Questions about writing TV/Radio jingles, ect.

[whitelightening]

I've done a little searching through google and other search engines about this topic but I haven't found any really solid advice yet. Basically, I've been a little frustrated for a few years now when it comes to the quality of jingles for these types of media and I thought that instead of complaining about it, I should do something about it. The biggest obstacle is getting started. I'm not exactly sure where to start, the basic rules of the trade, who to pitch my ideas to, how to pitch them, copyrighting, etc.

I know it's a long list, but any help, advice or suggestions any of you could give me would be greatly appreciated. I respect all of your opinions, so please feel free to chime in.

[Grey Loki]

I've done a little searching through google and other search engines about this topic but I haven't found any really solid advice yet. Basically, I've been a little frustrated for a few years now when it comes to the quality of jingles for these types of media and I thought that instead of complaining about it, I should do something about it. The biggest obstacle is getting started. I'm not exactly sure where to start, the basic rules of the trade, who to pitch my ideas to, how to pitch them, copyrighting, etc.

I know it's a long list, but any help, advice or suggestions any of you could give me would be greatly appreciated. I respect all of your opinions, so please feel free to chime in.

Contact the songwriter's and musician's guilds for your locality - in the UK, this would be BASCA, the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors, and the MU - Musician's Union.

http://www.basca.org.uk/

http://www.musiciansunion.org.uk/

Generally, jingle work needs to be done on a case-by-case basis - the client will say 'we want something cheeky that accentuates this part of the video so far, and must be precisely 22.5 seconds long', or something similar. Then, you work to that brief, and send off a draft copy.

Unless you're writing 'library music', which is used as background in cookery shows and the like, where you usually need to specify in the title the length, tempo, key and overall feel as quickly and succinctly as possible - 'Electric reggae, 80bpm, Em, 2.45', and so on.

HTH.