Our show’s most recent run this past weekend was the best by far, and of course it can only continue to progress and capture the imagination of our audience. Jeremiah Johnson (JJ) has one of the most incredible imaginations I’ve come across, and his use of tri tones as well as dissonance is better than anyone I’ve met in person let alone had the pleasure to work with.

JJ changed some things from our previous show back in August. The most notable is the Lord of Night scene where the four generals show the audience how they made their hordes of undead soldiers to fight in the apocalypse. This scene originally had the four generals kneeling stage right with the band having free reign of the whole stage. This alteration to the plot however helps fill in the gaps and gives the story a middle section that it needed before. Again, it was a magnificent addition to the show and Byron’s choreography for the Seattle Knights (who were kind enough to devote their time to Aeterno Elementum) adds so much more depth to the show that I cannot fathom a more appropriate group for our on-stage battle scenes.

I’d like to take a moment to give some extra credit. My friend Eve stepped in just a few weeks before the show to become our stage manager which was a real trial by fire since the notes she had to go off of were from the November show last year and several changes had been made since that show. She was a champ. She had nightmares of missing props, queuing lights at the wrong time or something else going horribly wrong (like most of us do prior to a show). Despite the amount of stress she felt she didn’t quite and she even intends to manage the following shows for Ara’Kus. She did a marvelous job.

Susan, our Ara’kus Mother and the leader of the CEM’s also deserves notoriety. This woman is always on top of the ball at rehearsals, not to mentions she is now the member that drives the furthest distance to get to rehearsal.  She continually has extra sheet music for all voice parts and is always game for hugs.  She sings either Alto or Tenor for us depending on the need, and as you can tell from this alone she is incredibly flexible and easy to work with.

Lastly, another improvement in Aeterno Elementum was the lighting. In sections where it seemed to lull the lights crew added effects that added movement to the scene. For example, Syren’s Embrace, though it had plenty of movement, flickering bright bluish-white blocks added what seemed to be either water droplets or waves and made the scene that more impressive to the imagination.

Aeterno Elementum has made so much progress it is astounding and wonderful. It is no wonder that all involved with this production give it their all to see it succeed.

Photos taken by Dane Brunson.

Where to start:

To make sure you are going to get the best bang for your buck you will want to start with Google’s Adword tool, I know it isn’t Facebook but we’ll get to that. . Once you’ve opened the adword tool, you are going to experiment with different words or phrases, even experiment with other bands that have a similar sound to yours. For this example I’m going to use Heavy Metal.

Google tells us the initial phrase has 1,220,000 global monthly searches and 368,000 local monthly searches. Now look at the competition for the phrase heavy metal, it is relatively low and if you have a heavy metal band it would be a great word to use in an ad. Take these words over to Facebook and then work on creating an ad.

Location/s for your advertising & identifying your target audience:

You will notice when you create your Facebook ad that you need to figure out the area around your gig’s location of which you’d like to promote. If a person is posting “heavy metal” in your desired target location, let’s say a 10 mile radius around Seattle, your ad will show up. As part of your decision making process include thoughts on how far people would be willing to travel vs. the cost of the tickets to your show and the fact that you are currently unknown. Perhaps the radius should only be 5 miles around the venue instead of 10. Then consider the age range of your potential fan base as well as their education level, work status, and gender. If it is applicable use it. Also note that you can have your ads show up for certain interests such as heavy metal, garage bands, rock and so forth. If a potential fan “likes” or adds Heavy Metal to their list of pages they like your ad would also show up. Have you ever noticed how the ads update when you update your status? Amazing how that works.

A really useful tip is to keep your ear out for larger promoted events and concerts that attract your audience. If you think your show would attract some relevant eyes, you can reach some of those show attendees by targeting them with the right keywords. You can also use those ideas as negative keywords so that you don’t go head-to-head with a competitive show and save your budget for fans that are open to your style.

Now the Fun Part IMO:

Designing your ad! Take into consideration that you could be dealing with multiple types of personalities; conservative, liberal, cheerful, angsty, etc. You may want to try more than one type of ad, have a few different pictures to choose from and see what receives more clicks as well as different content to the body of your advertisement. This could help you further identify who your target audience is vs. who you want them to be.

Budget, budget, budget…

This is the part that leaves us feeling like we have been cut off at the knees. Well, we had to get to the matter of money at some point so I’ll keep it as simple and short as possible. I don’t care if your budget is $5.00 or $5,000.00 that you intend to spend on your PPC campaign; know your budget so you don’t get overly excited and dig yourself into a shallow grave and pile the dirt on. To help keep you from burying yourself Facebook has a feature that will put a cap on how much you spend per day, an amount of your choosing. Once that amount is reached, and that is if that amount is reached, your ad will stop appearing until the following day. This will continue to occur until the time you specified for you ad to discontinue running, most likely through the day of your show.

Thank you Facebook for making life so easy!

If you have any useful information to add please leave a comment!

Also if you’d like to check out the reviews from the August show here they are: John Stevenson & Twisted Geeks Podcast.

20 useful music related twitter hashtags*:

1. #music
2. #musicbiz
3. #musicadvice
4. #Opera
5. #rockmusic
6. #heavymetal
7. #classicrock
8. #diva
9. #musicmonday
10. #nowplaying
11. #np
12. #guitar
13. #jazz
14. #bandpage
15. #freemusicdownload
16. #newmusic
17. #listeningto
18. #musicmarketing
19. #musicpromotions
20. #royaltyfreemusic

*I intentionally excluded band/group/solo artist hashtags.

There are hashtags I would not recommend using, for example: #music.

It’s extremely broad and holds a lot of noise within it. Therefore it doesn’t accentuate your target audience. With this list you should get a good glimpse of where to target your audience with your twitter posts and be able to find a applicable hashtag for your tweets.

What is the point in creating a hashtag if no one is searching for it? So before you start throwing your own hashtags on your tweets see how many people are searching that specific hashtag. Go to twitter.com and on the right hand side of the screen is a search box. In it type “#(and the hashtag you are inquiring about)” then see how recent the tweets that show up are and how regularly the page needs to be refreshed due to new tweets with that hashtag. You are looking for hashtags with a good pace so people have enough time to read your tweet, yet you want to know that it is popular so it will be viewed by others.

Help make your tweets a success with the appropriate hashtag.

On August 26th and 27th, 2011 Ara’Kus Productions will be returning to the stage at the Historic Everett Theater to deliver a show unlike any other. Aeterno Elementum combines dark, atmospheric, story-driven performance theater with Ara’Kus’ signature style of symphonic, operatic heavy metal to create an experience that is greater than the sum of it’s parts.

Aeterno Elementum tells the story of a world not entirely unlike our own which has descended into darkness, and of it’s inevitable and violent purification. Featuring fire dancing, aerial performance, acrobatic martial artists, fully armed and armored knights in large scale combat, and a cast of highly talented actors and musicians of all types, this is a spectacle that must be witnessed in order to be fully understood.

On each night, doors open at 7:30pm, show begins at 8:30pm. For these performances, we’ve opted to throw out the standard ticket pricing and go with a “Pay What You Can” option. This is literally what it sounds like. We are incredibly proud of this show and want all of you to see it, and we don’t want finances to be the reason that you don’t. Pay what you feel the show is worth to you. We’re taking a risk, but we have faith that this production is amazing enough that most people who attend will choose to contribute and help us continue doing what we do and delivering our message.

Thank you all for your continued support. We look forward to seeing you in August.

Please feel free to add yourself to the attendance list on facebook.

Also I thought I’d share my new hair color. I love it.

Oh and it amuses me greatly that Randy literally hangs his guitars.

Also, due to my audition I am unable to make it up to Camano Island today to see the art fair that is occurring. I wanted to take a ton of pictures and post them, but I’ll have to go some other weekend and take a bunch of pictures to share. Until then, you’ll just have to wait.

Andréa ~*