Last week, Judith Dobrzynski at Real Clear Arts posted this thought:
With newspapers and magazines shrinking faster than the
ozone layer, coverage of events like this concert will disappear except
for blogs. And that creates a large problem for arts institutions
dependent on the media for free marketing and PR, especially those
in the performing arts.I was talking about this very subject last week with
the PR head of an important music institution. Though he hasn’t lost
coverage by mainstream media, he is in a bit of a fix. More and more
bloggers are asking for tickets, which are expensive to give away. He
can’t do it, and doesn’t unless they have MSM credentials, too. Yet
bloggers may be the only ones writing regularly about the arts in the
years to come, especially outside of New York.
Bloggers without publications behind them asking for press tickets – and in my case, asking for interviews with artists – can be a problem. As Judith says, press tickets aren’t free; those are real seats that can be sold at top prices. In the current media climate, arts organizations aren’t in a position to turn down reviews, and publicists aren’t really in a position to turn down interviews, but where should we draw the line?
When bloggers I’m not familiar with request interviews with my clients, I always read their most recent entries and then – if their last entry wasn’t from months or even years before – ask them for their daily page views. That way, I can determine if an interview should be a priority or happen at all. I also do a quick Google search to see how often their blog is linked to by other bloggers. If the blog has a smaller readership but is a consistent source of information for more heavily-trafficked blogs, I take that into consideration. Turning down blogger interviews or ticket requests is not snobbery; an institution or publicist can have a page view cut-off, and inform bloggers of their policy. Ideally, bloggers asking for press tickets would go to organization press departments with their page view and readership information. That in and of itself is always a good indication of professionalism.
I would also recommend giving many bloggers first chances but not so many second chances. If a blogger with a high number of page views is given a ticket to a concert and then doesn’t review it, it’s fine to turn down their next request as far as I’m concerned. Bloggers aren’t dealing with space constraints or editors, so there’s no excuse for accepting free tickets and then not reviewing.
When I was covering at a record label in the fall, I worked for one artist who was not familiar with the “blogosphere” and had a history of turning down interviews that were not serious enough. I felt very strongly that interviews on Violinist.com and Sequenza21 would not only be quite serious musically but would really help sell records. Rather than just suggesting these to her manager, also not a blog-guy, and then getting annoyed when he said no, I sent him the following e mail:
These are the two blogs I think we should focus on for previews of the album. I have worked with both of them before, and find them to be very professional and thoughtful. Blog content from widely-read blogs such as these will be picked up and circulated by other blogs, creating a viral publicity effect. Additionally, the blogs below target readers who are actually interested in buying new music albums, whereas more mainstream press readers will not necessarily purchase an album or attend a concert.
Sequenza21
http://www.sequenza21.com/index.php
Contemporary classical music blog written by multiple musicologist contributors, including David Salvage, Jerry Bowles (editor), and John Clare.
Regarded as a community for contemporary classical composers and performing artists who support new music.
Topics range from album reviews and concert previews to profiles of artists and composers.
8,000 readers per day.Violinist.com
http://www.violinist.com/
Networking site for professional and amateur violinists run by Laurie Niles (a violin teacher)
Includes discussion boards, interviews, and links to violin shops, teachers, etc.
6,000 readers per day.
Her manager responded about an hour later with, “Great! What is the next step?”
Thanks for that interesting article.
There is no such things as a good and thorough review on a dedicated music blog – at least compared to a few superficial lines in a poor newspaper…
I have no problem at all with reviews by ‘amateur’ bloggers. Unless your name is Dudamel, Glass, Barenboim & the like, getting a review in the local paper (whether the NYT or the Fargo Forum) has never been much more likely than winning the Lotto. For every one that gets a lucky paragraph or two, dozens of other — often stellar — performances might well never have happened for anyone other than the audience that attended.
Most bloggers are not Writers with a capital “W”, but many know how to string their thoughts and words together just fine. And most usually do carry one capital “F” descriptor: Fan. They write about something they’re truly passionate over; often they have long and deep history with the music, performer or circle. They’re the audience the concert was trying to reach, so what they think and have to say can be every bit as insightful — and then some — as someone on an assignment.
Bless you for this entry, this is a problem I and other arts publicist struggle with regularly. I couldn’t agree more with every point you make.
I try to take the long view, knowing that blogs and new media are probably the future of where arts journalism (and hence, my job as a publicist) are headed. At the end of the day, I don’t care whether a review shows up in print or on a blog. I just want to know that it’s credible and that it has the potential to positively impact my company and its events. It helps a lot if the person is professional and easy to work with too…with bloggers, the level of professionalism varies greatly, in my experience. I absolutely expect the same degree of professionalism from a blogger as I do from a print journalist, and I believe that I need to treat bloggers with the same respect.
Amanda, I’m curious about the responses you’ve had when you ask for page views. I’ve tried this a few times, and I’ve yet to receive a hard number in response.
The most important thing to me is that people are reading it–are these blogs respected? Are they promoting and cross-promoting themselves? Do people comment on the blog? Has a review ever incited one of my patrons to joy or rage–and has that patron talked back to me about it?
I’d love to hear from others about blogs they work with that are excellent. For me, I adore ionarts in Washington. Sequenza is great, newmusicbox is great, thought I don’t consider it as much a blog as an e-zine. Then there are sites like Parterre and Opera Chic, which are roundly awesome and probably as well read as print newspaper reviews. I don’t have the cajones to call out blogs that I’m skeptical of, but maybe someone else does?
I usually get numbers in response. I actually mis-wrote in my entry: I ask for Page Visits, not Page Views. You probably know this, but Page Visits consist of one or more Page Views, that is, how many individual people went to a blog that day/week/month. Many Page Views can occur during a single Page Visit; once someone has gotten to your blog, they may look around and generate many Page Views. So Page Visits are more important for my purposes: if an interview with one of my clients is posted on that blog, how many people will potentially read it in a day? Numbers may pale in comparison to say, the New York Times’ readership, but how much are 6,000 violinists actively participating in an established online community worth vs. a million Times’ readers who may throw out the art section?
The worst response I got was from a freelance writer who I like(d?) very much. He said he was starting a blog and wanted to interview Hilary for it. I said great, just send me a description of the blog, I’ll pass that onto her and you can interview her at intermission. (The orchestra had arranged press tickets for him, and she was only playing on the first half.) When he didn’t send me a description a week later, I followed-up: sorry to be a pest, just wondering when the blog is going to launch and if you can send me a description. Well, putting it together is taking longer than expected, he said, so I don’t have anything for you. I’m sorry, I wrote back, but I can’t arrange an interview in a vacuum for you, but please do say hi to her after the concert. This writer not only blew off the concert, but e mailed me to say he’s blown off the concert, and that it was probably for the best because he didn’t think Hilary gave good interviews anyway! Funny, not two weeks earlier you were dying to talk to her.
So yes: sometimes people act less professionally when they don’t have publications/a boss behind them. Which is ironic, of course, because logic would dictate that humans should act more professionally when representing themselves. Thanks for commenting! -AA
Most of us who blog about the ‘classical’ performing arts make no financial gain from blogging. We do it out of a passion for music, opera, dance or theatre, and a desire to communicate that passion. Most of the major arts institutions here in NYC are very open to having bloggers cover their events and in fact we often receive far more invitations in a given week than we could possibly accept.
As far as giving away seats that could otherwise be sold, it’s a valid point but then again we often end up buying tickets to performances that we don’t want to miss – but to which press seats were not provided for us – only to find acres of unsold seats. It should also be pointed out that none of the bloggers I know asks for or expects prime seating, especially at big venues like the Metropolitan Opera House. We’re happy to sit upstairs, armed with binoculars, and report from there. But such accommodations are never offered.
People looking for coverage of events beyond ‘first nights’ will find options among the blogs. I routinely cover 2nd casts and mid-run performances of opera and ballet. Several important debuts in various works by dancers and singers are often overlooked by the mainstream press who only write about the season prima of a given programme.
Facebook makes it very easy to connect directly with many musicians and dancers; they love being interviewed, written about and having their work discussed. Photographers in the arts world are always happy to send me pictures to use on my blog.
Some blogs are dismissed as shallow, pretentious, badly written, irrelevant, unprofessional, etc. It’s up to the readers to determine what kind of reviews and articles they want to read. And readership stats are the clue as to whether your blog is a success or not.