BMG’s Ron Stuve on Making It in Nashville
Relationships and connections are important for helping songwriters to achieve success in any field, but in the country music genre they become crucial. Here, Ron Stuve, VP, A&R/General Manager, Nashville at BMG Songs, discusses some of the ins and outs of the Nashville scene.
By Kevin Zimmerman
Is Nashville the insular scene everyone says it is, at least as far as new songwriters are concerned?
Ron Stuve: I don’t know if “insular” is the right term for it - but it is a relationship town. We get new songwriters coming to town every day, trying to break in. But if you don’t try and get to know people, it can be pretty hard to succeed.
Is it necessary to physically live in Nashville to succeed as a country songwriter?
Stuve: There are some cases where people have had success without living here, but I’d say that the majority of writers with long-term success do find a home in Nashville. The new writers and new artists who come to town this week will be the ones who, three or four years from now, will be the ones getting the songwriting and recording deals. The same thing happens with executives and musicians - it’s kind of a situation where you all “move up” with your own crowd.
It’s also important to keep in mind that what’s going on now around town will take six to nine months to hit the radio. If you’re living here, and in it all the time, you know when things are changing, you can pick up on the subtle changes that are happening all the time.
How does someone who’s just arrived in Nashville go about building those relationships?
Stuve: The NSAI (Nashville Songwriters Association International) is a great organization; they do a lot of workshops, as do the performing rights societies. A major problem that I run into here at a major publisher - and even when I was working at an independent - is that we don’t take unsolicited writer appointments. Instead, we very often operate on recommendations from the NSAI or the rights societies.
Really, it’s a matter of knocking on doors, doing open-mike nights, getting out there on the street and showing what you can do.
Is there a particular trend in country music right now that it would be helpful for hopeful country songwriters to keep in mind?
Stuve: There’s a definite move away from the big, glossy and pop-ish sound that mainstream country was marked by over the past several years. What’s happening now isn’t exactly “traditional”; we have lots of almost “southern rock”-sounding things happening right now. What it is, to me, is more real, more honest.
What about lyrical content?
Stuve: The old “write what you know” still works best. Society in general right now doesn’t want to be presented something they can sense was just made up. Maybe it’s an outgrowth of all this reality TV stuff - and to what extent that’s all scripted is another conversation - but honesty goes a long way.
I frequently find myself being played songs by somebody, and I can just tell that it’s not them. Songwriters and artists have to stick with what’s real. Consumers, especially today, are looking for something they can believe in . . . and they have the power right now. They don’t have to buy a 12-song album with eight songs that they don’t care about anymore.
Any other tips?
Stuve: Do your homework. Find out who the songwriters are who are getting cuts, listen to them, try to figure out what they’re doing: Is it the melody, the lyric, the cadence of the lyric, the groove. What is it that makes their songs work?
Also keep in mind that there’s a limited number of people who can be successful, commercial country songwriters. Do you want to pursue the commercial market, or are you more concerned with writing about your own family, your personal concerns and issues?
People are always playing me something and saying, “This would be great for such-and-such an artist to do.” Well, what if it’s a song about loving your child, and that artist just lost one of his children? That’s why I say: Do your homework, and write what you know.
Posted Apr 13, 2006
Member Comments
I was there and beleave me—- The price to get someone to listen to your material is very high- everyone is out to get paid to shop your material. Most people there in Nashville live in a cacoon and don’t recognize that what the people listening to on the radio only get to choose what they want to hear or like, because some program manager at the top of sindcation, tells the station program directors at all it’s station what they can air. The public really has no choice. You can only choose from what is played on the air. The music business is really controled by who can convince the people who control the air ways to to air the material that the major record companies think the public wants to here. Catch 22. How can they really know when the only material they accept is from same catch 22 from publishers. Who out there**** will give an unknown artist/writer or independent a chance with out all the hoops and finance it takes just to be heard or concidered they might have something that the public might want to choose.
3years ago I started making the weekly trips into Nashville. And alot of the writers I met then are no longer around. But a group that I see often and write with ,things are starting to move a little here and there. The group has decreased and the quality of our songs gone up for the remainder of. Great article and all so true.
The question is, do you want to write songs that are art or bubble gum ? If you picked art,go indie ,if you picked bubble gum go to NASHVILLE…J.S.T.
Nice—but too short—article that focused on one of the three main foundations of successful songwriting: politics. The other two are talent and attitude. The old TAP theory works ... if you do.
It sure might be intimidating to a writer to hear that even with good material it can take so long to get a publishing deal.
I envision a day when record labels become altogether obsolete, and all music will be sampled and bought off the internet—or companion brick and mortar outlets in malls—like a cafe where a consumer can sit in a massaging chair with a latte and peruse categories of music and sample for purchase.
Once a customer gathers a CD-full of songs, he or she goes to the check out where a burned disk of the choices is sold.
The artist will be able to upload music for sale via contract at an agreed upon price. If that artist’s music doesn’t sell at a given rate per review, the system automatically kicks out the song and he or she must “re-up” financially to get the music uploaded for sale again.
When music is sold, theoretically, a check can be cut and all parties paid at the point of sale.
It’s an airtight way of doing music business, and I started a corporation with the aforementioned business model, and did surveys of the public in major retailing areas to see whether or not the idea would fly. It will soar, but the start-up will be in the neighborhood of 4 million dollars+.
A couple of genuine concerns are that the quality of uploaded music must meet certain engineering standards regarding the recording itself, and whether to make it totally open to all, or have a quality screening process (not for content, but rather to eliminate substandard recordings from fly-by-night types).
the music business twenty years from now will probably be much more automated, and much more consumer driven—as opposed to agenda driven (by labels). Quality sells. Record labels are becoming obsolete, and they know it.
JD
Responce to JD Srenzel—Your’er on the Right track. If someone’s Up-loaded music is not a Quality product, it want sell and that will force poor quality products and producers to delete themselves from the business. Artist are the first to recognize they may not be good enough. Sooner or later a person who can’t make the grade realizes they are wasting their time and money. What ever the venue a person should at least be heard and really be given a chance to have their material accepted or rejected. LET THE PUBLIC DECIDE! That’s why American Idle is such a sinsation.
I agree it sounds great in theory but as far as people knowing they are sub-par did you watch all of american Idle??? some folks have delusions of grandure that are unshakable so the Quality control would be a crucial part of making the Idea fly. but I too believe you are on to something.
American Idol is fake….just like Nashville Star.
When you supposedly have thousands of contestants, and you end up with someone in the top ten who CLEARLY can’t sing….they pick people who have the look they want. They pick the mixture of people they are looking for. I don’t even beleive the voting is kosher…
HI,
I am a newbie her as of today…whoo wheee. I write lyrics. R&B, Jazz, christian contemporary. I have paid for 4 to be made into songs by the pro"s of the internest biz. Absolutely great tech sounds, but strong voice and just 3 chords. No anything else happening except what I feel is rip-off stuff. Any sensible advise besides don’t do that again?
Thanks,
graziehope
JD Stenzel, you must be a visionary, your song lyrics sure make me ponder. I like your idea, the public should decide who’s music is good enough to make the grade. Best Buys burns customized CD’s for $0.99 a song via Napster, of course it’s already been published and recorded, but I like the idea of an open market place. There’s a matter of publishing and recording to be overcome. I don’t think the public will ever be ready for my moan and groan voice and home made guitar styling. So I have to depend on some real talent to make my material salable.
I think that it is an excellent idea that music, clothing even shoes for that matter should be prochoice….The Media and lawyers have made life unprochoice by allowing people to take choices away from the public on what will or will not sell….Example when fashion changes so does the department stores. Which I think is a small group of people deciding for the vast majority. Media controls or influence the way most people think or even believe…...Why is music business seemingly one of the hardest businesses to break into….?And once you are in then then it’s like they capitalize on the profits…...Can you imagine what the world and radio would be like without people like us!
Music is not a democracy it is a dictatorship! Great songs and musicians don’t ask for acceptance they demand your attention.
k
it all sounds like crap to me… the song will sing for you if it’s good, and that’s what counts.. people want to hear an amazing sound and an amazing lyric… period..
signed a music lover!
I agree with JD, but see this coming, as well. Songwriters will be the ones to produce the music, or at least, be paying for it. Companies like Oasis CD Manufacturing are offering free radio distribution if you order from them. Companies like Clear Channel Radio have a website where you can upload your music, and if enough people listen to it there, it could very well end up on the radio. Good quality recording studios will produce a master recording for you to distribute to radio yourself and you own all the rights; the only thing you need is release forms, and the name of the person performing the vocal.
I plan on going this route myself. Sure, I have my own recording studio at home, but I’m not too egotistical to think that my playing (and I’ve been playing for 36 years) will ever match up to those in Nashville or NY or LA who I know can produce a much better product. All I will ever do with my studio is produce the demo to send to these studios so they have a good idea of the concept behind the song.
I can take what they produce and put it on itunes, or whever else I can sell it, and I get to keep all the jack!
But, don’t any of you try this at home. :0)
Jeff
If the song ain’t liked by a highly
educated A&R rep,
to tell you (not tell you in most cases) that it won’t work for radio.
It doen’t mean the song ain’t art.
means the song won’t feed over 100
people that rely on that A&R reps
choices.
