Last year, we introduced our inaugural 6-Pack songwriting challenge. The idea is for writers to stretch and write outside their comfort zones. The winner was Liz Miller of Conshohocken, Pennsylvania. Her prizes included gear from Sony, Cakewalk, Digidesign and Universal Audio. As a grand prize, Broadjam flew her to the NAMM show in Anaheim. After the show I spent a day in LA with Liz introducing her to key people in the film and television business and getting to know her.

Like many of our members, Liz works a “real job” as a nurse, is married and has two kids. She’s an exceptional country writer, but can really write in many genres. I’ve never been in the studio with her, but I’m sure she’s the biggest critic of her own work. That’s probably why her stuff is so good.

There were a few memorable meetings. The first was with Kevin Edelman. He’s the music supervisor for 6 or 7 TV shows and always has a film in the hopper. We met him at his office in Hollywood and he had some advice for Liz and all aspiring writers:
1) The work begins when you’re done writing. Pitch your music and follow-up.
2) Keep writing and sending everything. While a supervisor can’t listen to everything that’s sent, keep submitting so your name is constantly in front of them.

I always love getting together with Kevin as he’s very good at his job.

After dropping off CDs to other folks, we had lunch with Tiffany Davis, Director of Membership for the Academy of Country Music. I appreciate Tiffany taking time out of her busy day to share her thoughts about the industry with us. Tiffany could be the most connected and hardest working person in the country music business. In an ACM newsletter after we had visited, Liz was featured as a guest of the Academy. This was a surprise to Liz and I both. Thanks Tif.

We ended up at Paul Broucek’s office. Paul is the President of New Line Music Group. His projects have included Austin Powers, Blade and the Oscar-winning Lord of The Rings. Paul spent an hour and a half with Liz, giving her feedback that only a guy of his caliber could offer. At times he shook his head and simply said good work to her. Other times he was encouraging, but honest with Liz. In all, he listened to 10 tracks and gave Liz the direct feedback we all desire.

Then Paul and I spent some time talking about Broadjam, New Line and the industry in general. As I’ve done in the past, I showed him around Broadjam.com and played several artists for him including Adam Dachman and Tally Hall. In Broadjam’s early days, he and Kevin gave me insight on how they look for music. This is one of the key reasons we ask you to include so much metadata for your songs. When these guys search for music, they’re looking for specific criteria to help them sift through the enormous volume they get daily. After we finished talking, he reviewed several artists on our site.

Our new 6-Pack launched this week. We can’t promise the above, but if you’ve checked out the details, you know we have something very exciting in store for the winner. Our line up of sponsors is a who’s who in the business: IK Multimedia, Sony, Genelec, Digidesign, E Labs Multimedia, PowerFX, Ableton, Hercules, Kaysound, DigitalMusician.net, PG Music, Mackie, ILIO, Spectrasonics, MasterWriter, Electro Voice and DigiTech. We’re eager to watch our members battle it out for the top spot and to hear the submissions for the new challenges: Spill Your Guts, Put Your Music Where Your Mouth Is, Acoustic Slide, Birthday Bash, Jingles All the Way, and Lights, Camera, Music. All challenges are now open, so let your creativity flow!

Congrats again to last year’s winner, Liz Miller. Thanks to the sponsors and to Kevin, Tiffany and Paul for their time and thoughts.

Let me know what you think about this year’s challenges. I’m anxious to hear your thoughts and submissions and to check out the competition when the Leaderboard launches.

Roy