For many years owning your own record label was not a practical course of action for the working musician to take. It took time away from performing, songwriting and rehearsing. For many it was cost prohibitive. For many others it was just an area of business that they were not familiar with at all. After all, you needed to know about artist development, production, marketing, accounting, publicity etc. in order to even think about launching. Added to that was the tremendous risk of investing in artists who may or may not be successful. All in all, it was a very big gamble.

Because of all the time, money and skills that were required to introduce a new talent to the market and make it successful, most artists opted for pursing getting a record deal with a major label. The major label would invest in the artist, paying all of the up front expenses, and had the expertise, resources and contacts to market the act nationally and even internationally. However, what many artists found out is that once they signed on the dotted line, the record company virtually owned the. They picked the songs the artist would record, the style they would be recorded in, how many albums (CDs) would be released, how the artist was marketed and so forth. The direction of the artists music and career was taken completely out of his hands,

The music world has changed a lot in even the past 10 years. The Internet has made it possible for an independent artist to attract fans worldwide. This leads to increased sales of his music (CDs and downloads), more demand for his performances, and more merchandise sales (tee shirts, posters etc.) There are still costs involved in creating this kind of a “buzz”, but nowhere near the cost that it required just a few years ago. In the end, with just a little bit of business savvy and a good product, an independent artist can make a very lucrative living while maintaining complete control over her music and career.