Easy Online Applications To Perform At Music Festivals

In the "old days," to apply to perform at music festivals across the nation was a "tough act" in itself.  It meant mailing out dozens and dozens of bulky press kits with music samples (CD's and before that, cassettes or LPs).  Now days, almost instantly, your band can apply to appear at festivals and other events throughout the nation and abroad through online applications:

Here are some of my favorites!  Some I have performed at.  Some I have attended. Some I would like to attend or perform at!  If you or your band would like to submit to perform at these, just click and submit!

Each May in Paducah, Kentucky, they have the Lowertown Art & Music Festival. It's a really cool festival featuring local artist and musicians.  Bands are required to perform original material, no covers, and must be based within 300 miles of Paducah, Kentucky.   If you'd like to play it,  Click Here to apply to perform at the Lowertown Art and Music Festival!  I've played this one several times and it's a treat!  The neighborhood is beautiful, the town is great, and the crew is easy to work with!

I've played the Handy Blues Festival in Henderson, Kentucky a couple of times over the last 14 years.  To my mind, it's one of the best "unknown" blues festivals in the nation.  It's only one stage but they consistently have the top blues acts in the nation over the festival, which last more than a week.  It takes place in a gorgeous park overlooking the Ohio River and it's usually packed for the performances.  The organizers use merchandise sales and sponsors to keep the festival free.  One of my favorite festivals to have ever played or  attended.  Several years ago, a friend of mine from Australia came to visit and I suggested he stay at a B and B and attend this festival prior to the Chicago Blues Festival and believe it or not, he enjoyed the Handy Festival as much or more than the Chicago Blues Festival because the performers were so outstanding and the local people were to nice!  If you'd like to perform at the WC Handy Blues Festival, Click here to apply! 

I've never played the Chicago Blues Festival, but it's a dream of mine!  You better believe I'll apply next year. I have attended it, and it's all you would think it would be: the finest Chicago Blues players and singers doing their thing that they do so well!  If you think you or your band has what it takes to play the Chicago Blues Festival, or any of the other music events in the Windy City, click here and submit your best stuff! 

One of my favorite Blues Festivals is the King Biscuit Blues Festival in Helena, Arkansas!  Been there many times.  Never played the festival itself, but did play at Pasquale's Tamales once, during the festival, years ago!  You can't really "apply" to play the main stage, but you can apply to play the "Emerging Artist" Stage and if you are good enough, you might work your way to the big stage in the future and get recognition in the present for appearing at this prestigious festival.  If you think this fits you or your band, apply here by downloading the application and sending in! 

There are several online services which make it easy for you or your band to apply for appearing at festivals and events across the country or abroad.  Right now, I'm utilizing SonicBids to see how effective it is.  It cost a monthly fee and some of the larger festivals, such as Bonnaroo, require an additional monetary fee, usually $5 to $20.  I'll publish a review after a few months and tell you how SonicBids worked for us!

Another huge festival for which you can apply to perform, online, is SXSW in Austin, TX!.  You can apply to perform through SonicBids,

You can apply to play at the Camp Wigout Music Festival in Alabama through SonicBids or Online through their website. 

I'll post more ways to apply to play Blues Festivals later!  Or if you know of some others, email me at ljetton at 61south.com.  Thanks!!!

Festival Update For 2013

We're still ironing out schedule for festivals and other major shows this coming year, but here's what we know so far!

Saturday, April 13, Juke Joint Festival, Clarksdale, MS:  We are still waiting to get our stage assignment and time but are really looking forward to our 4th straight appearance at the Juke Joint Festival.  As noted since our first ever visit there, it's one of our favorites and in my opinion, one of the best run festivals there is.  There is plenty of "real deal" blues artist, in the "real deal" settings, the actual juke joints of Mississippi, and even outside of the music, there is plenty for the whole family to enjoy.....like the racing pigs, and monkey's riding dogs! While there, check out the coolest store ever, Cat Head.  Here's a look at our visit last year!    Last year, we played at the Delta Amusement Cafe, and the year before we played at Ground Zero! 

Friday, May 17, Lowertown Art and Music Festival, Paducah, KY:  We'll play on the main stage at 4PM, so get there early.  This is a really cool festival featuring music and local art in the city's historic Lowertown district, which has been revitalized as a mecca for local artists.  The festival features the music, art galleries nearby and great food, too!  One cool thing about playing on Friday is our friends, Blue Mother Tupelo will too!  We're among their many fans and always look forward to seeing them perform and saying "hi!"

Saturday, May 25, Shawnee Art & Wine Festival, Murphysboro, IL:  Don't let the website fool ya!  The event has been moved to May this year, on Memorial Day Weekend.  Several of Southern Illinois' finest wineries are on hand for tastings, and great food, too.  We had a blast last year and this year's should be even better!!  We're schedule to play at 2PM on the main stage.

Friday, September 27, BBQ On The River, Paducah, KY:   Our annual gathering with 40,000 or so of our closest friends!  We played the very first one, way back in 1995 and have enjoyed making it our "homecoming" every year since!  Along the way, it's turned into one of the biggest events in the entire Commonwealth of Kentucky, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for charities.  That's the unique thing which sets this BBQ contest apart. The contestants cook for trophies, but also cook for their adopted charities, who receive the proceeds from the sale of the BBQ to the public!

You can always find a complete listing of our shows HERE!  And it's continually updated as new shows are added.  If you haven't heard, one of our fans is pushing our submission to appear at this year's Bonnaroo Music Festival in June!  That would be a major HOOT!  If you'd like to help with this venture, just click here and like us, and share on your facebook wall!



May God Bless,
Lew

Upcoming Festivals and our new Press Release

Gearing up for festivals!

So far, we'll be back in the Juke Joint Festival in April in Clarksdale, MS, along with the Murphysboro Art and Wine Festival in Illinois in May, and the Lowertown Art and Music Festival in Kentucky,

At the end of the year, we'll be back at the BBQ on the River in Paducah, KY, and I'm sure we'll be hearing from some others.  We have also yet to hear from several festivals to which we've applied, including the WC Handy Festival in Henderson, KY, the Shannon Street Blues Festival in Jackson, TN, the Boomslang Festival in Lexington, KY and believe it or not, Bonnaroo in Manchester, TN in June.    Keep up on our ever changing show page!

In the meantime, here's our latest press release, which I need to update as well!  On my!  The groundhog was right!  It'll be Spring and then Summer before you know it!  Get ready!

God Bless,
Lew

Mid America Motorcycle Expo

We had a great time playing over the weekend at the Mid America Motorcycle Expo in Evansville, Indiana at the Centre.  The crowd was great and we got to see so many beautiful bikes! (Click  on the pictures for larger views)

Great crowd at the Mid America Motorcycle Expo!

Also appearing at the show was Geneva, one of the top acts at bike events across the nation!  She was even gracious enough to join us onstage for a song!  Check out her band at http://genevaband.com

One of the hits of the event was their "pinup girl" contest

Just one of the great looking bikes on display

Special thanks to the folks who put the show on, along with Jimmy Rhodes of Owensboro Biker News. Check out their website and join their mailing list.

Rumble with Rumblefish...

I'm usually a pretty easy going guy and try very hard to be understanding of others, especially in business, but there comes a point when a business with bad business practices needs to be called out.  That's what I'm doing, right now, with my own opinion.

I've been with CDBaby.com for years. It's a great service, selling music for independent musicians online and also handling digital distribution.  I've been very happy with my service from CD Baby.

A few years ago though, CD Baby aligned with Rumblefish, another service which pledged to handle synch licensing for independent musicians, so the musicians could have their music licensed for videos, commercials, movies, etc. Sounds like a good deal, huh?  That's what I thought, so I signed up.

I never saw a great return from Rumblefish.  I think the biggest payment I ever received from them was 5 cents over a 3 month period, or less.  Then the most frustrating part happened.  Rumblefish claimed licensing rights on MY OWN VIDEOS ON MY OWN YOUTUBE CHANNEL.

I thought that was surely an honest mistake.  They must have used a bot of some type to identify the videos using my music and claimed it, to monetize it with ads, from which the songwriter, me, would get a share.  The trouble was, I was getting a MUCH SMALLER share through Rumblefish, than I was on my videos which had already ben monetized through Google Adsense.

No problem. Rumblefish has forms to fill out to reclaim your own music, which they have claimed.  It took a lot of searching to find it, but I FINALLY found the online forms to let them know they needed to relinquish the claims on the videos which I owned myself, and didn't want or need them to monetize.  I filled them out faithfully.

A month went by.  Rumblefish did not turn the rights back over to me, FOR MY OWN MUSIC!  Sooooo, I turned to CD Baby.  I went to their page and opted out of the Rumblefish Service, and received an email from CD Baby stating Rumblefish had been notified and at the most, it would take 30 days for me to regain control of my music videos.

More than another month went by, and still Rumblefish claimed control of my videos.  My next step was to contact CD Baby AGAIN and let them know what had happened....or in this case, what had NOT happened.  CD Baby was gracious and asked for specifics so they could find out what was going on with Rumblefish.  I also went directly to Youtube and disputed Rumblefish's claims on my own videos.

To date....nothing.  Rumblefish STILL has active claims on my own music and is costing me money.  My OWN MONEY ON MY OWN SONGS!  Rumblefish has obviously been very lucrative for its owners and now claims to be licensing more than 8 million songs.  Four of them are MINE, and I WANT THEM BACK!

In my opinion, songwriters and musicians should think long and hard before doing business with Rumblefish.  You might wind up in a rumble yourself, trying to get back what's rightfully yours in the first place!

Postcript: Finally, after the disputing the claim through CD Baby and Youtube, I was able to regain control of my music on my videos.....the long nightmare was over!

New Year's Eve Show Cancelled

We're sad to report our scheduled show for New Year's Eve at Walker Hall has been cancelled.  For those of you who already bought tickets to the event, they will be refunded through Walker Hall and we're very sorry for the inconvenience. 

2013? It's Here Already In One Sense!

Time sure flies, and for us, in a sense, it's already 2013! We're booking shows for 2013 and it's filling up fast, so if you or your festival would like us to play for 2013, just let us know asap to reserve your date! 

Of course, if you believe he Mayan Calendar, there will be no 2013, but since I use the regular calendar, I'm not too concerned.  IF the Mayan calendar is RIGHT, I might as well not be concerned either, since it won't matter anyway! 

For booking, call (270) 519-1788 or email at booking @ 61south.com and set aside your date for next year!  Hope to see you all in 2013!  NOW, back to 2012 and football season and oh yes, GO CARDS in the MLB Playoffs!