Greyhawks Digital Music Class – 1 – Introduction
Welcome to Greyhawk’s Digital Music Class. I decided to start writing some posts after several people (in the blogosphere and real life) asked me how I manage my (hedonistically large) music library. I’ll try to put these posts out there once in awhile, and I hope you get something out of them.
I’ll give you a little background on myself and on my music collection. First off, I’ve been a music fan since my first 8-track at 5 years old. I’ve always loved music, and have been a collector since I started saving money. In college I became a disc jockey at both the college radio station and the local 100,000 watt classic rock station. Through my (five) years of college, I did every job they had at the college station including two stints as the station manager. I also worked nearly 40 hours a week at the classic rock station. Sometimes it was commercial copy writing and production, but mostly it was on-air jocking.
During this whole time, I continued to amass titles in my collection. I would snag freebies any time I could, and at the college station, I worked with record company reps that liked me enough to send me multiple copies of every new release. That allowed me to have one and another could go to the station. During that time I also got on the guest list of hundreds of live concerts. The point it, music is a lot of what makes me, well… me.
I’ve tried a lot of things to manage the collection. In the past I’ve done things like have three 400-disc CD changers tethered together and to a computer to be able to manage it all. Besides the cost and the sheer size of that solution, it just became too cumbersome to find the music I wanted at any given moment. In recent years I’ve taken the majority of my music library and digitized it into MP3 format so I could catalog it and use it anywhere. This has freed my musical spirit considerably. I can listen to whatever I want whenever I want, and I can even transport almost my whole collection on a single 160GB ipod. It’s liberating. I’ll help you get to where I am, and avoid the pitfalls along the way.
In the next installment we’ll talk about how to get your current library into the digital realm, without DRM.
August 1, 2008 @ 6:52 pm
I was a college radio DJ, too. It was actually a commercial college station, staffed by students (except for one full-time salesman and one admin assistant), so I can say I have commercial radio experience, but as a non-professional. I did a couple of semesters as Music Director, but never did Program Director or Station Manager. I maxed out at about 20 hours a week of on-air time, which I kept up for the better part of a year, then I burned out. I started hearing stories of upperclassmen with way more talent than me getting stuck as tape-jockeys at fully automated stations in backwater towns, so I knew I wasn’t going to even think about going pro, and I cut back my time.
I did go back and visit the station at a reunion a few years ago, and they still had some of the old LP library (though it is never touched any more… they are waaay beyond that now), and I pulled a couple of albums out off the shelf and actually found one that came in during my tenure as Music Directory: The Wall. Some of the notes I wrote on labels that we put on the jackets weer still there, identifying the cuts for heavy airplay. That was pretty cool.
My only minor claim to fame was that I was the first Music Director to tell the college rep for Elektra records that The Breakup Song should be released as a single. When it was released, it went to #15.
Anyhow, from what you’ve said so far, though, my collection is less than half yours. I’ve got about half of it in iTunes, and have done nothing much in terms of organizign it, so I’ll bet there’s lots I can learn from you.
I’m very much looking forward to this series!
August 1, 2008 @ 7:34 pm
Very cool! I know there are some other former DJ’s lurking in the Domino community too, so maybe we’ll hear from them as well.
I actually switched my major to Communications with a Broadcast Journalism emphasis from Comp Sci when I was a Sophomore. As I was about to graduate, I realized that being a jock was not a good career move. So as I left college, I left behind the radio dream and moved on.
I would love to see what the station is working with now, and to see if any of the old CD’s and Vinyl still have my notes on them. That would be really cool… heh.
My only claim to fame was that I was the “Radio Knob of the Week” in HITS magazine which was a trade mag at the time. Got my picture in it and everything
Glad you’re looking forward to the series. I’m excited to write it!
-Grey
August 3, 2008 @ 4:10 pm
And if any of your readers want to get started actually making digital music, give me a holler
It is always nice to see you name in the ARTIST list of your (or even better someone elses iPlod)