Choose an Internship (not any internship) that will help you build your portfolio

Posted on: June 2, 2008

The music business, more so than a lot of industries, relies on a small army of interns. Promoters, label owners, managers and almost everyone involved on the business side of rock, rap, psych, folk, noise, blues, jazz, punk and any other genre you can think of, count on a percentage of their staff that works unpaid, for the experience and professional knowledge.

With so many choices, no aspiring music business management student should want for a lack of opportunity. However, picking the opportunity that will best build your portfolio, that's where things can get tricky. Keep the following things in mind:

The bigger the business, the smaller the jobs. Major labels rely on their interns as much as the indies do, but often the jobs at a bigger corporation will be much lower on the totem pole- i.e. putting up posters and handing out flyers. Smaller labels, however, often give their interns larger projects to take on, which can sometimes result in a more impressive body of experience. Is an impressive name on your resume more important that a higher level of experience? You be the judge.

Choose your company wisely. Don't work for someplace if you don't like the music they represent. If you're a die hard hardcore fan, don't apply at Kranky. If you hate hip hop, don't bother calling Chocolate Industries. You're never going to be able to help sell a product you don't believe in.

Set goals right from the get-go. During your interview, try to get a feel for what kind of work you will be doing and what kind of work you might be offered the opportunity to do. Most promotions companies will start you out on poster detail, but, if you do that well, you get bumped up to sending press kits and later promoted to contacting media outlets. If you're not sure what the advancement opportunities are, ask.

Get a record. As you do more work you'd like to show people (i.e. press releases, newspaper articles, booking and running concerts and shows), make sure you are documenting work for your portfolio and always check with your boss to make sure you can use the work you've done. 9 times out of 10 they'll say yes, but, especially with larger companies, you need to make sure.

With all the music business opportunities in the city and around the world, there's no excuse not to have some internship experience under your belt. Who knows? One day you could have a small army of interns reporting to you.