I want to talk about something that, for me as a Christian singer and overall fan of Christian music/karaoke, really bothers me.
Anyone who's into singing Christian music may have noticed that there are often only small handfuls of tracks available to songs by favorite Christian artists. In most cases, the "big hit" songs on the charts are available from one or more companies as accompaniment, and selected songs from artist albums and/or compilations are available as well.
One of the best things about the accompaniment tracks to these songs is that they're made in 2 or 3 keys, making it easier for you to sing to them - something you hardly ever see in secular "karaoke."
But that's about it on the "pros" side.
There are, IMO, many "cons" with Christian accompaniment tracks:
1. THEY ARE OFTEN DISCONTINUED WITHIN ONE OR TWO YEARS.
This is my biggest complaint, and a serious problem. Many times people hear a song released several years ago on Christian radio, like it so much they want to sing it in church, then go to purchase the track only to find out, "oopsy, it's out of print." It's almost like accompaniment companies are saying "too bad" to the consumers. There is only ONE company, Christian World, that releases tracks and keeps them in print, but of course they can't produce tracks to every popular Christian song.
The biggest offenders when it comes to discontinuing tracks are often the labels, but with the exception noted, all of the accompaniment sources do this. While I don't claim to understand exactly why they do this, I believe it's to save money. It costs a lot to produce these tracks on CD or cassette, and it means having to keep certain resources on hand. Plus some titles don't sell as much after a year or so because demand has diminshed, or simply didn't sell well, so they're pulled. This is all understandable, but with today's new technologies, there ARE ways to keep titles in circulation. For instance, one label has taken advantage of the digital downloading revolution and offers some (but not all) of their tracks at popular pay sites such as Napster and iTunes. For a small price you can obtain the tracks you want, and often for much less than the full retail price. You're happy, the labels make some money, and all seems right with the world.
2. MANY DO NOT TAKE ADVANTAGE OF OFFERING TRACKS FOR DIGITAL PAID DOWNLOAD.
I know of at least 2 major labels that would benefit greatly from such a service. They already offer singles and songs from their artists' albums...you'd think offering accompaniment tracks would be a natural extension of that. But they do not, and instead expect consumers to pay $8 to $10 for a track to ONE song. (See #3 for a possible reason why.)
3. THEY BELIEVE THERE ISN'T A LARGE MARKET IN CHRISTIAN ACCOMPANIMENT.
I've heard managers, customer service reps, and others tell me that Christian accompaniment tracks "just don't sell." Really? Then don't tell that to Getfreecds.com, whose sales are mostly derived from = guess what = accompaniment tracks. According to their manager, accompaniment tracks are a huge business for them. One look at their selection and prices, and it's easy to see why. Getfreecds offers some of the best prices on tracks - 20% off and a buy 6 get 1 free deal with no gimmicks. For me, they have become my primary source for obtaining titles unavailable via digital download.
There are other sites who also will tell you that accompaniment tracks make up a large portion of their profits. For them, to not sell them, or to offer only limited selections, would be tantamount to not offering a large selection of books.
4. SOME COMPANIES MAKE IT DIFFICULT FOR BOOKSTORES TO STOCK THEIR TITLES.
Bookstores often try to do the right thing by offering a vast selection of titles. Since they don't know what will truly sell well and what won't, they are sometimes forced to purchase titles that are not popular with their customers. For instance, it wouldn't make sense for a bookstore in the Northeast to fill their shelves with a large selection of Southern Gospel tracks, yet some companies will insist that they must buy them, along with a portion of Contemporary titles, when placing an order. In most cases, the titles that sell will probably be the Contemporary tracks - southern gospel isn't as popular in that area. As a result, the bookstores end up marking down the titles and taking a loss, which causes them to re-think offering accompaniment tracks in the future. The good news is that this is the exception and not the rule, but it is a problem which should be corrected.
5. VERY FEW "CHRISTIAN KARAOKE" SETS AVAILABLE.
While there are naturally more secular karaoke albums available everywhere you look, there are few Christian karaoke albums. There have been the attempts by secular karaoke companies to release on CD (or cassette in the past) "hits" by a certain artist or a compilation of hits from the Christian charts for a particular month, but these predictably don't sell as well as their secular titles. One reason is lack of exposure - many Christian singers may not realize these exist. Another is that the titles are in the original key only. I believe the main reason these titles don't sell is because they offer titles already available from Christian labels and track companies.
Two Christian companies, Daywind and Chordant, have offered karaoke sets but they too have had limited success, perhaps due to the same reasons listed above.
That's all for now, but I may write more in the days to come.
No comments:
Post a Comment