Ask Kix…Everything you wanna know about country music! Our listeners submit their questions about country music and Kix will answer…
This week's question is from Rebecca in Texas who writes…
Dear Kix,
I was curious as to what it means to be a demo singer. I hear that term a lot. Also, if I’m not mistaken, I heard that’s how Trisha Yearwood and Gretchen Wilson got their starts. If that’s true, is that a route you’d recommend for a female to get her foot in the door as a singer in Nashville?
Thanks, Kix!
Rebecca
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Kix's Response:
Well, Rebecca, unfortunately, nothing’s really easy in this business, but if you’re in Nashville and you sing out in bands or at writers' nights, or you write songs and make recordings of your songs, which are know as demos – and you are a good singer – there’s always a chance that somebody will hear you sing and say, “I have a demo tape that I need a singer for and she would be perfect!”
There are a lot of writers in Nashville making demos of their songs, and a lot of really good writers are not really good singers. For instance, I write songs for female artists sometimes and I’m always looking for some girl singer to sing on my demos. I have a list of girl singers, and depending on what kind of song it is, how they sing, if they are real country or folky or tough rock singers, that’s who I will call to sing those songs.
Demo singing can work for you in two ways… One, you can get a lot of experience singing in the studio, and two, a lot of times record company executives are listening to these demos looking for songs for their artist – and I’ve been in these meetings many times when the executive would say, “I like that song, but… Wow! Who’s that singing?” "Oh, it’s this girl named Trisha Yearwood, isn’t she good?!?!” And, there ya go!
Of course, you can make a little money doing this, too. I think it’s usually around 50 bucks or so… So, if you do it enough, of course, your chances of getting a record deal definitely go up, but regardless, you'll get to be in the studio singing a lot of good songs!
Thanks for your question, Rebecca!
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