Music / songwriting competition tips to help you stand out from the pack

I’ve been asked to be a juror for an “artist of the year” type of competition. In the past, I’ve submitted entries into many competitions with varying amounts of success, but being on the other side of the process has been quite the eye-opener. That part of my career is over, but I figured I’d share my insights to help you achieve better results with your submissions.

Now, this advice may not be applicable for competitions that use a SonicBid-style Electronic Press kit style process (or it may, I have no idea), but keep these tips in mind for your submissions to help you put your best foot forward.

1. Try to find out what criteria will be used for this competition

Not all competitions are transparent with this detail; others will publish the requirements but make it difficult to find. It can be helpful to know what the judges are looking for. For instance, is the quality of the recording considered? Is how recently you’ve performed a data point? Make sure you hit most if not all, the requirements.

2. Have a real website

Anyone can create a SoundCloud or a Bandcamp account and throw up some tracks, but having a dedicated website for your band or project really makes you stand apart from the pack. It makes you look like a serious professional and not just a hobbyist.

A couple of artists really impressed me with their websites initially, only to be let down by their other submission points, so a website won’t fix everything. But every data point will come into play when determining where you come out in the competition!

Your website doesn’t have to be fancy: have some professional or at least good photos (here are some tips to get better band photography), and have it look like “something.” Put in your past performances and any other accomplishments or press you’ve received.

Don’t just purchase a domain and point it to an empty Bandcamp page – that won’t impress anyone.

Don’t just have a bare “link-tree” page and submit that – what a great way to say to the judges, “We’ve put no effort into this at all.”

Being in the music business takes a lot of work, so be prepared to put in the time.

3. If you can, have one professionally recorded, mixed and mastered track

DIY is fantastic and, as an old punk, the raw and the unpolished can be great, BUT unless you’re Prince (spoiler: you’re not Prince – that’s ok, few of us are), your home-recorded submissions will probably just sound amature and will pale in comparison to other artists with more professional submissions. You can achieve something great by going the DIY, low-fi route, but that’s like catching lighting in a bottle.

Every artist or band has “that one song” – the one audiences love and that they love to play. Invest some money and record that song in a real studio with a real engineer and even a producer if possible. (There are probably some financial arts grants offered by your city, province/state, or other local organization. Do some research to find out what’s available to you. You’ll be surprised at what’s out there). It will be a great experience; you’ll learn a ton and have something you can quickly send off to a competition, a bar owner, or a possible music partner.

You can submit other tracks, home-produced tracks or, even better, live tracks as well, but having one professional track will make you look like the real deal.

4. Write your bio to get the critical highlights across

Artist bios are always hard to write for oneself, and most are meaningless blah, blah that won’t help a judge understand what you’re all about.

A short intro sentence is good, and “fans of [a well-known artist/band] will love this” helps readers understand where you sit in the music-style landscape.

Most importantly, grab some choice phrases from any press you may have received and note the source. This quickly tells a judge you have media coverage and provides more information than some artists’ meaningless descriptions.

“The Farting Dragons create a punchy, polka-inspired psycho-punk that gets audiences to stand up and take notice!
“…they came out on stage and kicked the hell out of the bar. I’ll be back!” – Bernie Journalist, Thistown Telgram”, Aug. 2022.

IMPORTANT: If you use AI to generate your bio (and if you do, that will mostly come across as generic and uninspired, but you be you), don’t forget to insert your name! The bio with “and so [artist]’s sound has resonated with audiences!”, didn’t come across well at all.

5. Submit just your best work – even if it’s just one track

Judges will be reviewing many, many submissions, and you can’t expect them to listen to 6 tracks in full to find that one jewel. Make it easy for them. Submitting just one excellent track is often all you need. The competition may require more than one, and if they do, try to make that awesome track the first one the judges hear. If you have other less awesome tracks, perhaps see if you can get a good live recording from one of your shows. The audience’s excitement will rise to boost a less-than-stellar performance.

6. Oh yeah, tune your friggen’ guitar!

A couple of the submissions had recordings with out-of-tune guitars. Come on, people, tuners are cheap. If your guitar is out of tune, then you won’t sound good. Enough said.

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I’ve changed my thinking about competitions over the years. I used to hate the idea. I now think it’s good to submit to as many competitions as possible, even if you never win. Every time you enter an event or competition, you’ll get better and faster at writing bios, figuring out how you stand out, getting your photos together and doing all that “non-music” important stuff.

You know, kinda like practicing . . .