I went and posted most of my music-like sonic product to YouTube (as ‘full albums’).

[Link to playlist]

Now, I guess I just sit back and wait for the monetized clickthru engagements to make the Bitcoins start filling up my digital wallet? Am I an influencer? Sure. Let’s say I am.

—

A key point of the first chapter in David Byrne’s latest book (“How Music Works”) is that music is written with a view of the place it is to be performed and by whom it will be listened to.

In a sense, we work backward, either consciously or unconsciously, creating work that fits the venue available to us. That holds true for the other arts as well: pictures are created that fit and look good on white walls in galleries just as music is written that sounds good either in a dance club or a symphony hall (but probably not in both). In a sense, the space, the platform, and the software “makes” the art, the music, or whatever. After something succeeds, more venues of a similar size and shape are built to accommodate more production of the same. After a while the form of the work that predominates in these spaces is taken for granted — of course we mainly hear symphonies in symphony halls.

Which got me wondering. Where do I expect this stuff to be heard, do I even expect it to be heard? The answer is: it will be heard in my own headphones, once in a while. Sometimes I’ll send a CD of stuff to a particular friend who was part of it all when I started. Sometimes I’ll post it here. Sometimes I’ll play something for my wife. Mostly it goes unheard by anyone but me. And yet I keep on making it, because it’s fun to make.

So I’m posting it on YouTube because, even though it’s not something I do for other people, I want it to exist somewhere besides just F:\Smaller Animals\Albums\. To be maudlin, I want it to outlive me. And now it’s out there in the world, sharing space on YouTube with every other song ever written.