There is an old Chinese proverb that says, “The nail that sticks out gets hammered down.”

That’s a helpful nugget to remember for the non-Chinese production music library that endeavors to expand their business into China. The “nail” in this example is not said music library, mind you, but rather mid-sized businesses, based in China, that take the inevitable hard look at their own branding efforts and ask the age-old question: “Couldn’t our music be cooler?”

As a former boss of my mine once said, “These companies are feeling a specific pain that your product can remedy. Bring your product to them.”

Is this a wise strategy to deploy in China? In this article we’ll dissect that opportunity and determine if the time has come for Western stock music companies to expand into China.

Flag #1 (which is colored red only because it’s their national flag….right?)

State censorship has dulled the musical sensibilities of Chinese listeners to the point where their top-grossing acts are an echo of the 80’s. Here’s a recent single from popular artist Faye Wong:

For any forward-thinking music executive, this void of decent music should be the first of many palm trees that form a tempting revenue oasis.

Assuming the music market evolves as it has in other countries, US intellectual property such as Louis Armstrong and Audio Slave will once again become America’s prized export. All that beautifully expressed angst will become our greatest ambassador.

Then music libraries will create their own slightly watered-down instrumental versions of these popular styles and enjoy the coup of not having any lyrics to be censored. The pitch would be simple: “Our stock music is culturally advanced yet politically safe. Place your order today.”

Flag #2 (wait a minute – it might really be a red flag)

The picture becomes even sexier when we see recent progressive gestures on the part of the Chinese government. In mid-2010, the Chinese Ministry of Finance announced it would no longer peg its currency, the Yuan, to the US dollar.

It is difficult to convey the impact this ground-breaking decision will have across the world over the next few decades. For most of the twentieth century, China’s one billion citizens have been insulated inside a national economy in which their basic needs were met largely by wages or government programs (the fact that this managerial feat flies in the face of every flag-waving speech given during the Cold War is an uncomfortable topic for another blog).

But because China’s currency only had value inside the country’s borders, most global companies severely limited the energy they invested into that swath of potential customers.

That will slowly and surely change over time. In the coming years we can expect to see the spending power of China’s citizens provide a key ingredient in our global economic recovery: demand. Lots of it.

Flag #3 (ok, it’s definitely a red one)

The final component that may convince a music library owner that good times are coming is the Chinese government’s 2001 announcement that they would increase efforts to enforce copyright protection and finally take an official stand against the rampant music piracy. Music piracy had plagued major label record sales in China years before Napster largely due to differences in fundamental beliefs about intellectual property, but outside pressure compelled the Chinese government to issue legislation that recognizes the entitlements of music creators.

Ready, set…..

So is it time for the Western production music industry to jump feet first into the Chinese market?

Sadly, no. While conditions appear to exist for an emerging market, they only appear that way. According to a report published by ASCAP in 2010:

“…in the entire nine-year period [since China passed copyright protection legislation], up to and including today, not a single Yuan has ever been paid to PROs for disbursement to songwriters, composers and music publishers for…..music used by broadcasters [in China].”

Quite simply, even large corporations in China cannot be expected to respect copyright law at a meaningful level if the state doesn’t take real action against violators and enforce their new laws.

Furthermore, it will take years before the inevitable thawing of censorship lightens to a point where media decisions are not fear-based and highly hegemonic. Large companies are more than happy to use crappy music as long as it prevents the hammer.

A high profile example of our earlier “nail” metaphor is Rupert Murdoch, who has became so enamored with China as a media opportunity, he took a Chinese wife (after divorcing wife #2) with whom he built a palatial home 2 blocks from Beijing’s Forbidden City.

Murdoch invested tens of millions of dollars into creating government connections that would allow even a milquetoast version of Newscorp content into China. So far, China has denied him.

No matter what quality differences exist between Gray’s Anatomy and TV content generated by the Chinese Department of Propaganda (yes, they actually have that), the house always wins.

So Until Then…

In this writer’s opinion, there will be no exploding market in China for production music until a climate exists where decision-makers at large China-based businesses regularly say, “Man! We really need some cool music in this video (see red flag #1), but we can’t afford the famous song we really want (see red flag #2).”

Until then, there’s only one potential client with both a vested interested in creating cool media and a high enough profile to respect international copyright law……the Chinese government itself (red flag #3).

No problem there. My brother knows a guy. I’ll hook you guys up on LinkedIn. Hey- did they just put out fresh egg rolls on the buffet? Back in a sec.

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

Both of these animated shorts are funny, inspired and interesting. But I think only one of them features outstanding soundtrack choice:

Example 1

Example 2

Animators pour a great deal of energy into storyboarding, sketching, modeling & texturing. So much, evidently, that other creative senses can sometimes atrophy. I can certainly relate. As a music producer, no creative task generated more artistic blindness than choosing the company logo.

Here are tips borrowed from leading feature film editors that animation teams can employ to help find the ideal music track for their next piece:

1^st Step: Borrow Your Dream Soundtrack

No, it’s not unethical.

There are many website forums where media producers ask where they can find a royalty-free music track that sounds like, for example, Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger”. Very quickly, well-meaning peers will respond by saying, “You can’t use that song. It’s illegal.”

They’re right of course, but all great songwriters will admit that their work is derivative. When I stare off into space and try to conjure a melody, I often have to admit that sometimes what I hear is just a memory of a favorite song. Maybe that’s why the opening guitar lick of “Eye of the Tiger.” sounds a lot like Steve Nicks’ “Edge of Seventeen”. Hmmmm.

Go ahead and temp with the track that works best with your animation. For research purposes, it’s ok and even optimal to choose something famous that you’ll never be able to license. The point is to inspire yourself and your team to create the best visuals possible. Even if your visuals are cut to that track’s tempo, a similar library music track can be chosen later and modified to fit that tempo using wav file editors such as Audacity.

2^nd Step: Exchange It For A Better Fit

Switching out soundtracks will require an aural cleansing of the palette that will take time, but remember that your audience doesn’t know anything about your temp track. They’re seeing your animation with fresh ears. Here’s what to do:

a. Make a Haystack With the Most Needles

Recently, I conducted a music search for a media producer seeking music similar to the soundtrack to the movie Diary of a Wimpy Kid. That particular music is orchestral in nature and sounds very bouncy.

However, searching for tracks using the keyword “bouncy” didn’t yield the best results. Instead, I had to listen to the track again and discern a distinct type of violin plucking called “pizzicato.” Using the keyword “pizzicato” gave me plenty of tracks that all fit perfectly.

Simply put, I had to think like a musician, not a video-editor.

Like most artists, musicians tend to think of their music in terms of the elements in which it’s composed. Existing music to which it is similar or the mood it evokes is often too abstract to ponder. Meta data is often the biggest barrier between video editors and that perfect library track. List every possible word to describe your temp track and try each of those search terms. You’ll be surprised which one yields the best results.

b. Let Experts Do the Searching

There’s no reason to be scared of royalty-free music. Just beware of BAD royalty-free music. How do you know the difference? You don’t. So just ask your favorite stock music library for assistance. Most production music libraries will be happy to help if you just give them a brief description of your project.

Music library staff members have insights into their own catalog that outsiders do not. It’s a bit like ordering at a fine restaurant and asking your server for recommendations.

Conclusion

Today I searched YouTube using the keywords “short animation cool soundtrack.” The resulting videos all featured stunning visuals, but I was surprised at how long it took to find one with a soundtrack I would consider cool. Not that every soundtrack necessarily has to be a quality piece of music, but some inspired compatibility between audio and visual would have made those shorts a great deal better.

Herein lies an exciting opportunity for animators to grow in their craft by recognizing the importance of a soundtrack that is not necessarily a great piece of music, but rather the right piece of music for their work.

Using the steps outlined above, the post-production process for your next animation project should result in a truly inspired soundtrack choice. Good luck!

*Special thanks for Vonetta Devonish for proofreading.

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

Let’s assume you are a creative professional being compensated to create a video for a client. Let’s also assume your client will NOT be broadcasting the video on television nor distributing it on DVD, but WILL be distributing the video on the internet (their website, YouTube etc), presenting it at meetings and even showing it at a trade shows. Let’s also assume that you, the creative expert, are expected to handle any and all copyright clearances for the video, including the soundtrack.

How do you ensure your soundtrack is cleared for all these uses and that no embarrassing copyright issues will emerge down the road? The digital marketplace offers lots of music that can be used without paying any license fees, but there will always be a direct relationship between the amount you pay to use a piece of music and the amount of control you (or your client) have over that music.

For example, that $0.89 you spent on iTunes for a Van Morrison single only allows you to enjoy that song on your iPod…and nothing else. But move that decimal point four places to the right and you can probably use it in your independent film until the cows come home. Here’s the breakdown of everything in between:

1. Royalty-free music libraries

   (*Full disclaimer: I co-own a royalty-free production music library).

   For as little as $10, a production music library will deliver a high rez version of a piece of music to you along with a license document (or at least a receipt) that lists both you and your chosen track specifically. Because you’re getting compensated by your client, it would be valuable for you to have a paper trail like this.Most royalty-free libraries will even conduct the music search for you at no charge. They know their library better than you. So why sift through thousands of tracks when you should be editing video?

   What’s the catch? Most stock music libraries won’t carry famous songs that your client knows. They may carry “sound-a-likes”, but that information definitely won’t be listed on their website. You have to discuss that directly with a sales rep.

   Also, a royalty-free music library is the most expense solution offered here. $10 is definitely the bottom of the price range whereas the average price is probably between $30 and $50 per track. If your client is willing to pay this fee in return for a relatively high degree of control over their music, then this is your best option.

2. Your own video software

   I recently edited together a family video using iMovie and Soundtrack Pro and entered it into an online contest. While there wasn’t a huge library of tracks, I quickly found something that worked well and incorporated it into my video quickly.In order to stay competitive, many video software makers completely buy out the copyrights to instrumental music tracks and bundle them with their product. Soundtrack Pro’s license agreement reads as follows:

   “You may broadcast and/or distribute your own soundtracks that were created using the Audio Content, however, individual audio files may not be commercially or otherwise distributed on a standalone basis, nor may they be repackaged in whole or in part as audio samples, sound files or music beds.” That type of license should work fine for your project.

   What’s the catch? Selection. I’ve worked for organizations that bought copyrights outright and I can say from experience that a collection that is “wholly-owned” can never be as dynamic, large or comprehensive as a user contributed music library. You’re at the mercy of what content Apple is willing to acquire. It’s easy for libraries like that to become “stale” and overused.

3. YouTube’s AudioSwap

   YouTube’s approach to copyright infringement has evolved into a simple ultimatum given to all major labels and movie studios: YouTube’s software will block their copyrighted content, but wouldn’t they rather just let it happen and share the ad revenue?
   The answer from many of the major record labels is “yes”.

   Therefore, you could theoretically synchronize your client’s video with Aerosmith’s “Dream On” in hopes that Columbia records lets you slide on copyright infringement. Just be sure to cross both fingers and kiss a rabbits foot as you upload the video.

   In order to offer a less risky alternative, YouTube has received permission from lesser known bands and musicians to create an online music library from which creative professionals like yourself can choose a track from that library and let YouTube automatically synchronize the music track with your video. Some of these tracks are fairly well known.

   What’s the catch? Your video will ONLY play with that music on YouTube’s website. And the music rights holder controls which ads run alongside your video. If your client plans to include this video in an email campaign or just embed it on their website, that may not be a deal breaker. But they ever want to present the video at a meeting or gathering of any kind, they’ll need to ensure the location has an internet connection.

   In order to use this music for free, your client is essentially entering into partnership with this rights holder to help them earn more ad revenue for their song. Also, the rights holders of this music can withdraw their music from YouTube, and thus your video, at any time. Your client may ultimately be ok with these risks, but you should at least make them aware.

4. Creative Commons

   I’ve included this option last because Creative Commons rights are both complicated and, in sprit, not always supportive of commercial usage. There are no less than six (!) types of Creative Commons licenses. Assuming your client intends to directly or indirectly generate revenue from this video, you’ll have to confine your music search to tracks that fall under the license called “Attribution-Only”.You may find a “diamond in the rough” from this subset of music available through Creative Commons, but be aware that “Attribution” means you must credit the artist at some point in the video. Most clients are ok with that.

5. Conclusion

   It’s all about choosing what kind of parameters you and client are most comfortable working within: lack of control (AudioSwap or outright infringement), a music license that may cost up to $50 (stock music libraries), or a limited selection (creative commons or your video software).

   We hope you’ve found this useful. To receive our blog weekly, please subscribe to our RSS feed.

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

As a way to give something back to the community, we’ve launched our Free Music Program for qualified schools, educational institutions and non-profit organizations (https://www.musicrevolution.com/free_music/).

Since our launch in April, we have had a tremendous response from musicians to contribute their music and participate in the MusicRevolution.com online marketplace for production music. The MusicRevolution.com production music library already has thousands of tracks of high-quality, royalty-free music and it continues to grow rapidly. When we announced our Free Music Program, this same community of musicians really stepped up to participate and give something back to needy organizations.

Many non-profit organizations can’t afford to use production music. Our Free Music Program provides schools and other qualified non-profit organizations with access to some great tracks of royalty-free production music for use in their projects. Hundreds of royalty-free music tracks have already been contributed to our Free Music Program by our musicians. It is clear that our community of professional musicians is a charitable and giving group.

To apply to the MusicRevolution.com Free Music Program for qualified schools, educational institutions and non-profit organizations go to https://www.musicrevolution.com/free_music/ and complete the brief online form.

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

Last week we delved into a method of creating electronica tracks I learned from music technology maven and performance artist Craig Anderton through his excellent columns written for Keyboard magazine.

Through this writing method – now dubbed the “mute party” – I have created production music tracks commissioned by IBM, and Dreamworks then later licensed by Microsoft, Chippendales and more….even though at the time my forte was really pop, rock and classical.

So far we’ve set up a four bar loop and an array of instruments within Logic 8 Pro and laid down every musical idea that has come to mind in a one hour period. The ideas were played back simultaneously to the extend that was sonically bearable. Sometimes it became necessary to mute a track because it severely conflicted with another, but our overall goal was to create a very dense 4 measure loop. Here’s what guitarist Brad Long and I came up with on a Friday afternoon in the fall of 2009 (note: the Logic tracks were imported into Pro Tools for mixing):

Loop – All Parts (Mixed)

So now what? Now we go to our part (or “region”) editor and make every part repeat until your song length is around three minutes. That’s right. Every part. All music editing software programs have a repeat function that allows you execute this in just a few keystrokes. The three minute minimum is somewhat arbitrary, but it is what I’ve come to believe is the average length required by most video editors.

The next step is to mute every part and zoom your screen out so you’re looking at the entire song. This, oh-maker-of-music, is your palette. And the “un-mute” function is your brush. For me, I can get lost in the “mute party” step (or more accurately the “un-mute party”) because it’s so darn fun. Deciding which parts will play when creates the troughs and crests within your track to which electronica fans really respond. In this step, you will determine whether the piece will evolve quickly and keep your listener on their toes or whether it will lull them into a calmer state through repetition.

With our track, I decided on an “A-B-A” form. I found there to be two basic subsets of my parts that sounded good together. They didn’t necessarily match vertically, but horizontally, they really went somewhere cool. I chose the stronger of the two subsets and considered that my “A” section. Through the “un-mute” function I had my “A” section gradually build into it’s full glory before going to my “B” section. I let the energy drop down and then did another gradual build with my “B” section before returning to an abbreviated “A” section. By then I was at my three minute target length and viola, I had professional stock music electronica track. Here’s my final screen shot:

As you look as this screen shot, notice how many parts don’t play. This makes me think of a composition master class I attended in college by jazz pianist Kenny Werner. Mr. Werner believed that music creation required two separate and very different stages: 1) Pure creation with childlike abandon and absolutely no inhibition…then….2) Editing where everything is judged, edited or deleted.

That dichotomy has always worked for me.

Here is the final mixed and mastered electronica track created by Brad Long and myself now titled “A God Among Geeks” (I thought of this title while mastering this track when I saw a press release of Steve Jobs announcing the iPhone 4):

A God Among Geeks

“A God Among Geeks” is available as part of MusicRevolution Free Music Program, which offers free royalty-free music tracks to music schools, educational institutions and non-profits. It is also available for commercial licensing at www.musicrevolution.com.

Happy music-making!

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

Years ago, high tech music guru Craig Anderton wrote a tutorial for Keyboard magazine outlining one of his very effective approaches to creating electronica music. Anderton was the editor of Electronic Musician until 1990 and has reviewed thousands of high tech music products. Though I am unable to cite the exact issue, the simple concept imparted in that article helped me create stock music electronica tracks for IBM, Microsoft, and other high profile custom music clients.

I’ve come to call this method the “Mute party”. Here goes:

First, set up a 4 bar loop and decide your tempo. Then set up a few basic instruments. The genius behind the “mute party” concept is that you don’t have to worry at all about form (i.e. which instruments start first, what comes after, how the track ends)…..at least for now.

Your only concern at the onset is to stack as many interesting and relatively compatible parts on top of each other that you can handle listening to simultaneously. If it gets to be too much, just mute a couple of parts and keep going. The idea is to just get into a stream of consciousness mode of musical creativity and remain unhindered by the two questions that can shut you down…. 1) Is this part any good? (answer: decide later) and 2) In what order should all this happen? (answer: decide later).

In the fall of 2009, guitarist Brad Long and I took this approach to creating a track to be included in our Free Music collection. Our computer set up was Logic Pro 8 and Pro Tools 7.3 running on a MacBook Pro. Brad played a JB Custom Fender Telecaster using Lindy Fralin pickups running through Pod XT Live.

Here’s Pro Tools screen shot of what we created:

What did all that sound like? Not surprisingly, pretty dense. Here’s the unmixed version:

Loop_All_Parts_Unmixed.mp3

The next step was to do some rudimentary mixing to make all this a bit more sonically palatable. Mind you, no big creative decisions are being made. This step is more akin to getting the classroom to settle down and behave.

Using some subtractive EQ, reverb and tap delays, here’s what the same mix sounded like after cleaning things up a bit:

Loop_All_Parts_Mixed.mp3

In the next installment of this blog I’ll reveal the next step in which all this becomes a great production music track in the electronica genre. Stay tuned.

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

In the previous installment of this blog series, I provided examples of what researcher Dan Levitin suggests are three types of songs that are not just important to us personally, but important from the standpoint of human evolution. In his book, The World in Six Songs (2009 Penguin Press), Levitin makes that case that human beings have evolved successfully in part because certain social, psychological and even logistical needs have been met by music. In today’s blog I will provide examples and descriptions of the remaining three types of songs.

4. Knowledge Songs

By all historical accounts, the Torah (first five books of the Bible) was preserved for a thousand years not by the written word…but by song. Alliteration, metaphor, rhyme, rhythm, accent structure, cliches and melody are musical devices that help us retain information better. Simply put, our brains don’t have to work as hard when we can attach key details to a larger, simpler block of information that is easy to recall. This allows our brains work more efficiently. Some examples:

This song featured in the cartoon Animaniacs is a schoolteacher’s dream come true.

Or who can forget the classic Schoolhouse Rock Saturday morning cartoon – “How A Bill Becomes Law”?

5. Religion (or Ritual) Songs

To this reader, the lines got a bit blurry trying to find a distinction between what the author calls “religion” songs and what he previously describes “comfort” songs. Most of Levitin’s examples of religion songs spoke more towards our need for rituals than towards our desire to express a particular belief or spirituality.

Ritualistic songs serve two functions. They put us in a broader frame of mind in terms of time. A wedding is an event that will have years of impact. It makes sense that some songs (like the “Wedding March”) take us out of ourselves and remind us that we are part of a much larger fabric. Ritual songs also give us a sense of control during moments where we feel we have very little control. It is comforting to sing a hymn in church when life is uncertain. Some examples:

Edward Elgar – “Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1”

Chris Tomlin – “Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone)” Soundtrack to the film Amazing Grace.

6. Love Songs

How exactly do people fall in love?

Levitin explains the physiology as follows:

“Researchers have identified neurochemical changes that occur during the first few months of a relationship; huge releases of oxytocin (the ‘trust’ hormone) and feel-good hormones like dopamine and norepinephrine, and at such high levels that they could be regarded as inducing clinically verifiable altered states of consciousness.”

My very unscientific belief is that songs burn deeper into our conscious when we are teenagers than they do when we are thirty-something homeowners with kids. Although RIAA statistics show that the largest music buying demographic is age 45 and over, I’d like to think the majority of those purchases stem from musical opinions formed by that listener during adolescence.

Adolescents are simply more open to new music than audiences over the age of 25; and adolescents are also experiencing love for the first time in their lives. Perhaps this is why more than 30% of the Rolling Stones 500 Greatest Songs of All Time are love songs.

Because love songs are so ubiquitous, songwriting experts usually break them down into further categories (“I want you”,“I have you”,“It’s not working out”, “I miss you.”). I’ve provided some classic examples here from the Rolling Stones list.

Example of an “I Want You” song:

The Beatles- “I Wanna Hold Your Hand”

Example of an “I Have You” song:

Beyonce/Jay-Z “Crazy in Love”

Example of an “It’s Not Working Out” song:

The Righteous Brothers – “You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling”

Example of an “I Miss You” song:

Sinead O’Connor – “Nothing Compares to You”

Summary

I earn income as a performing musician and have had the extreme privilege of watching music affect people very deeply and at very key moments in their life. I’ve watched people collapse and sob for Jesus. I’ve watched memory care patients sing along to songs from their childhood. I’ve watched the limitless potential that is a dance floor full of young people just happy to be together. I’ve played national anthems as troops departed for war.

Daniel Levitin’s The World In Six Songs has forever changed the way I think about what’s happening in those moments. And on a larger scale, it has made me realize that from generation to generation the melodies and rhythms may sound different, but the songs remain the same.

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

In his 2008 book The World in Six Songs (2009 The Penguin Group), researcher Daniel J. Levitin creates a fascinating thread that connects findings in neuroscience, physiology, evolution theory, and anthropology. He suggests that your love of music speaks to something deeper in your DNA than the moment you discovered your parents’ record collection. A deep, visceral relationship with music is actually a strong genetic trait that, for thousands of years, has helped mankind evolve and succeed as a species.

Specifically, there are six types of functions that music has performed in the lives of human beings both as a society and as individuals. Arguably, the world would be quite different had we not harnessed music, like fire, to fulfill very particular and very acute needs.

1. Friendship Songs

Ancient Mesopotamia is our earliest record of irrigation on a metropolitan scale. To pull something like this off, people had to collaborate in groups much larger than the villages and tribes to which they been accustomed for untold generations. How did all these tribes obtain enough trust and community to work together?

Just ask any baby boomer who saw this historic 1967 TV appearance by the Who. Suddenly, a frustrated teenager in Sacramento had the the same theme song as a teenager in Omaha. And the Woodstock generation became that much more unified.

Military cadences are another example of how music creates a sense of one-ness between people that share a common goal or challenge. When I served in the US Army, I loved how songs like this instantly synchronized large groups of young men and women from completely different backgrounds into one collective.

2. Joy Songs

Certain kinds of music urge us to get physical. I’ve played enough wedding receptions to see the catharsis that occurs when people dance as if nobody’s watching. At these events, there is often an overweight uncle who is sweating profusely with his tux shirt is hanging out. But it’s cool because he’s having fun. It’s clearly his medicine.

Levitin suggests that when we experience stress, our bodies produce cortisol which gives us the boost we used to require to outrun a lion or fight an enemy. But if that energy is not used up, it actually produces a deficit in our immune system. As biologist Robert Sapolsky points out, “We are living in bodies and thinking with brains that were designed to solve problems that almost none of us has today.”

In songs such as “I Feel Good”, James Brown points to what is probably the ideal way to dispose of excess cortisol in the 21^st century:

Levitin also posits that “joy songs” tickle the optimist in our primal human nature.
Specifically, the part of our forefathers that was optimistic enough to believe that approaching the neighboring cave woman would work out well. That theory becomes easy to accept after viewing iTunes’ most downloaded song of 2009, “I Gotta Feeling” by the Black Eyed Peas:

3. Comfort Songs

Legendary singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell was once approached in a restaurant by two woman in their late forties. They said, “In our twenties, we had a hard time…we listened to your album Blue and it made us feel better. Before there was Prozac there was you!”

Sorrow has an evolutionary purpose. It helps us grieve a loss or traumatic event which helps us “reorient our priorities for the future”. At the end of the film Good Will Hunting, Matt Damon’s character finally has a breakthrough about his childhood and he sobs uncontrollably. In the next and final scene, he’s rides off healthily into the sunset to pursue his woman. Roll credits.

It may sound like psychobabble, but Levitin provides an interesting factoid. He explains that, when we are sad, our bodies produce a hormone called prolactin. Prolactin is also found in females after orgasm, childbirth and lactation- all events that precede a period wherein a mother needs to be resilient enough to raise a child. Interestingly, prolactin is only found in tears of sadness. It is not found in tears of joy or the tears that accompany a piece of dirt in your eye.

“Comfort songs” are songs that help us feel those cathartic feelings. “I Can’t Make You Love Me” is a powerful example. This heart-breaking song was originally made famous by Bonnie Raitt in 1991 and is performed here by George Michael. Check out the comments posted by viewers which strongly reinforce Levitin’s idea that people truly need songs like this in their life.

In the next installment of this blog series, I will explain and provide examples for the other three types of songs described in Daniel Levitin’s The World in Six Songs. Stay tuned.

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

We’ve launched our discussion forum https://www.musicrevolution.com/forum/, which is focused on the various aspects production music, to provide an additional resource to serve the community of professional and aspiring musicians that fuels MusicRevolution.com.

Our objective with this forum is to create an online meeting place where our musicians can share their knowledge and experiences, and collaborate with each other. Our forum also cover issues that are important to media professionals and music buyers when they are selecting production music.

Topic currently being discussed on our forum (https://www.musicrevolution.com/forum/) include:

• Music Theory
• Collaboration
• Recording Techniques
• Customer Track Suggestions
• Creative Process
• Track Evaluation
• General Discussion
• Software
• Hardware

Please jump in and join the conversation!

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.

This blog article links to three play lists containing the type of production music I see used most often in TV commercials and video presentations. By “type” I don’t necessarily mean specific music sub-genres (punk rock, progressive trance, etc.) but rather moods or energy levels most often required by a video editor trying to tell a story. This will hopefully help media producers conduct better music searches and also help musicians understand what makes a royalty-free music track successful.

Certainly, the musical vocabulary in which these emotional messages are communicated has changed and evolved over the years. But the three core aesthetics, which are a) “This is cool. Pay attention.” b) “We don’t take ourselves too seriously.” and c) “We’re doing good things.” – has remained the same.

Quick note:

MusicRevolution.com uses “Music Bins” which are similar to play lists in iTunes. The music bin URLs included in this blog will open the MusicRevolution homepage with that bin pre-loaded in the lower left side of the page. All music in the bins is available for commercial licensing.

Music that says: “This is cool. Pay attention.”

This UPS commercial features a type of music I’ll call “Information Underscore”:

The soundtrack contains lots of motion, but not much melody or drums. When I compose music like this, I like to imagine what a full band would play in a concert right after the singer says, “Break it down!” and starts to initiate some kind of audience chant: You’d hear some busy rhythmic comping from guitars and keys, but very little from the back up singers or drummer. The idea is too let things breathe.

Click here to see a bin containing five “Information Underscore” tracks by Simon Wolfe, Shockwave-Sound and Scewby Mundo (look to the lower left).

Music that says: “We don’t take ourselves too seriously.”

This Cartoon Network bumper for Adult Swim features a “Quirky Fun” kind of vibe which is frequently needed for videos:

Tracks like this are often busy but simple. In my own writing, I often used retro elements like lo-fi horn samples and surf guitars to make it goofier.

Click here to see  a bin containing five “Quirky Fun” tracks by Skip Peck, Dmitry Lifshitz, RAD Music and Shockwave-Sound (look to the lower left).

Music that says “We’re doing good things.”

The soundtrack in this Visa commercial is an example of what I would call “Feel good rock”:

The guitars are big, but not overly distorted. It’s in a major key. The mix is full. And the music composition is based more on a single catchy rhythm part rather than a screaming guitar solo or vocal melody. It’s like an intro to a great alt rock song from the 90’s but vocals haven’t started yet.

Click here to see a bin containing four “Feel Good Rock” tracks by Frenetic Sound, Jeremy Luzier, Dmitry Lifshitz and Shockwave-Sound (look to the lower left).

Writing stock music in one or more of these musical veins can be tricky for a musician that has never actually scored to picture. A creative workaround, however would be to use a “dummy” video or “dummy” VO which you can play along with your track to see if your track is close to the mark.

In a future blog I will post links to tools like that. Stay tuned.

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Mike Bielenberg is a professional musician and co-founder of http://www.musicrevolution.com, a production music marketplace where media producers and business owners can license high-quality, affordable music from a online community of musicians.