What qualifies you start your own ensemble? Do you need a degree, sufficient age, a job or role in an established organization? There’s no such thing as the Entrepreneurs’ Licensing Office. Don’t bother looking for one. If you have an idea and the drive to bring it to fruition, you’re qualified. Congratulations! Now, get to work.
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Musical entrepreneurs believe in something more than ourselves. That the people we lead are more than themselves. That together we are more than the sum of our parts. Then, musical entrepreneurs must have conviction in that belief. It’s no mere belief, it’s the way things should be. Finally, we must have the commitment and perseverance to continue even when others (and sometimes we ourselves) have lost faith. If any of these is missing, then an entrepreneurial idea can never really take flight.
In order for a musical entrepreneur to act as a connector and relationship builder, we have to take the time to get to know people. Meeting new people. Learning more about people we already know, developing relationships, understanding their motivations, problems, hopes, ideas, aspirations. People are at the center of the music field, so they should be at the center of what we do.
The very first thing a musical entrepreneur does is to notice (a problem or an opportunity). That’s it. In the beginning, action isn’t even necessary. In order to notice, you have to be involved in the music field. If you haven’t noticed anything, it’s a sign to spend more time out in the field, paying attention to others’ needs and wants. What have you noticed?
With the traditional model of music, a musicians is trained through the academy or the conservatory, graduates, and perhaps pursues more training. At some point, they start to audition for orchestras, bands, and other ensembles. Ideally, they win a spot somewhere. And then they perhaps settle down.
Musical entrepreneurs go a different way. Instead of joining something that already exists (which they still probably do to pay the bills), we notice problems and opportunities in the ecosystem. Redundancies, frustrations, new repertoire. Different people. We take the old and do something new with it. We go against the advice of most of their friends to “just get a quiet job somewhere.” Instead, we move against the grain at strategically chosen moments. We build. We help. We solve. We evolve. We force others to move into the future. We do it because we see that possibility when no one else does. Maybe we’re crazy, but we trust our craziness because it tells us there’s a better way. What is your craziness telling you? The classical music ecosystem is comprised of several elements, including (but not limited to): performers, composers, audiences, donors (those who want to overspend in order to make music possible), customers (those who want to pay market price), support staff, stage crew, ushers, house managers, concert hall owners, corporate sponsors, students (of instruments, composing, and whatnot), teachers (elementary music teachers, band/ choir/ orchestra directors), tour managers, copyright specialists and administrators, lawyers, the various representations of the union. Performers are a tiny part of that and everyone must fulfill their role for everything to run smoothly.
It’s easy to forget that performers are a tiny part of the broader ecosystem. In order for everyone to thrive, everyone must help each other. Musical entrepreneurs see all these connections and potential relationships, and they maximize the benefits and returns by letting, encouraging, and persuading each person to do what they do best to the best of their ability. By fostering relationships and making sure everyone fills their roles, musical entrepreneurs feed the ecosystem. Isn’t it better to contribute to the ecosystem than to needlessly and selfishly cling to our own areas and shrinking the ecosystem? The world is desperate for more soul-nourishing music, and we need people like you to help provide it. Musical entrepreneurs are servants. We find people who are looking for something musical, and we serve it to them in a way that they want to pay for. It might be that they’re looking for something unexpected, something familiar, art, a reminder of their childhood (or other times in their lives). We have an opportunity to find these congruencies between our skills and what we can give and what those others want. We shouldn’t let our egos get in the way. We are never “merely” servants. Instead, we are people with specialized skills who are desperate to find our counterparts who want those skills. It’s how we become our best.
Musical entrepreneurs feed the classical music ecosystem by connecting audiences with musicians in new ways. Instead of doing the tried and true, we find new connections and new modes for music. We cultivate relationships and bring together people from different genres, fields of study, or even interest, which results in new combinations of old ideas and sometimes even new ideas. Who can you build relationships with? What different groups of people can you bring together through music?
Musical entrepreneurs use the tenses of language to our advantage. We use the past to look at what has happened and to search for lessons. What could have gone better? What went right? What other situations are similar to the one I’m in now? We use the present to accept where are (even if we “should” be further along, we’re only right here). Change only happens in the present, so we spend most of our time here. Finally, we use the future to plan and to anticipate potential hazards and obstacles. We will do x.
We use all the tenses to maximize success. We combine our past lessons with our future plans to build in the here and now. Staying in the past means we become mired in the lessons, needlessly churning the what could have been. Staying in the future means that we make plans all day without ever touching the moldable clay in front of us. Without the lessons and the planning, we constantly reinvent the wheel as we retread old ground and never look above the trees. Only by using the full Triforce of tenses can we become our best selves and create our best organizations. Musical entrepreneurship requires us to pull resources from wherever we can find them. We must remain open to opportunities and jump when we see them. The dynamic nature of startups means that multiple problems come at us from multiple directions. The resources, opportunities, and synchronicities happen when we’re actively scanning for them. Be quick, be open, and be ready.
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