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Hi guys,
I have a dream, and that dream is that I could sell my music score for more than 1 million dollar.
Actually, my dream goes beyond that, it's the dream that talented piano composer can sell their scores at a big prize.

If you google most expensive paintings, you'll find a wikipedia page that lists the most expensive paintings ever sold,
the most expensive being "The Card Players", sold at more than 250 000 000$.


Now, if you type the most expensive scores, chances are that you will find no entry.
Actually, I created that missing page here: http://www.most-expensive-scores.com/,
but that's not as official as a wikipedia page.


The real question here is: why is it that a painting can be sold 250 000 000$, whereas music scores have no value at all on the art market.
Doesn't it bother you?

As artists, we all know that music or painting are equivalent arts in terms of time consumption.
So, maybe:

- the painting is an object that you can buy and bring home
- the art collectors aren't used to buy scores now


So I want to do now is try to leverage that piano community to make art collectors change their mind.
Obviously I alone cannot achieve that, I need your help.
So, what's the plan?

The best idea I can think of is to create a buzz around that topic: "music score vs painting".


I have some material too.
My best composition is here: "http://www.premierconcert.com/when-you-wish-upon-a-star"

Although I might not be as talented as I think,
I dare you say that my work is not worth that painting:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Suprematist_Composition_-_Kazimir_Malevich.jpg
which by the way was sold 60 000 000$.

To make a buzz, we can certainly create posts about the topic and publish them on the internet.
I'm not going to ask your help without rewarding though (I'm a fair guy ;)), so here is my deal:


you and I know that as for now my music score's value is 0$, so, I have made a page where I sell my music scores to
high prizes: from 1 million to 300 millions (yes, it's the most expensive score in the world, that can help to create a buzz):
http://www.premierconcert.com/help-artist

And I will share equally the revenue of the first sold composition amongst the posters who posted a message which helped the sale happen.
So if you have a blog, and you want to support that crazy idea, create a blog entry, and add a link to your blog entry on this page;
otherwise I will not be able to reward you if the sale happens.



Even though we are not here yet, if a sale happens, here is how I intend to share the earned money:

- count this post's blog entries (or web pages) links in the replies
- count the other post's blog entries (or web pages) links in the replies: I may duplicate this post on different websites to increase the chances of making a sale.
- I will count this post as a blog entry too
- I will divide the gain for the first sale only between posters who helped me


To count all posters post: I will use this page: http://most-expensive-scores.com/buzz-project




So, for instance if the first sale is a score which price is 1 000 000$, and there are 10 posters,
I will give each poster 1 000 000 / 10 = 100 000$.

But that's only for the first sale, otherwise I will not be able to make any money from it.

If ever a music score is sold, I will reply to my own post so that every person interested in the subject can see the progression.
At this point, we would have made a good job.




So, for me it's clear that music should be worth painting on the art market.
There are no excuses for an art collector to not collect music score if he/she likes the artist behind.

The question is: What is YOUR opinion about that, and what are you going to do about it?




Cheers, Talfi.

I think the reason is that, unlike a painting, there isn't a tangible representative version of a piece of music to buy and sell. The art isn't really in the manuscript, it's in the playing of it. The manuscript is simply the instructions for painting the picture. Every time a piece is played, the art is being created anew. Other than forgeries, a painting is the one and only copy of it.

And even for rare manuscripts that DO sell for a lot of money, they aren't selling for what they are themselves, really. They're selling for what they represent. I guess you could make the same argument about a painting (they are often bought and sold by people who buy it for the idea of it, not the thing itself), but it's still true that the painting has the art there in it--it IS the art, whether or not you see it that way--and a musical manuscript is still only describing the art.

Or to put it another way, if you offered me all the manuscripts in the world but I could never hear them played, I would turn you down.

If you offered me a stable of amazing musicians whose only job it is to instantly play anything in the world just for me, but I could never see the manuscripts, I'd take you right up on that.

First of all TwoSnowFlakes, happy birthday for a couple of days ago! ^_^ I think it's still valid...

Now, the topic interests me a lot, but in all honesty the OP is pretty much SPAM in my book, with all those links... It almost feels like a pyramid scheme of sorts, so no thank you.

If the Original Poster can prove that he's truly interesting in the subject and he's not trying to get more people into his websites, perhaps... just perhaps I'll click away, but as it stands... no thank you!

You're still within 24 hours of it--and within 12 hours of it if you are looking at it from my time zone--so it's more than valid! So thanks!

I hope the OP isn't spam (I didn't read very carefully the bottom part of the post, which does look suspiciously spammy now that I see it), but it's a moderately interesting discussion anyway. But also kind of fundamentally obvious unless you truly do not get that manuscripts are not art in the same way that a painting is art.

I'll refrain from posting further on this thread. If we want to have a discussion about manuscripts and their role in the art world, we can have that in a separate thread.

If you don't understand why "Suprematist Composition" by Kazimir Malevich sold for $60 million, you probably don't have much hope of making a score that will sell for $1 million.

I did have similar notions, when doing my PhD in composition and as such I composed a work titled "Unique". The idea was that I would compose a work of music, to a single copy: The high quality recording (with electronic elements, not possible to reproduced (at least not easily) would be 192 KhZ and 24-bit (in DVD only), and the music score was printed in high quality paper and hand noted by myself.

This "package" is in the possession of a dear friend of mine. I doubt it's worth anything!

HOWEVER,

A work titled "Non-Unique" is actually available for sale in our website: http://www.musica-ferrum.com/catalog/viewitem.php?show=3

This is a published work for flute and piano (rather than trumpet, piano and electronics that "Unique" had).

At the moment it's got 0 sales!

I had a whole chapter in my thesis about this very issue, but I'm not going to talk about it further, unless the OP comes up and explain the nature of all those links, or perhaps a mod would alter them...

To the OP: Malevich is one of my favourite artists and your comparison is akin to someone drawing a house, admittedly quite well, and saying "well it's better than Webern, isn't it?". Um...secondly...wouldn't you rather drive the price of art down rather than the cost of music up? Classical music is a struggling business as it is; orchestras closing down, um...you name it (yes, I *did* run out of things...but they're there! ). Any incentive to corporations and dealerships to promote price rising *is* exactly what they'd do and, thankfully, this hasn't affected music yet (the notions of what's acceptable to wear, eat, even think are all born out of high fashion; um...if there wasn't money to be made out of it at some point, they would ignore it), but it *could* and I'd really rather it didn't. You may consider one high-price sale a staggering success, I'd consider it the first step down the slippery step of devaluation and hyper-commercialisation of what was and *should* be art. I don't think paintings should sell for millions, they should sell for the price that befits the skill and time of the artist and *not* the value. To commodify value is...well, to not understand value, really. Um...no offence, it's not a bad idea and I can see why you might have had it, but stuff like this scares the sugar-honeyed ice tea out of me. Also, your site has grammatical errors and other unprofessional flaws you may wish to revise if you're serious about this. Nikolas: the links are just to the OP's site; it's a little spammy, but s/he just seems quite enthusiastic about this project and, you have to admit, it's not a terrible obtrusion. No money is being asked for or anything so...I don't know Um...I've done a similar thing Nikolas, in my past, likewise I doubt the quality and value of it though Happy birthday *really* in advance, SnowflakesSnowflakes (I shan't admit to being late )
Xxx

Hi again,
first of all, thanks for your reactions.


@twoSnowFlakes,
yes, this is the obvious and apparent reason: the painting itself carries the art,
whereas we cannot appreciate a score simply by looking at it.


You said:
"If you offered me a stable of amazing musicians whose only job it is to instantly play anything in the world just for me"

Well, I'm glad you said that.
I've thought of that already, and the solution I found was simply to create a device that
would read the music for you.
I have pictured it in this page:
http://www.most-expensive-scores.com/

It's the bottom most image.
As you can see, it's the idea that you called "having the music band play instantly for you".
And for 1 million dollars, I guarantee you that I will create that device.
That device can also turn the pages of the score while reading and has also the basic navigation
features that a mp3 has: play, forward, rewind, next track.

Now for a billionaire, I think that having this device really is not the problem.


I think that there are two things to note here:

- maybe as you said, people are not aware that a simple score reader device would suffice to
expose a music as a painting.
Music has just a characteristic that painting does not: music use the dimension of time.
Hence the need for an appropriate device.
Maybe if such a device existed already, we would have made a big step.
But hey, that's the goal of my post: I know it doesn't exist yet,
but guys like you and me create the future.
So this is a potential future.


- also, the target of my "marketing campaign" are more the patron of the arts: the one who wish to help
artists. So the idea behind the sale of a score is symbolic: it would mean that art collectors
know how to appreciate music as they appreciate painting.
To me that would mean that they have open mind, and a true interest for art in general.
On a business level, it would open a new whole market, and that could be a very good thing
or a very bad thing, who knows?





So obviously, my first idea was to earn money for myself, but then,
the battle I'm asking you to participate into is not just about me,
it's about music in the market art.

If this battle (I like that term, lol) is won, not only is a victory for me,
it's a victory for all piano composers, and for the idea that music is equivalent to painting.

In fact, what I dream for is that mentality evolve.
You know, some sports are more supported than others: for instance football generates much more interests
(from a media perspective) than badmington.
And my request here is to ask that WE do something about it rather than just passively go through it.
We are composers and we claim that our art is worth the art of painting: in fact, we paint with sound in time.

We might not succeed, but at least we will try, and maybe, just maybe, we will be at the beginning of the new age for
music in art market. Maybe our try will not be unseen by others and some other guys will take over.
Maybe tomorrow, composers will have their most expensive scores page on wikipedia, and we will be able to listen to music compositions
in museums.

Even if you don't take the time to post something about it, could you just think about it,
this would be an internal victory for us: mentality evolution.


@phantomFive:
I'm not criticizing the painting,
I'm just saying that if someone can spend 60 million dollars for that painting,
he/she could also have spent 60 million dollars for a music score as well.
For the sake of the argument that art has simply the value that we put on it.

That said I admit that I had deliberately chosen a painting that I personally did not found very attractive.
Another painting that I don't like is here:
http://www.theartwolf.com/news/images/rothko-orange-red-yellow.jpg
This my friends has been sold 86.9 million dollars.
I don't like it personally, but it does not change the price at which it was sold.

And don't get me wrong, I like painting in general.


By the way, I've just found a new list: the most expensive sculptures:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_sculptures

The most expensive being a 104.3 million dollars sculpture.
Hang on musicians, we can do it!!!





@nikolas:
Now, the topic interests me a lot, but in all honesty the OP is pretty much SPAM in my book, with all those links... It almost feels like a pyramid scheme of sorts, so no thank you.


Well, I'm just using links where they seem appropriate, didn't mean to be aggressive.
But the idea of asking people for help like this is itself aggressive so I understand your reaction.
The good thing is that you said that this topic interest you a lot, and really, that's all what matter to me.


The thing is that I provide a strategy in my post.
Might work or not, I don't know, but the strategy is quite simple:

people help me make a buzz around the topic of "music vs painting" in market art,
the "not so hidden" goal behind being that a billionaire (or very rich generous donor) buy me a score.
By doing so, I will redistribute the benefits for that score.
Then, the good part for me, which was by the way my primary goal, with one score sold, art collectors
are more likely to buy another one. At this point all the composers and the art market in general will benefit
from this actions.

That said, my strategy might not be the most efficient, and I'm open to suggestions.
The real goal being for composers to find a way to sell their "products".
There is always the good traditional method of asking music stores to resell your score,
but this post propose an alternative.

Plus, it is really unfair that music has not the same popularity as painting, don't you think?
When museums were created, there was simply no way to capture audio, but nowadays, even a 5 years old
with an iphone can do it.
We have no excuses, it's time to play the music in museums, or, am I crazy?


Please join the dark side of the force (just kidding),
I can not promise you victory, but we will have fun trying it.


In your second post you said:
"I doubt it's worth anything!".

Well, the point of my post is partially to bet that it's worth the value you gave to it.
I'm not saying that ALL music are worth million dollars, because that would be a terrible mess:

imagine you are a billionaire and you want to buy a piece of art, and on the art market you have a lot of
crappy "bad ass" compositions. That would be disappointing and we don't want that.

But, for the good composers, why not try the "big leagues", why should painters only be allowed to do
so: that's not fair, and that's something we can something about.

Join me into the dark side (does is sound goofy?), and let's change that.
We just need one donor to make the shift in the mentality.
Imagine, just imagine, that one score is sold 1 million dollar.

What do you think comes next?

The very idea of getting that to happen is ridiculous.

Because the visual art world is about a fetish for wealthy people to posses things that only they can have, and which can glorify their perverted egos. It's really not about Art at all in any true sense of the word. That's why classical music suffers because wealthy people aren't interested in owning or commissioning it because the product is too democratic-a score is and can be ultimately for everyone. Someone/anyone can spend $10 on iTunes or buy a cd of Bach's music and possess the equivalent of the Mona Lisa or the Pieta.

That's why there's no money in it because music is the most abstract-you can buy the written score to a Bach piece but you'll never actually own the creation- that's for everyone when it's played by musicians. And that's also the beautiful thing about music as opposed to the visual arts

@fso:
Okay, I'm not trying to devalue the work of Malevich (sorry if I sounded like I was),
which by the way I don't know, just saying that the price is completely subjective.
I hope that there is enough money for all of us, therefore I would not devaluate my
own work as well.
I agree that art and prices are two separated worlds.
I like to think of myself of an unknown talented artist (for fun) to be revealed by a generous donor,
so I deliberately set prices accordingly.

You said:
"your site has grammatical errors ",
thanks for pointing that out.


@Polyphonist:
The first step is often awkward, isn't it?


@anthony:
thanks for making the discussion evolves at the argument level:

You said:
"Someone/anyone can spend $10 on iTunes or buy a cd of Bach's
music and possess the equivalent of the Mona Lisa or the Pieta."

And that's exactly the problem that we (as composers) need to overcome.
I partially solved it by selling unique scores.
So that it cannot be democratized: only one person in the world will own it,
and that person will be an open minded billionaire which wanted to help me.
I believe the hardest part is to reach such a billionaire's ears.

That's why I am trying to create a buzz and trying to get you involve in it.
Your suggestions and comments are always welcome.
Help me spread the idea that music has its place beside painting on the art market,
or don't get involved, but sooner or later, music will end in museums, and you will remember
that I told you so, won't you?

Besides the fact that your whole premise is idiotic...

The reason art is in museums is because it's so expensive. Why are you trying to take music out of the hands of the common man and into the hands of some wealthy bimbo who has similarly idiotic ideas as yourself? If you want quick money, you picked the wrong field.

What a way to start your PianoWorld forum career! Welcome! (sigh...)


-J

Museums will conserve any object of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance. The price has no meaning for art conservation.

And, I'm not a bad guy, I could sell the score in a common format,
at a reasonable price, but the reason I do not do so is that common pianists will have a hard time with the scores (the pieces are very difficult to play, you have to believe me on this), so it's not worth publishing a score for a few (piano geeks) guys.
I could change my mind though.

But that's not what I'm selling to wealthy people.
To them, I'm selling the concept of freedom which is behind my work, and the uniqueness of the handwritten score.


Besides, I don't like to criticize wealthy people, I rather admire them. It seems that they have a pretty bad reputation on this forum, but I think that wealthy people are just wealthy.
I wish I could be like them.
Did you hear about the giving pledge ?
Would you say it's idiotic too ? http://givingpledge.org/

There was a similar painting in MOMA. If you took a picture of it, the picture would not look good, because it would not even have half the colors that appeared in the original. The range of colors in the original was so rich, deep, and beautiful....the color was what made the painting and computer monitors don't have the color range to display that.

Write some good music first, then think about getting rich.

Unfortunately quite often you have to be dead in order for your work to sell for several millions... Apparently Van Gogh for example only sold 1 painting while he was alive (and not for millions!).

PS: Happy Belated Birthday, TwoSnowFlakes!

I know a few wealthy people and I won't say they don't care about the concept of freedom, but I wouldn't bet on them investing in your score. If you were a famous composer your handwritten score might be a worthwhile investment, but assuming you're not Stephen Sondheim or Andrew Lloyd Webber chances are you won't get your price. I mention musical composers because I don't think a classical composer such as John Corigliano or John Adams would garner big money either. Billionaires make investments, they don't spend money foolishly, that's how they become billionaires. But, it's worth a shot and I wish you luck. I think you might have better luck with a crowd sourcing approach.

Scores won't sell for prices like that. It just won't happen and it's a waste of time to try to make it happen.

If what we are witnessing here is the start of a paradigm shift of the musical arts, you have my nod, but this just isn't something that can be done.

John Cage made a book of manuscript examples. I do not think anybody made much money from it originally, but copies of the book are moderately valuable now, $70 and up for paperback, about $400 for hard cover on Amazon. You can download the pdf for free now.