Ideas!
I was eating dinner while looking at my site. I know, it isn’t a good habit to have your laptop on your dining table along with your food. I know I am already risking something by telling you about my personal habits. Anyway, I kept looking, chewing and thinking. I was asking myself, what people could possibly want from my site apart from getting the music news. I know that bands will peek every now and then to see if I have written something about them. I know that fans will check to see if I have written something about their favorite bands. Yes there are videos, but these videos are only appealing as far as the musical preferences of my viewers permit. I have interviews scheduled as a weekly thing. My reason for this is to give bands and musicians the opportunity to have more exposure. I do have pending interviews but I need to stick to my schedule to provide everyone the same opportunity.
I am sure you don’t come to this site for the following reasons:
- The weather forecast
- Fashion trends
- Health tips
- Romance counseling
- Stock market reports
- Tips on how to get even with your neighbor who plays the same annoying album over and over again.
- Self defense advice
- Recipes. Hmmm…No.
Something occurred to me. People like to visit websites not just for information, but they do appreciate being offered freebies too. It’s nice to be able to have visitors leave my site with something they can keep. I think digital downloads are a gift that is always appreciated. I will have to ask the bands I have already interviewed to see if I can do this as a part of a weekly freebee give away. I can’t commit to doing daily updates since I am working on this alone and committing myself to something that might be too hard to carry out might tarnish my reputation in the blogosphere. I think that this download offer will work. A weekly free mp3 (I don’t know how many I can give away) is what I will be offering you.
This idea isn’t new. Marc Gunn has been doing this way before I launched this site. But you, my readers, are important to me and I think you should have something you can keep with you when you come and visit this site. In return, I would like to ask from you to share the word about the bands you download especially if you like their music. Please spread the word about this website too, so that it will get more traffic. The more traffic it gets, the more we can help expose our favorite musicians. So what do you think? It’s fun to share together!
My choice this week is Mike Vass whom I had the honor of featuring before. This track is taken from his album String Theory.
Scottish Musician and Composer:
http://www.mikevass.com
Biography
Winner of the inaugural Neil Gow International Composition Award, Mike Vass is fast gaining a reputation as one of Scotland’s foremost tunesmiths. His compositions frequently appear in the recordings and performances of some of the UK’s top name acts; most notably luminaries such as Brian Finnegan, Corrina Hewat, and Mairearad Green.
Mike is regarded as one of Scotland’s finest fiddle players, in great demand as a performer, composer and teacher. He has toured extensively in the past few years with leading Scots Song band Malinky, in a duo with twin sister Ali, and with International super group Fiddle Rendezvous, featuring Bruce Molsky, Maryann Kennedy and Gerry O’Connor.
Mike’s New Voices Commission ‘String Theory’ debuted at Celtic Connections in 2010, and was described as ‘the most direct and honest since the idea was first conceived … precision, subtlety and attention to detail’. One of the highlights, the avant-garde piece ‘Man’s Search’ inspired by Viktor Frankl’s best-selling book, was described as ‘utterly compelling’ and ‘one epoch-making composition’. ‘Man’s Search’ was subsequently featured by the Victor Frankl Institute in Austria to commemorate Frankl’s birthday.
Mike was nominated as ‘Best Up and Coming Act’ in the 2007 Scots Trad Music Awards, along with pianist/singer twin sister Ali, and won ‘Best Folk Band’ with Malinky in 2010. A runner-up in the 2007 BBC Radio Scotland Young Traditional Musician of the Year competition, Mike was subsequently invited to tour with the 2008 finalists as an accompanist. Although barely 5 years into his career, Mike has already featured on more than a dozen recordings, including Volume 1 of The Complete Songs of Robert Tannahill, produced by Dr Fred Freeman, and Malinky’s acclaimed fourth album Flower and Iron.
Celtic Music Fan 