A link to my interview in the Spring 2017 edition of McKendree Magazine has been added to the Links page on my site. The jazz feature has several stories. Scroll down and you will see mine.
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"Musicians strive their whole lives to become like alchemists, healing the world with their music, turning the world’s pain to beauty. But we haven’t yet learned how to save ourselves. If we remain passive bystanders, I believe we will watch the music that we most value slowly silenced." -Maria Schneider
DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES Music has never been more popular, more accessible, or more valuable. Billions of people around the globe rely on it to enhance their lives. Overall revenue from the use of music has increased exponentially, but only a tiny fraction is finding its way to the people who actually create the music and recordings. The business of music has become unsustainable for those who make it. Therefore:
I support these principles and encourage fellow musicians & music fans to add their endorsement to the Music Answers campaign. I received this letter from my friend Gary Wakenhut in April 2016. I wrote a number of tunes for his ensemble (including his wife Anne) which they recorded in the 1990's and early 2000's. Gary passed on in February 2017.
"Roger, I don't think you are aware of how many people listened to your music back in those early days. One of your compositions is on 12 of our 16 Collecting Consort releases. Through the years, those recordings have sold over 200,000 copies. That's a lot of people hearing your music when you weren't aware of it. Don't feel badly that no one gave you any feedback for your compositions. When people mention their favorite recording, I often ask them what their favorite composition is on that recording. They can never give me an answer even though each recording has many familiar folk, classical, and contemporary selections . I think that has something to do with the spirit of our recordings and the expressive capacity of your compositions. People seem to enter a different reality, perhaps on a deeper unconscious level when they listen to this music. It all goes back to me answering your ad for "free compositions" in a music magazine. You sent us a book of your music and I responded with a gift of one of our cassettes. After listening to it, you wrote "Winter's Woods" for us. You truly captured our essence and it appeared on our next recording. That must have been the late 1980's. Thus our collaboration and release of your compositions continued until we quit producing CDs in 2005. 200,000 recordings is a lot of listening time for Roger Aldridge's music. Now we are exploring videos of nature with our music as the sound track. I expect it won't be long until a Roger Aldridge composition appears on one of those videos. I suspect "Treasure the Chesapeake" might make it. Thanks for all these years of great collaboration and friendship." For those who would like to listen to my past radio shows with Rich Pulin, archive recordings are available on the Links page under Interviews.
This is part of a message that I received in an email from Bandcamp: "If you give fans easy ways to directly support the artists they love, they'll take you up on it every time". Is this statement true?
During the years of vinyl records, and later with CDs, music listeners purchased a physical product. Now, in today's world of digital music -- while one can purchase music downloads from sites like ITunes, CDBaby, and Bandcamp -- many people listen to music without paying for it on streaming sites like Youtube, Soundcloud, etc. These sites make money through ad revenue, third-party use of music, and other ways. However, the musicians, whose music draws people to these sites, typically receive no or little money for the number of plays their music receives. This is a departure from TV & radio where composers receive royalties for the use of their music. Musicians need financial support from those who listen to their music. Fan-funding is a simple concept and it can help: If individuals give a small amount of money as a show of support to a particular artist, the collective amount spread across many people can help to fund new projects. Fan-funding campaigns are typically done within a specified time period for a single project. However, this concept can be used by fans in on-going ways such as licensing the artist's music for videos, purchasing sheet music, as well as buying MP3 downloads or CDs as several possibilities. Simply put, even in small ways, please support the artists who are creating the music you enjoy. Image downloads from my website have been disabled. An important feature of this site is having my lead sheets and scores displayed so that musicians can study my music. With this change, unauthorized copies cannot be made with a right-click download.
My written music is available in these ways: Musicians and ensembles interested in performing my music can write to me from Contact. A selection of my sheet music can be purchased on the Store page. Buying my music helps to fund new recording projects. David Arivett made a recording of Gina's Waltz. This piece was originally written for flute & guitar and has a playful spirit (with tricky shifting time). It can be heard on the Gina's Waltz page.
The lead sheet for Gina's Waltz is for sale at Sheet Music Plus and the recording is available for music licensing through Zudo Music. David Arivett made a recording of Catoctin Snowfall. This piece was inspired by a day of snow at Catoctin Mountain in Maryland. It can be heard on the Catoctin Snowfall page.
The lead sheet for Catoctin Snowfall is for sale at Sheet Music Plus and the recording is available for music licensing through Zudo Music. David Arivett made a recording of Mountaintop. This piece is uptempo and has a soaring spirit. It can be heard on the Mountaintop page.
The lead sheet for Mountaintop is for sale at Sheet Music Plus and the recording is available for music licensing through Directional Music. This new video, filmed by Robert Peak, features Jennifer Carpenter-Peak dancing to one of my bossa novas. It can be seen on the Videos page.
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AuthorRoger Aldridge, jazz composer in Olney, Maryland. Categories
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