This post is a continuation of my December newsletter which was becoming too long and dense to ever hope it would get read. I am also considering the option of splitting my updates from monthly to weekly so that they are both more frequent and easier to read. What do you think?
Anyway, let’s get started with this most “sacred” reflection.
1 out of 10
In my daily quest towards improving my offering so that it is closer to what you are looking for, I stumbled upon a creator who was given a simple task: open ten browser tabs, each with the website of another creator in the same field. Then, he would open his website and had to ask himself:
What differentiates me? Why should they buy from me?
This left me thunderstruck because, when I asked the same for myself, I couldn’t really get a convincing answer. Why would you buy from me instead of from any other publisher? Sure, I offer a unique repertoire, but if that is not what you want, then there is no point. Reality is often as harsh as it is simple: my project essentially offers what I like and what I am passionate about, hoping that someone else would also find that useful. This is something I learned during my apprentice programmer years (2016-19): formulate an idea that solves your problem, create a solution, and you can bet that 100,000 people will have your same problem. To a certain extent, this has proven correct, but not in the broader way I was expecting.
Very broadly speaking, there are two kinds of businesses: one that reacts to existing demand, the other that tries to create demand by drawing interest in a specific topic. According to business rules, both approaches are equally valid: the first may quickly become successful while risking market saturation, and the second may never succeed to awake interest in their target, but if they do, they may truly explode. A great example of the second approach is none less than Apple: who cared about smartphones before they introduced the iPhone? There was zero demand for that, with even top-level CEOs laughing at what Apple had just done! We know the rest of the story.
My approach has always been the second one because, at least when I started, there was close to zero demand for any Dotzauer that wasn’t Klingenberg, for any Piatti that wasn’t the caprices, or for any cello duet that wasn’t some baroque reheated soup, so the mere fact that I sold more than one copy of what I do is already a tremendous success. My goal has constantly been to awaken interest in good, unknown or unjustly forgotten music.
What became clear, though, was that close to no one cared for good notation, even if they appreciated it in a vacuum. The focus was still on getting the gig done and move forward to the next one. “Show must go on”, right? If one is not interested in a specific piece, they will not even open the book; if one is looking for a specific piece, instead, they will buy it even if it is printed on toilet paper.
Finally, one good musician friend with a minor in economics once gave me a most valuable feedback on why my business ideas were not lifting off.
Simple—he said—, you are targeting musicians as your customers.
Now think about it: if you are a performer, or a music teacher, how many original scores did you buy as a student? Then, how many original scores do you regularly buy with your hard-earned money compared to the amount you download for free or photocopy from libraries and friends? When teaching, how much do you insist with your students that they buy original, high-quality scores? Please — be honest in your reply, no one is going to judge you for a practice that is for sure quite widespread.
The big (wrong) assumption
This continuous exchange of opinions with people working in the music industry, from kindergarten teachers to top-level performers, has led to an unpleasant realisation: most musicians assume that publishers are sitting on a pile of money by definition. Even in the earliest days of my activity, with barely three titles in my catalogue, I was forced to give free scores to performers whose cachet for that specific concert would have bought those titles a hundred times over. And mind you: gifting those scores brought nothing in return, regardless of what they tried to put in my head! More recently, when I proposed a collaboration with a festival, they replied that I could just give them cash to sponsor them, since I was a publisher!
So, now, let me tell you the hard truth—and one you can easily verify yourself: the vast majority of publishers are family-based (and sized) businesses, from parents using their children as copy machines (I have seen this!) to partners trying to do their best to create something great investing only their time (us). These entities do not hire engravers, nor are in a position to pay well anyone working for them, which often results in them not hiring anyone at all.
The only music publishers with the resources to contract engravers or to hire editors are the biggest ones, and not even all of them! So, please, stop assuming that being a publisher equals having a capital of any size to use! I know most of you will not even listen to this advice of mine, but, at least, I will have done my part.
But wait … why then?
This question had to come sooner or later. If this business is not making any serious money (that is, enough to pay the bills by itself), why would I be doing this? If anyone is doing anything at this level of quality and with this kind of time investment, there must be a catch. They must not be telling the whole picture.
Were I doing this just because I believe in Mr. Dotzauer’s music, why haven’t I copied all the 150+ of his scores I have with me and published them with the minimum possible effort already?
Were I doing it for the memory of Mr. Piatti, why didn’t I just pay for the rights to publish the scans as high-fidelity autographs—you know, from my pile of money, right?
So, why on Earth am I doing this? If I am spending 2 hours per day engraving and researching instead of watching Netflix or going to the gym—the latter of which, honestly, would be much better for my health—I must be earning tons! I mean, who would ever go to this length for little to no reward?
Because music notation quality is my purpose, my ultimate goal, my Treasure Island, my Holy Crusade! Because no one deserves bad notation, nor anyone should accept it when they see it on their stands!
So that’s it: I am not doing all this for Dotzauer, or for Piatti, or for anyone else. I am doing this to educate musicians around the world to accept nothing else than good, flawless notation on their stands. My life goal is for musicians to eventually look at a badly engraved score on their stands and say:
I’m sorry, but I am not going to play from this!
Utopia? We shall see! But let me tell you this: I am very stubborn, and my hide is already extremely thick!
Every week I share proofreading and engraving tidbits on my social media pages; every week I send out free scores to my mailing list so that everyone has access to high-quality music at no cost. Then, I sell the full titles for a fee, then, but I hope I should not explain why that is the right thing to do!
This explains why these last two years have been so hard for me: first a world star cellist taking everything I had to give, promising gigantic things in return just to, then, disappear; then someone very dear to me openly asking me to work badly, to create a miserable work, as long as it was for free!
To conclude this section, here is my humble request to you for next year: please purchase ONE GOOD SCORE during 2025, post a picture of it somewhere and tag me—or send it privately to me if you so prefer. I don’t care if you buy it from me or from someone else; it just needs to be good, it needs to make your eyes jump out of your sockets because of how clean and beautiful and well laid-out the music is! Share with the world how good notation makes you feel, how having that on your stand is a no-brainer choice compared to the bad version.
If I may be more specific, it should be a printed edition, even if it has the same layout as the digital one. The enthralling smell of freshly printed paper, the creamy colour of the best paper available for music printing, its matte finish feeling while you turn the pages.
These are all feelings that we cannot afford to lose!
Thank you for being so patient and reading this epic rant so far!
I wish you the greatest 2025 in music and remember this motto:
Music Preparation Services 