Freelancing, and How it Benefits Your Songwriting Career

photo by Scarleth White

In a previous post I proposed 4 reasons keeping a day-job can benefit your songwriting career.  This post will tackle the flip-side.  Freelancing, or making a living without a steady nine-to-five job can be the perfect support system for the working songwriter.  The first part of this post covers freelancing as a career choice.  The second part ties freelancing to the songwriter’s career.

The Freelance Lifestyle

What do I mean by freelancing?  I’m talking about using your professional skills to service a wide variety of clients and companies - not one single company.  Many freelancers work primarily from home, or travel to various companies and locations to perform their service.  It comes with a tremendous amount of freedom, but also lots of additional responsibilities.  Aside from working in your field, you’re running a business and that can become very time-consuming and stressful.  But also rewarding.

Freelancing lends itself well to a few specific skills, particularly creative fields.  Here are just a few examples of common freelance career paths:

• Graphic Design
• Copywriting
• Journalism
• Web Design
• Computer Programming
• Audio Engineering
• Session Musicians / Instrument Instruction
• Video Editing

Professional freelancing comes with several pros and cons.  First lets look at the pros:

• Flexible working hours
• Little or no commute
• Often work from the comfort of your own home
• Involvement in a variety of projects and industries

And now the cons:

• Lack of a steady paycheck / fluctuating income
• Less or no interaction with co-workers
• Additional responsibilities (you’re running your own business)
• Work can stretch past 40 hours per week

If you are considering dropping the day job and diving into the freelance lifestyle, you should take some time to take all of the angles into serious consideration.  For more valuable info about freelancing, check out the fantastic blog, Freelance Switch.

Freelancing + Songwriting

As any dedicated musician knows, pursuing a career in songwriting takes a tremendous commitment of time and effort.  It’s hard to strike a balance between paying the bills and meeting your musical goals.  Freelancing, whether music related or not, can offer the flexibility many songwriters and musicians are looking for.  Lets break down the benefits:

1. Flexible work schedule = Writing songs when inspiration hits.  Since you’re not stuck in a nine-to-five every day of the week, you’re free to use your daily time however you want (for the most part).  If you work from home, you might decide to dedicate 2 hours in the middle of each day playing and writing music.  Or a great idea may hit you at 10:00 am and you want to spend the morning laying down recordings.  Of course, this doesn’t mean you don’t have other paid work to attend to.  It means you have the freedom to work at night, or arrange your schedule however you see fit.  It’s hard to capture your songwriting inspiration when you’re stuck in a cubicle all day.
2. More networking opportunities.  While it’s true that as a freelancer, you probably won’t see much daily interaction with co-workers.  You might be working completely alone most days - especially if you work from home.  However, as a freelancer, you will get meet many clients, work at many different companies, and attend networking events.  This makes for broader networking opportunities.  Whether you meet someone who can directly help your songwriting career or not, knowing more people in more places is better than knowing a bunch of people in only one place.
3. Freedom to Let Your Creativity Flourish.  Many songwriters (including myself) find it difficult to talk about writing music with their co-workers at the daily nine-to-five job.  It can also be difficult to shameless self-promote weekly or monthly gigs to your co-workers.  When you’re in “work mode” you’re not in “creative mode”.  That separation can cause you to downplay that part of yourself - the creative and emotion-driven songwriter part.  Since freelancing brings in you in contact with a wide variety of people from week to week, it can be easier to put forth your true self.  Of course, this is different for everyone, but seems to be a common thread among many musicians.
4. Mix your freelance work with music-related goals.  Freelancing allows you to dip your hand in a wide variety of projects and interact with professionals in a variety of industries.  Even if your specific skill as a freelancer is not directly related to music, you may find opportunities to apply your skill in a music-related context.  For example, I make a living as a freelance web designer.  For the most part, my client’s websites are not music related, but from time to time I’ll work on a website for a recording studio, or music publisher.  I’m still doing web design work, but I’m involved in the music industry and networking with people connected to music.
5. Songwriting as a freelance career.  Of course, songwriting, composition, and many other skills within the music industry lend themselves well to freelancing.  You can easily apply any of the advice for running a freelance business to your songwriting career efforts.  Working as a freelancer also gives you the flexibility to work in several fields at once.  Once again, I’ll use myself as an example here.  The majority of my income comes from freelance web design work.  However I earn some of my income from producing music for picture - more on making money in music for picture here.  Freelancing gives me the freedom and flexibility to dedicate time to both web design and music composition.

As you can see, there are arguments to be made for both sides.  Freelancing and keeping a day-job both provide sufficient financial support systems to songwriters who are in pursuit of a career in music.  It’s all about finding that balance and keeping your lifetime priorities strait while staying financially secure.  It’s tough out there, but there’s always a way to make it work for you.

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