ALAMOSA — Somewhere, there is a talented, passionate but struggling artist faced with a soul-crushing decision. Continue to pursue their dream of a career in music even though, in the industry today, “more month than money” is likely to be a permanent condition? Or give it up, get a job and turn their dream into a weekend pastime?
It’s a brutal choice and one that’s impacting more and more artists and those people who love their music.
Music has been a historical harbinger for social change. It’s therefore fitting that a diverse group of professionals — singers, songwriters, producers, engineers, and others — have formed a non-profit to give those gifted musicians and their fans a third path to follow.
Howlin' Dog Music Group (HDMG) was created to, in their words, “invest in the music we love, and the livelihood of the people who create it.”
In starting a non-profit that makes a career in music more viable, HDMG founders Don Richmond and Teri McCartney know they’re on a journey into uncharted territory, doing something that has never been done. They also know that, if music as they know it is going to survive, it’s a journey that must be made.
How did we get here?
The world of music changed in ways no one could have predicted in 2006, when two guys from Sweden decided to fight the online piracy of music by forming a digital streaming platform.
It soon became apparent that allowing access to a staggering amount of music for the monthly price of a Starbucks was an idea whose time had come. By 2018, when the company went public on the New York Stock Exchange, the U.S. Securities and Stock Exchange reported the small Swedish start-up company was worth $23 billion.
The name of that company is Spotify, and, in 2023, they tout 551 million monthly active users, including 331 million who have access to 100 million songs for free. While it’s a great deal for listeners, the artists whose music makes Spotify so successful only receive $.003 each time one of their songs is played.
“It’s this dichotomy,” Richmond says. “My music can be in front of the whole world but there’s no way that I can make anything that even resembles a living.”
Spotify also boasts 11 million artists on its platform, but of those 11 million, only 165,000 — less than 2% — have 10,000 monthly listeners.
“Even with putting a lot of money into it and pushing a lot of promotion, it’s almost impossible for a new regional artist or a regional artist with a collection of CDs to stand out as one in 11 million,” Richmond says. “People are kind of siloed and that’s just the way it is.”
Streaming platforms like Spotify and others have also rendered CDs almost useless, ending for many musicians the revenue stream they relied on in the past to support themselves and their families.
“Nobody buys CDs anymore,” McCartney says. “It hard to even find CD players. And why buy CDs when the music is available for free?”
It’s a perfect storm of frustration, but, luckily, the story doesn’t end there.
Light on the horizon
At its core, HDMG is built upon the idea of a collaboration among people who are committed to being “a transformative force for positive change.” That change starts where the music always starts, with the artists themselves.
Making a good, professional recording is out of reach for many artists. It’s just too expensive and, with the difficulty of selling physical media (CDs or vinyl, for example), the investment doesn’t pay off. Knowing that’s the reality, HDMG will directly invest in selected artists’ projects, including access to high quality recording and production of their music.
Although having a high-quality recording may not directly pay off in sales, it does help create a following, which pushes “live” performances, which, in turn, creates another revenue stream.
Knowing these things and being a successful artist also involves learning from those who have known success. Learning “the business” is another of HDMG’s areas of focus.
The decades of music that the artists who founded the non-profit have created is a legacy all its own, but their vision goes beyond now and themselves. A third goal of the non-profit is to collect and create a digitized archive of regional music — professional and otherwise — that preserves the extraordinary richness that has come out of this part of the country.
It’s about the audience
More than any other art form, the relationship between artist and audience is at the heart of things. Gilkyson, Hearne, Richmond and truly countless others have all said that it’s the audience that makes the music come alive. Keeping the music alive is now about the audience, too.
The non-profit plans to apply for grants to support them in making their vision a reality, but in going the distance and making it sustainable, the journey is reliant upon those who love the music that they hear financially supporting its continued creation.
“Will there be troubadours in the future if it gets too impossible to do,” Richmond asks. “We want to make it less impossible.”
“That’s what Howlin’ Dog Music Group is all about,” McCartney says.
For more information, go to www.howlindogmusicgroup.org.
