Art within art, art because of art — that’s concert photography. It’s creating art (photography) out of art (live music) and I don’t think I’ve ever felt as big of a rush from doing anything as much as concert photography.
I love watching an amazing live performance and trying to capture the best shots. I love being so close to the stage that I can feel the sound vibrating through my body. I love making those special moments in a show last forever in a photo.
I’ve always been a huge music consumer — buying CDs or vinyl and band merch is a big deal to me. When I started going to concerts as a teenager it became like an addiction, trying to figure out how I would come up with the money to go to all these shows and hopefully be able to buy a T-shirt there. It’s an addiction I never kicked.
I also have always enjoyed taking pictures, even if at first it was more of a way to hold on to memories rather than a serious art. I went through a ridiculous amount of disposable cameras as a child, taking pictures of animals, friends, and family events. I still remember my first reusable film camera and my first digital camera. Having pictures to remember people and places and events has always been important to me.
Now I’ve figured out how to combine two of my life-long passions.
The idea of taking pictures at concerts as an actual hobby or career aspiration somehow never occurred to me until I was asked to do it for a band at one of the Rocklahoma campground stages in 2017. Even then, it took me several months before I would actually edit the photos and really try to make something of them and share them on social media for everyone to see. But after that I was hooked. For my next concert photography venture I made a four hour drive just to be able to take photos. I began trying to go to more shows and asking for permission to take photos of more well-known bands.
I have to admit there are several times I wanted to give up. I want concert photography, and photography in general, to be a career, not just a hobby. Camera equipment is expensive. It takes a lot of time to edit photos. It can be hard when you’re not getting customers, not being paid, or not being noticed for your work (I’ll make a more in-depth blog post about this soon).
But if I’ve learned one thing in life, it’s that you never quit doing something you genuinely love. That won’t make your life any better. It will just create a void. So even if you’re not exactly where you want to be, keep going. You won’t get there by stopping.
At this point I still don’t have musicians knocking down my door for photos or people filling up my email with portrait requests. But I’m still trying. And one day I’ll be on tour with a band or getting paid to take photos for a magazine and I’ll laugh about the fact that I ever seriously thought about selling my camera.
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