Like a lot of working musicians, the current global pandemic has cost me pretty much all of my paying gigs (which is fine, as much as I like singing about dead people, keeping as many of you all healthy as possible is a lot more important than me playing shows).
I'm fortunate in that I have a part-time "day job" income, so unlike a lot of my colleagues in the music business, I'll still be able to eat and sleep indoors and all that. It'll be a bit tight for a bit, but we folk-singer types are a hardy bunch and have been historically hard to stamp out.
But I like making music, exploring both traditional stuff and creating new original music, so I'm directing my energy to recorded projects, one of which will be taking some of the content on this blog and turning it into short video essays. I'm also putting some original harp and mandolin compositions online as well, and I'm hosting it all on my Patreon page.
I'm going to start out very simple, talk about the history of the song for a few minutes, then perform a version of it. The videos, which I will probably try to make one or two of a month will be available free to view on Youtube, but Patreon supporters will also get a downloadable audio version of each episode's song for their own enjoyment.
You can see the first video here.
The way I've set up my page is to ask supporters for money only when I post an original composition. So if you subscribe at the $1 level, each time I post an original, you'll give me a buck. When I post traditional folk content, you won't be charged, but you'll still get exclusive access to recorded content.
I plan to try and post two or three originals a month, along with at least one of these video essays. We'll see how it works and how successful it is, but I'm hoping it will both help push me to write more and provide a small revenue stream that I can invest in better recording and video equipment, to give you better production values (my pie-in-the-sky dream for all this is to be able to hire someone who actually knows more about making video than "sit in front of a smartphone and press play" to help with the editing).
Things are weird right now, that's for sure, but I really appreciate all my friends who have given me support over the years, whether financial or moral (or occasionally immoral. You know who you are!).
Whether it's here online, out in coffee shops or just on my own back porch, I'm going to keep singing.
-Matt
