For Immediate Release

Contact:  Ric Farrah

                Ric Farrah Photographs

                615-773-1702

                ric@farrahphotos.com

                www.farrahphotos.com

Image vs. Sound and What Stars Have in Common

Often I wondered which of these fundamentals are more important. We all have been around seemingly successful acts who demonstrate more image and marketing prowess than craft. We scratch our heads wondering why these acts even achieve regional recognition much less national prominence. Thankfully, these acts rarely stand the test of time and soon fade the scene as quickly as they arrive.

My personal experience working with pro talent at both ends of the spectrum, either national household names or young talent taking their first steps toward stardom, is that true stars have several things in common that reach across all genres and art forms. First off, the legends all have a deep passion rooted to their sole for their craft. They love what they do and sharing their talent with others is not an option; it's as important as their craft. Passion for their art is coupled with an honest heartfelt belief in their own vision and ability. Others, including myself are inspired by these remarkable individuals. We are attracted by their ability and confidence. This attraction is infectious and results in the numbers required to achieve prominence.

Passion and belief in one's own ability are the essential building blocks that form the foundation for determination. It's with this determination that stars are willing to do the things required that others who fail are not willing to do. Every star I've worked with, both in LA while producing live comedy and now here in Nashville working as an entertainment photographer, holds an unwavering understanding of what they want and where they were going.

While it is somewhat easier wield clout to get the things you need to advance your career as a star, these acts didn't start their career at the top.  What all stars have in common is that they take personal responsibility for their careers and their decisions. They know to seek out and surround themselves with other quality professionals who will  mutually benefit when working together. They fully understand the industry and own the responsibility for their career choices.

Without passion and belief in their vision, natural industry roadblocks and setbacks become insurmountable and the aspiring talent will not attract the people necessary to achieve success. The road to stardom isn't traveled in a vacuum. To take things to the next level one needs both professional assistance as well as their fan base.  Again, it is worth repeating, stars must be willing to do the things that others who fail were not willing to do.

Your sound is a given, obviously the backbone of your act. But even with top notch musical ability, without vision and the necessary tools, you and your band will plateau. This is not to say you can't earn a respectable living as a musician but it is unlikely you will achieve the heights you hope for by taking the time to read this. So what are these necessary tools that will take you from your current level to the next?

We've already discussed the most important items which are primarily a state of mind. All success starts in your mind. Actually, to be more precise, your success starts in your subconscious mind. And your subconscious cannot take a joke. In other words, your subconscious mind will believe anything you tell it even if your conscious mind doesn't believe what your are thinking. You tell your subconscious you are a star and your subconscious thoughts act accordingly, feeding your conscious mind with ideas and solutions that manifest those subconscious thoughts into physical reality. Conversely, if you are consciously negative your subconscious mind will believe the negativity and replace possibility with impossibility and provide the steps required to fail.

To prove this point you and some friends can pull a cruel practical joke on another friend or a coworker. Start off in the morning when you first greet your unknowing victim. When you ask him how he's doing, place doubt in mind by telling him he doesn't look very good and ask if he feels sick. His first response will to reassure you and himself that he feels fine.  Fifteen or twenty minutes later have another greet the individual in the same manner, questioning his present health. In another twenty minutes or so have your third accomplish tell your victim essentially the same with the help of a fourth party agreeing as well, that your victim is definitely under the weather. I promise you by lunch your victim will be on the way home suffering only from his mind manifesting subconscious thought into physical reality.

Think about this truism:  What gets thought about gets done. It is your passion, vision, belief, and determination that fuel your subconscious to take your desires and turn them into physical reality.  You can probably recall several occasions when a great idea or a solution to a problem just popped into your mind while at that particular moment you weren't even thinking about the situation. That is because your subconscious is always at work, on the job, day or night, asleep or awake. Therefore it is vitally important to consciously feed your subconscious with a positive attitude.

Entire books have been written about the power of your subconscious mind and go far deeper into the subject than the scope of this article. For now we should acknowledge that this is a critical element to achieving success.

Another critical element is placing the same importance on your package as you place on your sound. There are industry standards in marketing and promotion required to attract the people who will mutually benefit by helping your career. It is not reasonable to expect others to help in your career for any length of time with benefiting in some way for themselves.  It is your responsibility to provide others, willing to help, the tools they will need for your advancement. This is particularly true in a market incredibly rich with top quality talent such as Nashville.

As a working act you are a business, a creative service provider and just like any other business a band, a photographer, a record label, a plumber, a guitar manufacturer, or anyone else selling a product or service must advertise to be seen and must be prepared with materials on hand when opportunity knocks.

Fortunately the Internet makes a lot of this possible without a lot of expense. As you know your presence on MySpace is invaluable for providing information about your act for just the price of a computer and an Internet connection. Unfortunately for many this is a two edged sword. While a presence on the World Wide Web may be inexpensive and easy to start, it will require an investment of your time and capital to be helpful and not hurtful. A low budget, poorly thought out site is a direct reflection on the act. Very often, your Internet presence is that most important first impression to many who may have an interest in you. Perhaps a show or some "buzz" generated some interest but the Internet is where industry professionals and fans are going to gather additional information to form their opinions as to your professionalism, experience and frankly your worth.

It is to your benefit to be prepared when they arrive. Your press kit should be attractive and designed to drive traffic to your website or MySpace pages. Here you can provide a wealth of additional information minus printing costs. Remember a PDF and other downloaded items don't have reproduction costs. Also, interested people will take the time to read all the copy, views all the pictures, and listen to all the samples they can find. The fact that you are still reading this article should be proof that others too will do research when interested.

Our industry is a visual industry. Pictures in your press kit and website should be provocative and reveal the message of your image. This is important for building a fan base as well as being booked by those who stand to gain by your performance. Photography helps the interested party to visualize your importance and often provides fodder for a fruitful imagination. People always fantasize to their own benefit. We will take what we see and use our imagination to make it even better. For example, for most men, viewing a picture an attractive female scantily dressed in a negligee is more provocative than the same women entirely nude. Why? It is because the imagination will always fill in the blanks to our own advantage.

Often we only see what we want to see. Therefore well designed press photos and energetic live action concert shots go a very long way in selling your talent while during the times you are not performing and are crucial in advancing your career. Quality photography is also a profit center during the performance right along with your CDs, Tee shirts and other memorabilia.

It is not recommended to use fan pictures to build your gallery. Remember to most fans, stars are bigger than life. It is a let down when surfing a talent's website only to find pictures they could have taken by a cell phone or developed at Walmart. It's much better overall to invest in your career with other professionals who will enhance and highlight your qualities and credibility rather than risk guilt by association on a poor quality image.

There are cost effective ways to get high quality images on your website. A cost effective solution I offer my clients is to shoot a live performance and create a slide show for posting on their MySpace band profile. The large captioned slideshow on my profile is the sample I use to market this service to other artists.

To sum up image vs. sound, both are required tools to achieve success. Without a rock solid tight sound that speaks to your image, you have no image. Very few if any have reached stardom by just their music alone. Your sound and image are not mutually exclusive but rather a symbiotic relationship in which each part is made stronger by the whole. Just as your music required an investment in time, training, equipment, and capital, so will your image and marketing. While you may reach national prominence with only marketing and image, you will not earn and retain stardom without both.

###