Cold calling (or emailing) musical groups as an accompanist.

MusicianWages.com Forums » Gigs & Other Income Sources

Latest reply from noedg

(9 posts) (5 people)

Cold calling (or emailing) musical groups as an accompanist.

Posted 2 years ago by brian

#

brian said 2 years ago

I'm trying to stay active as a musician and find work as an accompanist wherever I can get it. I've emailed people, churches, high schools and so on, asking if they were looking for an accompanist for their music based needs and sending them my resume. I'm about to email a well known community theatre organization in the city where I live and I'm wondering, what is the best way to cold call or email or contact someone about getting a gig? Does anyone have suggestions on how to word an email or a phone call?
#

David J. Hahn said 2 years ago

That's a good topic for an article. Maybe I should put something together.

Here is an email I sent out a few months ago and made a new friend and contact as a result.

My name is Dave, I'm a piano player and keyboardist originally from Chicago. I've worked primarily in theatre for the past 14 years. I've been an accompanist, conductor, keyboardist, copyist - you name it. I studied jazz and classical, I worked on cruise ships, MD'd the Wonderful Town national tour and worked as a consultant for Hal Leonard. My resume, bio, recordings and photo are all at http://www.davidjhahn.org.

I moved to NYC a few months ago and I'm looking for work. I'm certain you often receive emails to that effect, but I thought it wouldn't hurt to write you anyway. I'm a member of the 802 and I found your name and contact through them.

I wonder if you are in need of [whatever the gig is]. Also, if you have any advice for me about getting rehearsal and audition accompanist work in the area, I would be very, very grateful.

Thank you for your time -
Dave

***********************************************
DAVID J. HAHN
Piano, Conducting & Keyboards
(630) 740-9274 | http://WWW.DAVIDJHAHN.ORG

Join my songwriting newsletter at Songwriter.fm
#

Andree-Ann said 2 years ago

Thanks for that email example Dave! Really helpful. I've kinda been wondering about that too.

Andree-Ann
http://www.myspace.com/andreeanndeschenes
#

brian said 2 years ago

Awesome example. Thanks! Now if only I could have your qualifications as well. =)
#

DC said 2 years ago

I sent out email messages to local theater groups this past fall and I've received a few responses. It doesn't hurt that's for sure. You're either going to be ignored or get a response. David's got a great one.

I sent this:

I'm a local professional musician (electric and acoustic bass, drums and percussion) looking for pit work in the Merrimack Valley area. (I live in Methuen.) I'm interested in speaking with or auditioning for the Musical Director for the bass chair in your upcoming productions.

Short and sweet.
#

noedg said 1 year ago

Hi..

I've been a reader of the blog for a while, some very interesting posts! The site deserves to be a hell of a lot bigger than it is in my opinion, I'm sure in time it will catch on.

I registered purely to reply to this post but I'm sure I'll stick around some more.

So I'm 18 years old (prefer to remain annonymous as I hate being googled) so I was searching like crazy for pop gigs, chart bands etc. So I decided to do what you did and "cold call". There was an artist very popular over the internet who I heard of with thousands of fans worldwide, signed to Universal but yet to release an album (being released in March 2010). So I decided to send his manager an e-mail asking about auditions, I got a reply saying I needed to send them a photo (the pop scene is as much image as it is music in my opinion, unfortunate but hey).

So then they asked me to go and audition in London, so I did, got the job (name dropping a little helped me), did a sell out tour, played live radio shows, met a hell of alot of contacts that I've now got other live and studio work from. We're also playing all the big festivals over here like Glastonbury, V Fest and Ocean Fest, aswell as touring the states, australia, and europe. It's also got me way more work with other people including a big tour I have coming up with someone off of the xFactor over here.

Sorry for the essay here, I can talk for britain.. but what I'm saying is, cold e-mailing is definately a good thing, but don't make it cold.. with all due respect to DC's post, you gotta remember the people you want to work for are human.. being a people person goes a long long way in this business. And I know I'm young so I don't mean to lecture, but you need to have a balance of not sucking up to them, but not sounding like you've copy and pasted the e-mail to a hundred other people.

But then again what do I know (apart from without cold e-mailing I would still only be playing in pubs and clubs), I've just been lucky so far.. could all go down hill anywhere along the line I guess
#

DC said 1 year ago

noedg,

Good points and congratulations! I agree with adding more "humanity" to the message. My original though was to "get in and get out" quickly. By being simple and to the point, I could at least get the person to read my inquiry and send it along to the appropriate person. My intention was not to waste anybody's time. My next round of messaging will reflect more personality.
#

David J. Hahn said 1 year ago

noedg -

Very cool, congrats on the great gig.

I'd love to see an example of your first email. Do you think you could post it here for us?

Join my songwriting newsletter at Songwriter.fm
#

noedg said 1 year ago

I don't have a copy of the e-mail I sent as it was over a year ago, but I've re-wrote something along the same lines.

Hi there.. I'm an 18 year old lead guitarist/backing vocalist from London.. I've been listening to your aritst [NAME] for a while now after coming across his myspace page, and I really like what I hear.

I was just wondering if there would be any possibilty of an audition for the live band? If not then no worries, I've attached a copy of my CV anyway just incase. I've been playing professionaly for over a year and recently finished a tour with a show from the West End, but I'm currently trying to break into the pop scene.

Anyway, my number is 07777888889 just incase.

Many thanks and I'll look forward to hearing from you

Noedg (obviously I would put my actual name there haha)

And the reply I got was far less formal, but I wouldn't risk going any further formal or informal than that personally.. You never know if a person is going to be hella posh, or totally the opposite.. but that seems to be about half way. I've used the same approach for most things including endorsements, and have been successful most of the time.