#knack factory

Nobody Does This Alone

A version of the following post went out on our newsletter earlier this morning; sign up for weekly updates on the Contest community. Soon, we’ll start featuring entries there for thousands of people to see.

With the 2017 Tiny Desk Contest opening for entries in a mere two weeks — remember, you can submit your entries Jan. 13-29 at npr.org/tinydeskcontest — we thought now would be a good time to reflect on a theme that's struck us repeatedly these last two years.

The Contest is about great music, but it’s equally about community. Whether it’s a big band like Ezra Vancil & The Congregation coming together in 2016 to perform their rousing entry or a local scene like Buffalo, N.Y. rallying around the Contest, this experience is all about bringing people together. We thought we’d share some examples here for ways you can bring your community together this year:

Communities provide support of all kinds, but they’re practically useful because they’re a way for musicians to share resources. Last year, before entries were even open, we heard that Portland, Maine digital production house Knack Factory was teaming up with a local music blog, Hot Trash Portland, to film nine local bands’ Tiny Desk Contest videos. They even cut a short video together featuring bits of those submissions in one place. If you have resources you think other artists could use or a tip about how people are coming together around the Contest, let us know at [email protected] — we can help share your idea to bring people together via this newsletter and our Tumblr.

Some of NPR’s Member stations did similar things after the Contest. Many acts who didn’t win wound up earning local press in places like California, Indiana, Missouri, Pennsylvania and Wyoming. Last year, opbmusic made a cool interactive map of local submissions from the Pacific Northwest. Local music scenes are so foundational to amateur artists’ success, and we hope that the Contest can become a way for musicians to find each other within a scene. That’s why we organize local tour stops, too, where a few bands that entered the Contest can come play for each other and for fans.

Remember, too, that even when you see a single Contest winner, there’s a whole community behind them. Fantastic Negrito entered the Contest after the artist collective he belonged to encouraged him to enter and helped him make his video. Students and friends of Gaelynn Lea contacted her to say “Gaelynn, you really gotta do it,” and then she even had the audience at a local show pick her song.

“I knew the Contest closed at the end of January, and I had picked out the song that I wanted to record via a vote at my pizza shop gig,” she told us recently. “I played all three songs and then had people raise their hand, and I picked 'Someday We’ll Linger In The Sun' because that song won.”

None of us does this alone, and we wouldn’t have it any other way. How are you going to bring people together around the Contest? Email us your thoughts, and let’s make music together.

From the Tiny Desk,