I went down to San Jose last week to do an interview and performance on the NBC Bay Area show Press:Here. The host, Scott McGrew was awesome for making the whole thing happen. The piece aired on TV this morning (its also available on the web here) and one of the interviewers also wrote about it for TechCrunch.

The interview went by so fast, and there was such much I wanted to say that I didn't get in because I was so flustered. Thankfully, that's what blogs are for: a chance to elaborate. Here are some of the questions I was asked, and how I would have liked to answer them if I had had my wits about me and an hour instead of a few minutes.

Thank you Scott McGrew and everyone at Press: Here TV and thank you Sarah Lacy for the follow up story. These things really help, they really do.


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Do you feel like you've sold out in licensing your music?

Nope. Basically I think "selling out" is when you compromise your creative ideals in exchange for money. I have never done that, so I don't think I'm selling out.

I've been lucky that the companies who've wanted to use my music are selling things that I approve of, like Apple, Specialized Bikes, and Herman Miller. Second, in every single case, I didn't solicit them. The people making the commercials found me and asked if they could use my already existing music, or if I could tweak something to fit. Thankfully I haven't had a situation yet where I've had moral problems with the company (i.e. Exxon).

The film work I've done has been custom in that I've had to write to the movie. But I don't feel like I'm selling out there either. Directors ask me to write for their films because they want a certain style that I presumably have. I would never compose anything out of character. Its all MY music and I think its recognizable as such. If someone approached me wanting me to write a score of salsa music, well, I'd turn them down...because I don't write salsa music.


How did you get 1 million followers on Twitter?

I've been very upfront about this. I've written about it, the SF Chronicle and Billboard magazine have written about it: I am on the Twitter Suggested User List! I don't know how I got there, or how (or if) I deserve it...but of course its incredible and I'm grateful and I should probably give Twitter a cut of my income if it makes me a lot more money than normal (I don't know yet if that is the case).

I will say however that I don't think this all this is a big deal. I honestly don't believe that 1 million people are listening to everything I say. I use Twitter to talk to whatever subset of that million is my friends, fans and potential fans.

What is great about Twitter is that, like I said in the interview, it allows me to be myself to as many people as possible. Me and my music are the same thing and I've always had this stubborn, egotistical belief that if I just had a chance to get the real me across....people would be interested. The belief that what I'm doing is worthwhile, even if no one hears it, has sustained me through a lot of rejections and hard times.

I doubt my current career would be possible without the internet. Thanks to social networks I can have what feels like a direct relationship with an increasingly vast audience. There is no middleman.


If a label approached you with a huge record contract, would you take it?

No. There are so many reasons....

I can't help noticing that most of the signed musicians I've known are broke or struggling. Those on small labels keep their day jobs. Mid-level bands, they run through their advance quickly and then they make a living by touring constantly so that they can sell t-shirts. It will be several millennia before the amount they owe the record label is recouped out of the band's royalty, and they don't own the recordings. New music/modern classical artists seem to sustain themselves with teaching and maybe performing as they get more well known.

Then there are the bands I know who've been dropped as soon as their sales dip. I know bands who've been majorly screwed by this: they recorded followup albums that never saw the light of day, or had nervous breakdowns. A basic financial decision to a company can feel like a matter of life or death to an artist.

So I've just watched all this and since I'm realistic that my brand of instrumental cello music is never going to go platinum anyway, I might as well save myself some suffering, release it myself and keep all the money.

I didn't always think this way. I used to feel like landing a recording contract was like a "stamp of approval" and I wanted that approval. Back when I was starting out my solo career, Myspace didn't exist yet. The standard wisdom was that the way to success was to build a local following and strive to get the attention of a record label. I spent some time and energy sending my music unsolicited to record labels, agents and managers that I thought would be a good fit for me. Of course I didn't hear back from most of them. I did hear back from two labels that were kind enough to reply. They both said that I didn't fit with the other artists on their roster.

Since then, I've had industry executives tell me very respectfully the following things: my music is interesting but not marketable; my music can't be sold because it doesn't have words & it lacks a single, simple melody for people to latch onto; and I am not young/not sexy enough/too nerdy. I've had classical industry people tell me that my music is too pop. I've had pop industry people tell me my music is too classical. And by the way, what category am I in and can I name any similar artists? The music industry seems entirely focused on releasing albums that are similar to albums that have sold before.

Very quickly, it became clear that I would never fit on any label without serious compromise....so I stopped trying. I didn't bother to hire someone to craft a "story" that would fit me into a neat little bucket. I just focused on playing music and selling my CDs at shows and on my website, and on Amazon, CDBaby, iTunes, Rhapsody, etc.

I'm not trashing record labels. They perform a useful service for many artists. But I don't think the model works for me. I think of recording contracts as very, very expensive bank loans. In the future, if I need extra money to make an album, I'm more likely to try and raise it by appealing to my fans.

Because there aren't very many mouths to feed, I don't feel any pressure to continually be selling more, more, more. I have never done an ounce of official marketing or publicity. I make enough to pay the mortgage, the bills, go out to dinner and a movie every now and then, go on vacation and save money for the future. I'm not rich, my car is old, but I have enough to live well and not be continually worried about money. That's really all I want. I want to exist and keep making more music. I'm in this for the long haul. Slow and steady is fine by me.



How do you make a living?

I realized that I should probably know the exact percentage breakdown of my finances before I answer questions on television. I just went and looked up all my tax returns, looking from Dec 2005 when I released my Natoma album until today. Averaged over that almost 4 year period, roughly speaking, digital sales have totaled 40% my income. Of the remaining 60%, maybe a quarter of that is physical sales and the other 3/4 is licensing, commissions, performance fees, grants, and royalties. That's all 4 years together. This year physical sales and performance fees are much less because I've spent most of the year in the studio and not performing (that's the deal... if you're out there performing, you sell music, but then you can't write music). But digital sales and licensing has been much higher and made up for it. This year has been my best year ever, I'm guessing because of my internet presence.

I'm optimistic about the future. However, the entire situation is constantly changing and I know I can't keep all my eggs in one basket. So if by this time next year everyone has migrated to subscription music services, I'd better find a substitute for the digital chunk of my income. I don't want to start selling T-shirts, which I've resisted to date. I do know it helps when people know that by purchasing my music they are supporting me directly, that each CD sold is a vote for me to continue as an artist.



Phew! That's it!

I'd love to hear your comments about all of the above!

You know I love all of you.

However visiting Myspace is like visiting a trashy discount strip mall surrounded by obnoxious flashing billboards!!! It gets worse and worse! I used to be good at tuning that shit out, but the advertising is seriously limiting my experience (and I won't even start on the byzantine interface). Its reached a point where I find it so offensive that I don't like to come here.

People will say that this is a free service, and I should be grateful and just shut up and accept the advertising. But I don't accept it. There has got to be a way to be able to make money while keeping some kind of dignity.

(There, I said it, watch this blog get canned!)

I am here less than I used to be, however, you're my fans, and I NEED YOU. Seriously, I really need you. I don't have a label or management and Myspace is one of the primary ways I can reach you and tell you about stuff. So, I won't abandon you until the bitter end (and when Myspace implodes, how will we find each other?) BUT, PLEASE, if you want to know what I'm doing, sign up on my mailing list:

http://www.zoekeating.com/contact.html

I won't advertise to you, I will treat you with respect and I only email about once a month. And, for the fun stuff that we all like about social networking....You should know that I am spending a LOT of time on Twitter!

http://www.twitter.com/zoecello and Facebook

There are even 2 of me on Facebook, Zoe Keating the person, and Zoe Keating the artist page. Confusing, but I started my personal page before they had fan pages, and now I don't know how to unify myself. (Probably best to sign up to my "page" in case I discontinue the personal one)

So, if you can't stand it here any longer either...COME ON OVER to TWITTER & FACEBOOK

(and then we'll move to the next thing when they get ruined, and so on, and so on...!)

celloly yours, Zoe

Hello everyone.

I'm still somewhat stunned by this news......

Jeff Rusch and I were awarded a performing arts grant by the Creative Capital Foundation! The initial grant is for $10,000 and we are eligible for up to $50,000 over the course of the project. In addition to funding for our project, which I'll tell you about in a minute, we also get to participate in Creative Capital’s Artist Services Program. The program "offers artists assistance in areas like as fundraising, networking, marketing, and strategic planning, with the goal of advancing both their projects and their careers".

Um, WOW. The application process spanned several months last year and it seemed like such a long shot that I tried not to get my hopes up too much. In fact, I had put the grant out of my mind entirely and assumed we would do our project this year without funding. So when I got the phone call, I happened to be at a restaurant at the time, and I promptly lay down on the floor in shock.

What is the project? It is to create a live synaesthetic presentation of my music. Jeff and I will be taking one step further the work we have done together in the past with our layered cello-plus-video performances in San Francisco, in Italy, and in France. The goal is to create an ideal live performance environment in which you, the audience, can experience a version of what I see in my mind's eye as I play.

I'm very grateful. The first meetings with Creative Capital are this week. The work begins!

Obviously, I'll keep you posted on all this as it develops. If all goes well we should be ready to perform in November.

2008 went out with a bang. I had a great time on tour with Amanda Palmer and the Danger Ensemble. I really love performing, and also I love to travel. Its already a blur of warm fuzzy memories. A special treat this time around was that I got to tour with my sister Laura and her pregnant belly (she is Amanda's as merch girl extraordinaire). Now I'm also very eager to be back in my studio because being in my studio means I can WORK ON MY ALBUM, which I haven't been here to do since August. I've been tinkering away on it the last 2 weeks, hopefully productively!

Thanks very much for listening. I know these are tough times for a lot of people, but watching the inauguration today gave me so much hope.

celloly yours, Zoe

Hello everyone,

It is 6am and I am wide awake here in my temporary apartment on a quiet medieval street in Valencia, Spain. It is so beautiful! Its like a stone stage set. I am still having difficulty believing I am here.

How it happened....the choreographer Asun Noales discovered my music on iTunes. She choreographed a ballet to "Updraught", "Legions (War)" and "Frozen Angels". Then she was invited to put on the ballet at the Teatro Principal here in Valencia so the music director of the theater contacted me to see if I could produce sheet music for orchestra. However, because I didn't have time to do that (because I was leaving the following day for Amanda Palmer's tour) they asked me to come do it live.

Hmmm...let me think hard about that one...a two week trip to Valencia, Spain to perform with a ballet company in a grand theater that is a copy of La Scala in Milan...how about....FUCK YES?!

So here I am. I've stayed up nearly every night the last 4 days making the music perfect. I'm finally ready, which is good because the premier is today.

Here are the details if any of you happen to be in Spain over the next week (come on, the weather is lovely and the food here is fantastic!).


"Llebeig"

danced by the Ballet de Teatres de la Generalitat
choreography by Asun Noales

live music by Zoe Keating

Teatro Principal
Valencia, Spain

Nov 20, 21, 22 and 28 at 9pm

Nov 23, 26 and 27 at 7pm

10 to 20 ?.

tickets here: http://www.bancajaticket.es/Servientrada/janto/main.php

Celloly yours from Spain,

Zoe

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTU-6oigFg0

Live video from La Boule Noire in Paris last week. Thank you Alexandra Opillard for taking the video! By the way, I'm looking for a name for this song if anyone has any suggestions...

Hello!

I'm writing this from Paris, where I just spent a lovely day wandering with my sister. Because we're here on tour we had no plans, which is kind of nice. We headed off in the most appealing direction and went from pastry shop to pastry shop until we found ourselves at the Louvre. Then we strolled along the Seine to Notra Dame and wound up the day in the Latin quarter. I have to say, it is days like today when I LOVE MY JOB. I think we stopped for crepes at least three times.

The concert is tomorrow at La Boule Noire in Montmartre and that's my last performance on this leg of the Who Killed Amanda Palmer Tour. Amanda and the Danger Ensemble will continue on to Belgium and the Netherlands, but I must get myself to Chicago for another live installment of Radio Lab on Oct 26 and 27. You might remember last year I performed with Radio Lab in St. Paul Minnesota for their deconstruction of War of The Worlds. They are reprising the show, for two nights, at the Victory Gardens Theater in Chicago and I am providing live music. Details below!

Then, in November I'll be in Spain working on live music for a ballet. It will run from Nov 20 to Nov 28 at the Teatro Principal in Valencia. And immediately following that, I rejoin Amanda Palmer in Toronto on Nov 30 for the rest of her North American tour which ends on Dec 16 at the Henry Fonda Theater in LA.

That's the scoop! All the dates are below...and will be on my website as soon as I have internet for more than 30 minutes!

Thank you to everyone in Europe who came to see us. I've had an amazing time. Its all still a bit of a blur, but there were so many amazing moments, and audiences. I will certainly be back.

celloly yours, Zoe

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Oct 26, Oct 27
RadioLab Live!
Chicago: Victory Gardens Theater

Victory Gardens Theater Fresh Squeezed and WNYC's Radio Lab will present Martian Invasion! Decoding the War of the Worlds, on the eve of the War of the Worlds 70th anniversary, at Victory Gardens Biograph Theater, October 26 and 27.
Radio Lab hosts Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich will deconstruct the original broadcast of War of the Worlds and describe what was happening-sociologically and psychologically-at each step. The program will be accompanied by cellist Zoe Keating.

more info:
http://blogs.wnyc.org/radiolab/2008/10/08/get-yer-tickets-war-of-the-worlds-live-in-chicago/

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Nov 20 to Nov 28
performing live with the Ballet de Teatres de la Generalitat
Teatro Principal, Valencia, Spain

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Who Killed Amanda Palmer - North American Tour
(supporting and accompanying Amanda Palmer on all dates)

Nov 30, Toronto, Ontario: Mod Club Theatre
Dec 2, Ferndale, Michigan: Magic Bag:
Dec 3, Chicago, Illinois: Cabaret Metro
Dec 5, Minneapolis, Minnesota: First Avenue Nightclub
Dec 6, Denver, Colorado: Bluebird Theatre
Dec 7, Apsen, Colorado: Belly Up
Dec 8, Murray, Utah: Murray Theatre
Dec 10, Vancouver, BC: Richard?s On Richards Cabaret
Dec 11, Seattle, Washington: Showbox Theatre
Dec 12, Portland, Oregon: Wonder Ballroom
Dec 13, Sacramento, California: Harlow?s
Dec 15, San Francisco, California: Bimbo?s 365 Club
Dec 16, Los Angeles, California: Henry Fonda Theatre

hello everyone,

i'm in edinburgh right now, in a fantastically homey pub called the Black Rose Tavern. the mohawked staff is attractively decked out in black, the music loud and punk, but most importantly, they have all day breakfast (black pudding!!), comfy sofas and free wifi.

anyway, i haven't had internet for a few days and see that i have a PILE of messages! i will do my best to read them all, but you should know that i might be a bit out of touch for the next 4 weeks since i'm relying on free wifi in conjunction with free moments to find the wifi!

thank you for the lovely messages. as some of you probably heard, amanda palmer got hit by a car in belfast. she stepped off the curb while looking the wrong way. thankfully, only her foot was injured, but pretty seriously, and she has three broken bones in her foot, a broken big toe and a cast up to her knee. the girl is a trooper though and even performed an extra long set in belfast that same night. so...the show goes on. send her your best bone-healing wishes....

i'm going to go now and have a wander while the sun is shining. i forgot how much i LOVE BEING ON TOUR.

celloly yours, zoe

Ello, ello, ello....

The outline....

1) NEWSY BITS
2) WHO KILLED AMANDA PALMER PRE-ORDER
3) UPCOMING PERFORMANCES

1) First the NEWSY BITS....

I'm getting ready for tour, trying to finish all my competing projects, and coping with the RadioLab-podcast-effect (i.e. mailing hundreds of CDs - thank you everyone! AND you made me 1 on iTunes classical last week!!). Jeff's been helping me figure out logistics of transporting me and my stuff (fly to Boston, rehearse in Boston, fly to SF, then perform at Oracle OpenWorld, fly to Boston, perform in Boston, fly to Ireland).

One of my goals is to not bring any external hardware with me, and just use a software looper called SooperLooper. Not sure yet if I'm going to be able to pull that off, but it would be so freeing (er, and with less baggage charges!) to travel with just cello+computer+foot pedal.

I heard, via my Dad who read it in the NYTimes, that "Secret Life of Bees" premiered at the Toronto Film Fest the other day. It said the film "a coming-of-age drama set against the civil rights struggles of 1964, turns out to be stitched together, emotionally speaking, with a cello". I know they're speaking about Alicia Keyes' cello-playing character, but its gratifying nonetheless, given that it is me playing all those cello parts. The movie premiers in theaters while I'm in Europe, so if you see it, tell me how my "solos" with the London Chamber Orchestra sound...

2) Next....WHO KILLED AMANDA PALMER PRE-ORDER...

Yes, at long last Amanda's album is here! Its great, nuff said. I can't wait to go on tour and play the songs. I am extremely happy with how my bits came out. And its not just an album, this is a full-on art project that comes with a variety of options: signed by Amanda and Ben Folds, companion book by Neil Gaiman, lithographs, twin-peaks-inspired crime-scene-photo sets, special songs, etc.

Here's where to get it: Who Killed Amanda Palmer?

3) And now...UPCOMING PERFORMANCES!!!

So, at the bottom you will find whens and wheres of the Amanda Palmer tour. Opening solo are myself and also Accordion-playing-audience-mesmerizer Jason Webley. Then I'll join Amanda and the Danger Ensemble for the big show (yes, costumes are involved).

Right before leaving this continent I have a performance at MIT for the Emerging Technology conference. For those of you in Boston, yes, this show IS FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC!
September 25th, 4:30pm
MIT: Building W16 (Kresge Auditorium)
street address: 48 Massachusetts Ave (Rear)

Also in there, are performances on Sept 22, 23 and 24 at the Moscone Center in SF at Oracle OpenWorld (before keynote speeches, if any on this list happen to be going).

After the tour, there are some other things happening (i.e. live performances with a ballet in Spain) but I think there is already enough in here and I'm amazed if I haven't lost half of you already!

Thank you, thank you for all your support.

celloly yours,
Zoe


Performances:

Sept 22,23,24 Oracle Open World @ Moscone Center, San Francisco
Sept 25 4:30P EmTech @ MIT, Boston

Sep 27 7:30P Academy Dublin, Ireland
Sep 28 8:00P Auntie Annie's Porterhouse Belfast, Ireland
Sep 30 7:00P Cabaret Voltaire Edinburgh, Scotland
Oct 2 8:30P King Tuts Wah Wah Hut Glasgow, Scotland
Oct 3 7:00P Birmingham Space 2 @ The Custard Factory Birmingham, UK
Oct 4 7:00P Concorde 2 Brighton, UK
Oct 6 7:30P Club Academy Manchester, UK
Oct 7 7:30P Thekla Bristol, UK
Oct 8 6:30P Carling Academy Sheffield, UK
Oct 10 8:00P Koko London, UK
Oct 12 9:00P Knaack Klub Berlin, Germany
Oct 13 9:00P Star Club Dresden, Germany
Oct 14 9:00P Karlstorbahnhof Heidelberg, Germany
Oct 16 8:00P Abart Zurich, Switzerland
Oct 17 9:00P Music Drome (fka Transilvania) Milan, Italy
Oct 18 8:00P Komma Wörgl, Austria
Oct 20 7:00P Szene Vienna Vienna, Austria
Oct 21 9:00P 59:1 Munich, Germany
Oct 23 8:00P La Boule Noire Paris, France
Oct 24 8:15P Handelsbeurs Ghent, Belgium
Oct 26 7:30P Melkweg Amsterdam, Netherlands
Oct 27 7:30P Helling Utrecht, Netherlands
Oct 29 8:00P 13 Tilburg, Netherlands

Last month I wrote about my weekend at O'Reilly's Foo Camp. During my performance, I mentioned that I was looking to work with someone doing music visualization. Well, someone there (Jeffrey Veen) hooked me up with this incredible artist, Robert Hodgin.

His work is astonishing, here is a piece he did to a song by Trentemoller:



We thought it would be cool to try something together, so Robert invited me to perform a couple days ago during his presentation at Flashforward 2008 (an Adobe Flash conference). Here's a video of it, certain parameters of his animations are responding, live, to musical input from my performance (as I understood it: pitch, density, that sort of thing). I hope somewhere out there is better video of it, because it looked amazing from what I could see in the stage video monitor.



I'd love to do more of this kind of thing. I dream about midi control as well as audio since it seems like things could easily be triggered via midi data from my foot controller and Ableton Live.

If you know anyone, or have any interest yourself, write to me!! (info zoekeating com).

more about Robert: http://www.flight404.com