Going Inside the Song with Me and My Booking Agency

My name is Donna Nolan-Wilson and back in 2001, I was forced to close one business but started a new business, which was a direct result of advice and need by my customers from the original business. You see I had opened and run a Songwriters Cafe, which was doing very well until the Towers fell in 2001. Six months later I found myself having to make the painful decision to close the doors. When I notified singer/songwriters that we were closing many requested that I become their booking agent.

Something to Think About

I was quite surprised but pleased by this development. They liked the way I did business and my enthusiasm for them and the original song. I had been a paralegal in New York for 16 years and since my move down south I had produced a show from Nashville’s Broken Spoke Songwriter Cafe so I had a lot of experience with songwriters. I also had my first song published in Nashville in 1992 so I knew first hand the hearts and souls of songwriters and how precious our homespun stories set to music are.

ITS Entertainment is Born

agreed to work with a few of the songwriters and Inside The Song Cafe turns into Inside The Song Entertainment. I have always called it ITS Entertainment for short and to this day I maintain the original website which is www.InsideTheSong.com

It is now ten years later and I still have Inside The Song. We have had our good times and we have had our bad times. With the economy so bad here in the U.S., things have been slow for my booking agency because the very first thing that is cut out of a budget for major corporations, hotel chains, casino’s and any entertainment for that matter is Entertainment part of the budget. I have seen bars go from having full bands to Karaoke or Texas Hold Em. It is a lot less money to hire just one man than to pay a decent band. When times are really and I am having trouble getting them work, I always continue to promote them and their music to direct people to their talent and their CD products.

Keeping A Float During the Tough Times

I have had to fall back on my legal training and actually sub-contract for different companies doing legal and corporate transcription. My advice to anyone starting a business is first of all, know when it is a good time to open that business. If you business has something to do with hard times like a used clothing store and you might have something to offer folks of value in this hard time, then this might be a good time to do it. If you are looking to open a store that sells designer everything in this economy, that probably wouldn’t be a good idea. Also, make sure you have a way of supporting yourself during the tough times if your business is having a tough time keeping afloat. I work out of a home office but if I had to pay a separate rent for office space, then I would have had to close my doors years ago.

Make Sure Your Business Is Something You Love

Make sure your business is something you love and something you believe in. You have heard people say, “do something you are passionate about?” Well that really is true. If you are passionate about what you do, it truly does not feel like work.

As long as there are songs and songwriters, there will be ITS Entertainment because songwriting is my passion.


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