⌘f

more about music

July 7, 2008 – 6:14 pm by rachel

at the risk of becoming ⌘-f’s arts and entertainment writer, i’m going to talk a bit more about music today. first, a story:

i have a friend who is a well-known musician, Kristin Hersh. i was riding in her minivan with her, her husband Billy, and two of her sons then aged about 4 and 9. the 4 year old, Wyatt, decided we needed to start a new band.

Wyatt: “Mama will play the guitar and Daddy will sing. Ryder (the 9 year old) will play drums and i will play bass.”

Billy: “What about Kiki” (they call me Kiki for some reason) “what will Kiki do?”

Wyatt assesses me for what feels like a very long time, his bright blue eyes darkening and narrowing as he examines me. Finally, his eyes brighten and he smiles. “Kiki? Kiki can be the fan.”

i have told this story many times, over drinks perhaps, for laughs. i like it, i think it’s a good story. it works for the “kids say the darnest things”-type conversation and also as an answer to the “do you play any instruments” question. i usually tell it with a self-deprecating tone but, in truth, i’m kind of proud of it and i feel like Wyatt, in that moment, really did know me and my strengths. i listen to music, read books, watch movies, etc, actively and creatively, with my whole brain and heart. And i like to think that little Wyatt was onto the importance of the listener/viewer/reader to the process of making art. That he was pointing out that the novel doesn’t fully exist except in mind of the reader, that the song needs a listener, the painting a viewer.

why does this matter in the context of ⌘-f? two reasons, one that i’ll talk about now and one that i’ll leave open as theme for later discussion.

First, i tell this story now as an extension of the comments i made in my first post about music as a shared and social enterprise and how maximalist copyright regimes, together with the commercialization of cultural products, threaten that enterprise. When art is an industry and the audience is a customer, what does that do to that co-creative process? When intellectual property comes to be seen as real property, what does that do to our relationship with the art we experience? Nothing good. When the culture sends the message that we can’t create art because: 1. we’re not pretty/sexy enough 2. we’re not marketable enough 3. we’re pretty much criminals if we think about doing it anyway we have a serious problem.

i promise i’ll write more substantively on these ideas someday, probably when I take the time to review the book I’m devouring right now, Arts, Inc: How Greed and Neglect Have Destroyed Our Cultural Rights by former NEA chair, Bill Ivey. Right now, though, i just want to direct your attention to a project that my friend Kristin and her husband Billy (the parents in the story above) are doing to put the power back in the hands of the audience and artists and take it out of the hands of the businesses. The project is called CASH (coalition of artists and stakeholders) music. From their website:

CASH artists and the audiences are stake holders in common. Audiences want the art to continue. Artists want to continue creating. Supportive relationships create this flow, a read-write culture where all are parties to a richer artistic experience. CASH supports artists, their audiences — and perhaps most importantly — this vital and emerging read-write culture.

Eventually, CASH will offer a platform for any and all artists to use but, for now, there are just a few artists providing a kind of proof of concept. Kristin is using CASH to distribute a new Creative-Commons licensed track from her record-in-progress each month. She goes a step further, though, and posts the mix stems so that potential remix-ers/mashup-ers will have the tools they need to create new works based on hers. She even provides a space on the website for people to post their remixes and art inspired by her songs. The result is pretty remarkable. How does Kristin use this to put food in the mouths of those beautiful sons I was mentioning? Through subscriptions. Participant-fans can subscribe to Kristin’s work at a couple of different levels or they can take advantage of some of the special opportunities Kristin offers to help fund the music.

What does this mean for Kristin? It seems to mean the freedom to be astonishingly productive by not limiting her to a single “act”. She’s writing songs for her solo projects, playing a new collection Appalachian folk songs, writing and performing her memoirs, writing children’s books, taking photographs, writing songs and recording with her punk band, 50 Foot Wave, and even writing some songs for her original band, Throwing Muses. An artist with a major label record contract does not, it’s safe to say, usually feel such freedom to go where the muse takes her.

What does this mean for the audience? A chance to participate artistically, intellectually, and, yes, financially with the production of art that matters to them. A participant-fan posting art inspired by Kristin’s work on her website feeds more fuel back into the creative machine that made the art in the first place. The subscription supporter going to see Kristin perform her songs at a club helped make those songs possible and sustains the songs by hearing them and enjoying them.

Billy and Kristin have compared this model to the Community Supported Agriculture model where the producer and consumer share in the risk and the benefit of the production of something good and sustaining.

The thing I’d like to explore later is how this ties in with Anne-Marie’s earlier post about “best sources” because in a very real sense the “audience as co-creator” idea is tied in with the “the best source on a project is the source that gets you thinking — it sparks the idea, the understanding, or the connection that shows you where you’re going” idea. I want to think a little bit more about that but you’re tired of reading this post and i have to get to work.