Who I Am, and Why I’m Doing This

Hi, I’m Steve Geroe – pretty much a one man band getting this project up-and-running

At this stage I have no plans to quit the day job, teaching

My motivation? Far-and-away the most potent motivation is finding an interesting and absorbing way to get my own music out there

The prospect of making an income out of this is appealing, but not something I’m aiming to do in the early stages (apart from my own music)

I’m a singer songwriter pretty much in the folk genre, although my fingerpicking styles range across roots music and some more poppy songs

I’ll be using the site to try to get some gigs for myself – I have about 50 songs and instrumentals that I’ve decided to try and do something with

Right now I’m happy to take on any gigs on pretty much any conditions, for practice and the experience. I played quite a few pubs, restaurants, folk clubs, markets, street corners etc years ago, but got out of the way of it with one thing and another. As I’ve written quite a few songs in recent years, I thought I might try to share them in this way.

Future plans for Melodic Gigspace

I’d love to start ‘Melodic Gigspace Sessions’, probably once or twice a month in an upstairs room at a pub or other fairly low-key venue. It could develop as an open mic/musos club, or an invitation event if there was stronger interest. A longer term dream is that it could lead on to a music cafe/venue.

I hope to promote artists through such events. I have quite a few ideas about promoting Indie artists,  but as that would be time consuming and involve expenditure I’d prefer to discuss that with selected individual artists than put those strategies up on the site.

When it comes down to it, this project is based on my self belief as a talent scout and promoter – primarily of acoustic singer songwriters, but also of talented artists in other genres as well if they come along.

I don’t see charging struggling/emerging indie artists as a viable business model, so I have no plans to charge artists for my services in the foreseeable future.

Essentially I believe that there is a far broader market for quality indie music than at present exists. While there are quite a number of great venues, festivals and labels I think there is plenty of upside. The main viable revenue streams I’m aware of now are promoting hardworking artists to build up their following and play bigger venues, and building up traffic on this site and accepting advertising. Various ways of presenting music online to a broader audience online could also come into the mix.

I also believe (at least suspect) there is a fair sort of market for more personalised gigs in the acoustic and classical space. By this I mean more ‘music experiences’ than simply playing at parties or functions. This concept would be highly variable, and would need to be integrated with other aspects of promotion.

In short I’m seeking to promote quality artists as a way to promote my site, my dreams of being part of a vibrant music scene through events and a venue, and my own music. More fundamentally, I believe the quality of life in our society can be enhanced by bringing great independent music more into the mainstream.