on relationship building as it does on skill and inspiration. Why should Ourstage be any different?

The important thing is that Ourstage does a good job of winnowing the field and by the semi-finals, the cream has risen to the top.

Conclusion:

Overall, I'm very pleased with Ourstage. I plan to use it as a learning tool. Not only to assess how people react to my music in general but to assess how they react to different variations of the same material. I'm looking forward to next month.

Ben

I think you might be all right with that entry. There's a song currently in the Bluegrass channel, top ten, that's an old traditional fiddle tune. The song is Old Joe Clark. As a matter of fact, there's a fellow doing Black Mountain Rag in Bluegrass as well and he made the quarters. So, doesn't seem like anyone is flagging the PD and Traditional stuff.

Good luck with it,
Eric

Hi Brian,

You raise an interesting point. I entered an original arrangement of "We Three Kings," which features a motif based on "Carol of the Bells," both of which are in the public domain.

If anyone flagged my entry, it didn't get removed.

The reason I felt the instrumental category was appropriate (as opposed to the cover song category) is that, under copyright law, I'm allowed to copyright my "original" arrangement of music that's in the public domain. I would not, however, be able to copyright my original arrangement of a Van Halen song, for instance, because none of their songs are in the public domain.

So, legally speaking, an original arrangement of music in the public domain is not considered a "cover" but rather an original work.

All that being said, I'd be interested in hearing what Ourstage has to say about this.

I agree Eric, and yes Phil, That's why I made it a medley instead of recording both songs separately, to make my own arrangement which I had copyrighted. I'm not trying the system, but the song is very familiar to most everyone which is why I believe it might get tagged by someone who is not familiar with P/D. But so is "Old Joe Clark" and "BMR". They didn't get tagged. Ben

The songs are "Sailors Hornpipe" (The Popeye Song) and "Devils Dream". A little shameless self promotion, the medley can be heard by clicking the URL below.

http://soundclick.com/share?songid=5845856

Great assessment Phil!

And I don't have a problem with public domain songs being used, as long as they are clear that it's okay to do so so that everyone is aware of what they can and can't do. If no rules are supplied, I'd likely flag it since there is a cover category and it seems that since they don't allow a cover of a country song to be in the country category, why would they allow a cover of solo instrumental song to be there? From a "rules" point of view, it shouldn't matter that one is a public domain cover and the other is a copyright protected song. I know that Ourstage pays a large fee for the permission to allow their members to post cover songs (in case anyone wondered how that worked). And all songs will EVENTUALLY be public domain.. so the real question is Can you post things you haven't written in a category and compete there against people who are doing songs they wrote themselves? When it comes especially to the general public voting, they may vote on the quality of the song more than the quality of the performanc of that song and thus be more likely to vote for the song they recognize.

So, I wonder if Danny can answer that. I think the solution is to strategically place "Tradional" categories for cover/PD performances of stuff so there's two different categories. We do that in our own awards.

Brian

Brian said:



That's a very good point, Brian, and one I hadn't considered.

I agree with what you're saying Brian, but you are comparing P/D songs with cover songs. You know that a P/D song is not protected by copyright. If what I think you're saying is true, then yes Ourstage should distinguish the difference. I grew up learning P/D songs and have my own way of presenting them. As Phil said, I can record my own arrangements and register them which is perfectly legal. I've never listened to the Folk channel, but am sure a lot of P/D songs are there.
My question is, if my P/D song can be construed as a cover song, exactly what song am I covering? There may be thousands of versions out there. Ben

I understand what Public Domain means Ben quite well. My point is that it's only a matter of financial issues that separates Public Domain from Copyrighted material. It has no artistic significance in that you're either performing a song you wrote, or a song someone else wrote. If they are going to allow you to post a song someone else wrote to compete in a category, then that should apply to ALL songs someone else wrote, not just the ones that you can record for free. Being free or not is not relevent in the contest.

Brian

I'm not sure that I understand what you are saying Brian, yes I know that you know what public domain means, I never doubted your knowledge. If it appeared that way then I apologize. P/D songs go back centuries to the point to where no one knows who actually wrote the songs.
But it sounds like you are still comparing them with cover songs and their is no comparison in my opinion. You can take a P/D song apart and add your own artistic qualities as if you rewrote the song its self and do it for the love of the song and not because it's free. That's how we keep the old songs from being forgotten. Money isn't everything. I recorded my version of "Sailors Hornpipe"/ "Devils Dream" not because it was easy and I didn't have to write anything new. I did it because I love those songs and hope that those melodies will stay alive. Next time you talk to Dan, please bring this subject up. Maybe they can make room for a P/D channel. Thanks, Ben

I'm pretty sure that A.P. Carter built a family fortune doing just that, Ben.

Eric

Excellent example Eric.

Ol' man Carter might have gotten rich, but without him, those old songs would be forgotten. Ben

No doubt. "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" comes to mind. I think most folks think that AP wrote it, but he didn't. It's just that it's his version we're all so familiar with.

Thank goodness for the AP Carters, Harry Smiths, and Lomaxes of the world. You're right, Ben, without folks like that, lots of those great old songs would have been forgotten

I saw a documentary on Harry Smith the other night. There were some clips of contemporary artists doing their interpretations of songs from the Anthology of American Folk Music. It was awesome. Anyway, something I saw on there is similar to our discussion about PD on Ourstage. Elvis Costello wasn't satisfied with the ending of "Ommie Wise," so he wrote his own. I thought it was pretty cool

http://www.cmt.com/videos/elvis-costello/134160/ommie-wise.jhtml

The McGarrigle Sisters do the original version first, then EC does his.

Enjoy
Eric

I have been playing "Omie Wise" for twenty years. It's one M, not two. Elvis does the song justice. I like the Doc Watson version better. He plays it out of an eerie Am.
Omie wise is a murder ballad as were much of the songs from Appalachia of the late 19th century. Most people were illiterate and news spread through music. Only the well -to-do read newspapers and most folks relied on song for their news. That's where the "murder ballad" started.