2012 Fall East Coast Tour Blog #2 (Day 8)
Driving Stats:
Miles Driven - 882
Average Speed - 50 mph
Miles Per Gallon - 45.1
Total Driving Time - 17 hours, 31 minutes
A complete week is now in the books for the 2012 Fall Tour. This has been perhaps the best first week of a tour in 9 years of touring. I am always surprised and thankful when each year is better than the previous one. This is largely due to two factors: 1) I am more anxious about things than I should be. If something can go wrong, I half expect it to. This may be a semi-good thing, as I can be pleasantly surprised when certain things go well, and not be overly disappointed whenever something goes wrong. I don't think that I would endorse this outlook, though. 2) The dwindling popularity of the Compact Disc. It just "officially" (whatever that means) turned 30 years old on October 1st.
More portable forms of carrying music have been taking over for a good decade now. But I have somehow managed to continue to sell more CDs from year to year (or at least from Fall Tour to Fall Tour, which is my general method of tracking my progress from year to year). I am extremely thankful for this. I think the main thing is that I am playing more shows where die-hard music fans are in attendance. Or perhaps it's a mix of die-hard music fans and listeners who believe that artists should be directly compensated for the work that they do. Whatever it is, I am thankful for it. Especially with services like Spotify (which pays me a whopping 1/5 of a penny per song stream) planning to take over the music world, you can see how this can be a subject of concern for many songwriters.
So far, after 7 shows (out of at least 33), I have been able to sell 44 cds. I don't expect this rate to continue, but if it does, the total would be 207 for the entire tour, which would blow my previous tour record out of the water. The current record (ah, get it? Record?) is 139, set during last year's Fall Tour, which was a week longer than this one, and had at least 9 more shows). So even if the pace doesn't continue, a new record should be set.
Speaking of CDs, I only have about 120 copies of my most recent album (Can You Hear the Music?) available. Along the lines of CDs being a matter of concern for artists, I need to make the decision of when to reorder another set of that disc once it sells out, and figure out how many to reorder. But I suppose this is a good problem to have.
Ah, where did we leave off in the last blog entry? Okay... the beginning of this tour was very interesting, because I stayed with the same host for five nights, and had shows exclusively in the Cincinnati and Dayton areas of OH on each of those five nights. Except for stints in the Pittsburgh area (my hometown), I rarely stay in the same place for more than two nights. It was nice to have a temporary "home base". On Sunday the 30th of September, I would head back to Cincinnati to make my first visit to the LEO Coffeehouse, which isn't really a coffeehouse, but rather a great listening room run by a folk music group called the Queen City Balladeers. It is held in a Church, which is usually a good sign that it's going to be a good show. There were about 30 to 40 people in attendance. There was no pay involved in this show, but I had the honor of being one of the 2 featured acts on the evening. And Sunday nights can be difficult to find any shows, let alone one in front of a captive, appreciative audience. I did a short set of about 25 minutes, and hung out to talk to people and catch the main act, a local bluegrass group called Red Cedars. I wound up selling 11 cds that evening, so it was absolutely a Sunday night well spent.
On Monday, I had another show in Dayton. This one was at a coffeehouse that is actually on the same road as the venue that I performed at two nights prior. It was a nice intimate room with great acoustics. My hosts and members of their family came out for the show, and there was surprisingly a good group of other listeners in attendance, as well. Mondays and Tuesdays may be worse than Sundays as far as lining up good shows is concerned. And it was a very rainy Monday night, which I thought might discourage people from coming out (if you ask me, a rainy night is a perfect setting to catch live music at a coffeehouse). This was also my first visit to Ghostlight Coffee, and I set it up kind of as a low-stress show that would allow me to get to know the room a little. I'm almost certain that it won't be my last visit. I was able to sell 5 discs that evening, which I will take on almost any Monday evening. Heck, if I averaged 5 cds sold per show, that would still break the record.
Tuesday would be my final night in Ohio, and it ended at a newer venue back in Cincinnati; one that I have grown very fond of. The staff there is very nice to me, and it's always great to return. Unfortunately, there weren't many listeners in attendance on this particular Tuesday, though I was apparently good enough to catch the attention of one audience member, who was visiting the venue for the first time. She picked up a couple of cds before I packed up to hit the road back to Dayton for the evening. If just one person grabs a cd at a show, I feel like I must be doing something right.
Well, I think this entry has reached a good length, and this is a good stopping point, as well. We'll pick up with the beginning of the western PA leg of the tour when I get a chance to report again.
Thanks for following along on the ride.
Miles Driven - 882
Average Speed - 50 mph
Miles Per Gallon - 45.1
Total Driving Time - 17 hours, 31 minutes
A complete week is now in the books for the 2012 Fall Tour. This has been perhaps the best first week of a tour in 9 years of touring. I am always surprised and thankful when each year is better than the previous one. This is largely due to two factors: 1) I am more anxious about things than I should be. If something can go wrong, I half expect it to. This may be a semi-good thing, as I can be pleasantly surprised when certain things go well, and not be overly disappointed whenever something goes wrong. I don't think that I would endorse this outlook, though. 2) The dwindling popularity of the Compact Disc. It just "officially" (whatever that means) turned 30 years old on October 1st.
More portable forms of carrying music have been taking over for a good decade now. But I have somehow managed to continue to sell more CDs from year to year (or at least from Fall Tour to Fall Tour, which is my general method of tracking my progress from year to year). I am extremely thankful for this. I think the main thing is that I am playing more shows where die-hard music fans are in attendance. Or perhaps it's a mix of die-hard music fans and listeners who believe that artists should be directly compensated for the work that they do. Whatever it is, I am thankful for it. Especially with services like Spotify (which pays me a whopping 1/5 of a penny per song stream) planning to take over the music world, you can see how this can be a subject of concern for many songwriters.
So far, after 7 shows (out of at least 33), I have been able to sell 44 cds. I don't expect this rate to continue, but if it does, the total would be 207 for the entire tour, which would blow my previous tour record out of the water. The current record (ah, get it? Record?) is 139, set during last year's Fall Tour, which was a week longer than this one, and had at least 9 more shows). So even if the pace doesn't continue, a new record should be set.
Speaking of CDs, I only have about 120 copies of my most recent album (Can You Hear the Music?) available. Along the lines of CDs being a matter of concern for artists, I need to make the decision of when to reorder another set of that disc once it sells out, and figure out how many to reorder. But I suppose this is a good problem to have.
Ah, where did we leave off in the last blog entry? Okay... the beginning of this tour was very interesting, because I stayed with the same host for five nights, and had shows exclusively in the Cincinnati and Dayton areas of OH on each of those five nights. Except for stints in the Pittsburgh area (my hometown), I rarely stay in the same place for more than two nights. It was nice to have a temporary "home base". On Sunday the 30th of September, I would head back to Cincinnati to make my first visit to the LEO Coffeehouse, which isn't really a coffeehouse, but rather a great listening room run by a folk music group called the Queen City Balladeers. It is held in a Church, which is usually a good sign that it's going to be a good show. There were about 30 to 40 people in attendance. There was no pay involved in this show, but I had the honor of being one of the 2 featured acts on the evening. And Sunday nights can be difficult to find any shows, let alone one in front of a captive, appreciative audience. I did a short set of about 25 minutes, and hung out to talk to people and catch the main act, a local bluegrass group called Red Cedars. I wound up selling 11 cds that evening, so it was absolutely a Sunday night well spent.
On Monday, I had another show in Dayton. This one was at a coffeehouse that is actually on the same road as the venue that I performed at two nights prior. It was a nice intimate room with great acoustics. My hosts and members of their family came out for the show, and there was surprisingly a good group of other listeners in attendance, as well. Mondays and Tuesdays may be worse than Sundays as far as lining up good shows is concerned. And it was a very rainy Monday night, which I thought might discourage people from coming out (if you ask me, a rainy night is a perfect setting to catch live music at a coffeehouse). This was also my first visit to Ghostlight Coffee, and I set it up kind of as a low-stress show that would allow me to get to know the room a little. I'm almost certain that it won't be my last visit. I was able to sell 5 discs that evening, which I will take on almost any Monday evening. Heck, if I averaged 5 cds sold per show, that would still break the record.
Tuesday would be my final night in Ohio, and it ended at a newer venue back in Cincinnati; one that I have grown very fond of. The staff there is very nice to me, and it's always great to return. Unfortunately, there weren't many listeners in attendance on this particular Tuesday, though I was apparently good enough to catch the attention of one audience member, who was visiting the venue for the first time. She picked up a couple of cds before I packed up to hit the road back to Dayton for the evening. If just one person grabs a cd at a show, I feel like I must be doing something right.
Well, I think this entry has reached a good length, and this is a good stopping point, as well. We'll pick up with the beginning of the western PA leg of the tour when I get a chance to report again.
Thanks for following along on the ride.
posted by Jeff Miller at 5:10 PM
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