Canadian Musician - November/December 2017 | Page 42
Google Tools for the
Busy Musician
By Deryl Gallant
Google employs me as a bassist.
What I mean by that is, their free services give the outside world
the impression that I’m an organized, punctual, prepared, profes-
sional bassist and I keep getting hired.
Want in on a secret? Yes, I’ve enjoyed a 20-plus-year career as
a performing and recording bassist in Prince Edward Island while
working full time in IT, teaching bass at the Holland College School
of Performing Arts and UPEI, raising five little kids, and sometimes
seeing my lovely wife; however, my life is full of daily challenges that
seek to make me fail in my music career. I’m naturally disorganized,
forgetful, and a total procrastinator.
Enter Google, add my Smartphone, and watch as my chaotic
life is turned into beautifully manageable bits. This music career of
Google Calendar is my
invaluable personal assistant.
Its power is highly under-
rated. I outlined this in more
detail in the Bass Column in
the Sept./Oct. 2017 issue of
Canadian Musician, but brief-
ly, make sure you create all
calendar entries with a title
having the same searchable
keyword. Add the date and
time you need to arrive, the
address, gig-specific notes,
and default reminders of 45
minutes, 24 hours, and one
week before the event. Make
sure you invite anyone that
should know about your gig:
band members, significant
others, Alain Caron, etc.
Google Now will calculate
the distance to your gig loca-
tion and tell you when you
need to leave. Hop in your
car, click the location on your
calendar entry, and the GPS in
Google Maps will guide you
to your gig.
42 • C A N A D I A N M U S I C I A N
mine is not limited to the instrument I play, the notes I choose, the
styles I enjoy, or the gigs I get. It has a thousand tiny pieces that
make up who I am as a musician, which translates to who I am as
a professional, which translates to this: when someone hires me,
who are they really getting?
I want to share with you some of the habits I’ve developed over
the last 10 years since getting my first iPod Touch and subsequent
smartphones – habits that I honestly didn’t intend to create. I look
back and realize they are habits I wish someone had introduced me
to 25 years ago when I first started gigging – habits that I could not
function without now. Google makes it incredibly easy to imple-
ment and use these techniques on a daily basis so you can worry
about what is important: the music.
Google Contacts is an often-overlooked feature of any Gmail
account. Have you ever seen someone post on Facebook: “Got
a new phone... lost all of my contacts. Text me your number so
I can add you?” I always simultaneously chuckle and shake my
head. Say it with me: Google Contacts. Add that lovely Google
account to your phone so that when someone texts you,
choose “Add to Contacts” and save to the Google account.
When you switch or lose your phone, just add your Google
account to your new phone and you have all of your contacts
again like nothing changed.
Besides the obvious single contact usage, Contact Groups is
another overlooked feature. When you add that new contact,
make sure you add them to a group.
Once, I had an amp I was trying to sell. I put it on Kijiji, I put
it on eBay, and I put it on Facebook. No bites. Then I decided
to try some direct marketing: Email every bassist I know. Ok,
compose new email, write my perfect sales pitch, now who am
I sending it to? I’ve got 716 contacts, so go through each entry
and remember who is a bassist? No way. I don’t have time to
sort through contacts. I use Google Contacts groups that I’ve
spent tiny bits of time over the years compiling and maintaining.
Then I go to Gmail and compose a new email, and start typing
“Bassists” in the “To” field like this:
Sure, Facebook is great for this, too, but sometimes an old-
fashioned electronic mail in true 1994 style can really do the
trick. For the record, I sold that amp because of that email.