Tax Return for Songwriter

If you love music, and have both musical and writing talent, being a freelance songwriter could be the perfect career for you.
A career as a songwriter involves writing both the music and lyrics to sell to a music publisher or singer. It’s a difficult industry to break into, but this guide will make it a little easier.
What skills and qualities does a songwriter need to have?

Understand music: You’ll need to be able to read and write sheet music, as well as understand music theory.
Passionate: Writing and selling songs takes a lot of hard work over many, many hours. If you’re not passionate about writing music, you won’t get far.
Musical ability: You should be able to play at least one instrument, with singing ability a plus. This will help you write, as well as communicate your ideas to other people.
A good communicator: This will be helpful in writing songs, since music is essentially a form of communication. This skill will also be helpful when talking to clients and understanding what sort of song they want written for them.
Good with words: You might be great at writing notes, but writing words is another matter. Learn by listening to the lyrics of songs you like, and\ read poetry.

How to be a better songwriter – training and qualifications

You don’t need a qualification to work as a songwriter – in fact, most music publishers or singers won’t care about your education. They only want to know if you can write songs. However, there’s no such thing as too much knowledge. The more you know about music, the better a songwriter you’ll be. You could learn at college or university, or take specific classes. You’ll learn some of these relevant subjects:

The music industry
Music arrangement
Music theory
Composition
Song writing

Formal music education will also give you a chance to meet industry professionals, and make friends with other budding musicians and songwriters. You might even end up collaborating with some of them.

Working as a part-time songwriter

Only a tiny percentage of songwriters actually become so successful that they work as a songwriter full-time.Most songwriters have to find other jobs to work part-time, and look for song writing jobs in their spare time. You need to consider if this is the sort of life you want to live before deciding to become a freelance songwriter.

How to find work as a freelance songwriter

Like most careers in the arts industries, there is huge competition among songwriters. You’ll need to put in a lot of work marketing yourself to find work and clients.
Here are a few ways to market yourself:

Set up a website: A professional website will make you look more credible. It’s a place to display the songs you’ve written for singers or music publishers, or demos if you haven’t yet done any paid work.
Record companies: Submit your song demos to record companies and music publishers, along with your CV.
British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors (BASCA): BASCA
represents writers of music. Join them for benefits including free insurance and networking events.
Music Jobs Ltd: Music Jobs is an online jobs board for the music industry.

How does a songwriter earn money?

As a songwriter, you’re extremely unlikely to earn a regular wage. Most songwriters are paid an advance by a record company. If the song you wrote is successful, you’ll earn money from the royalties after the cost of the advance is paid.

Accounting as a freelance songwriter

There are various benefits to freelancing as a songwriter, from the freedom and flexibility to work with a variety of businesses and individuals to doing something you’re passionate about. But there is one downside – accounting.
As a full-time employee, your tax is usually taken care of on your behalf in the form of PAYE.
As a freelancer you’ll have to keep a range of financial records and then prepare and pay a Self-Assessment tax return at the end of each business year. Accountancy can be very confusing and can distract you from writing songs.

Getting tax and accountancy advice

With most accountants, you’ll pay them to do your year-end accounts, and then they’ll forget about you until the next year. But for your business to be run smoothly and successfully, you’ll need advice on tax and accountancy throughout the year, especially in the early days.

Citi Accounts is different

Citi Accounts provides an affordable and specialist accountancy service designed just for freelancers. Throughout the year we’ll be on hand to give you any tax and accountancy advice you might need, including things like:

Take-home pay
Which VAT scheme to register for
Expenses
Tax allowances
Choosing between sole trader and limited company
Running your business in a tax-efficient way

We charge for our accountancy services in a clear and simple way, which means you’ll never receive an unexpected bill, and you can get in touch for advice whenever you want without the worry of being charged a fortune like you would with many other accountants.

It seems that more and more people want to be writers these days, which means there s a lot of competition. But it’s still possible to make a career as a freelance writer. This guide will show you how to be a success.

What type of writer are you?

There are a few types of writing that you can make a career from, the most viable being copywriting and journalism:

Copywriting: Being a freelance copywriter means writing for businesses. You’ll be contributing to their marketing efforts by writing the words for things such as web pages, leaflets, brochures, adverts, direct response letters, emails, press releases, etc. You’ll have to write persuasively to sell to customers and other businesses.
Journalism: As a freelance journalist, you’ll be writing news articles and opinion pieces for news publications, either online or in print. You’ll need to have your finger on the pulse with what’s happening in the world, so you can write about what’s relevant and current.

There are, of course, other types of writing, such as song writing, story/novel writing, or poetry writing.
However, journalism and copywriting are the most likely to provide a full time career.

Learning to be a great writer

Most people aren’t very good at writing.
If you were the sort of child who stayed at home reading books instead of going out to play football, you might just be capable of being good at writing. Though you can become better at writing through practice, you still need to have an innate talent to build upon.

Training and qualifications

If you’re thinking of freelancing, qualifications aren’t essential. You just need to show that you can write to find work. But it’s always beneficial to gain as much knowledge as possible. Studying at university gives you a chance to practise the art of writing without the distraction of a job, and you’ll get to make friends with people with similar interests. You’ll also have a decent writing portfolio by the end of the course, which is essential to finding freelance writing work.
Here are a few relevant subjects you could study:

Journalism
English Literature
English Language
Creative Writing

How to find work as a freelance writer

In the early days of your freelance career in writing, you’ll be spending much of your time marketing yourself to find new clients.
Here are a few ways to do it:

Portfolio: A strong writing portfolio is essential to finding writing work. People will only hire you if you can prove you’re a good writer. Studying a writing related course at university will provide you with writing to put in your portfolio, which you can add to as you find paid work.
Set up a website: Having a professional website advertising your services will make you look more legitimate and credible. It’s also a place to display your portfolio – unless you want to carry a hard copy of your portfolio with you all the time, pointing out your website to people you meet is the best chance you’ll have of them seeing your work. You should also think about writing a blog, which will show your writing skills, and contribute to SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) so you’ll be more likely to be found on Google.
Business cards: Give business cards to friends, family, and anybody you think might need the services of a freelance writer.
Networking events: If you want to be a copywriter, meeting other business owners in person is the best way to promote yourself. Your words will be representing their businesses, so they’ll be more likely to trust you if they can see that you’re a real person. Give your business card to anybody you have a conversation with.
Social networking: Social networking websites such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn are great places to make new contacts, talk about writing, and show your creativity.

Accounting as a freelance writer

There are various benefits to freelancing as a writer, from the freedom and flexibility to work with a variety of businesses and individuals to more take-home pay. But there is one downside – accounting. As a full-time employee, your tax is usually taken care of on your behalf in the form of PAYE.
As a freelancer you’ll have to keep a range of financial records and then prepare and pay a Self-Assessment tax return at the end of each busine s year. Accountancy can be very confusing and can distract you from practising your craft.

Getting tax and accountancy advice

Citi Accounts is different

Take-home pay
Which VAT scheme to register for
Expenses
Tax allowances
Choosing between sole trader and limited company
Running your business in a tax-efficient way