Last month my blog was about the many hats that musicians have to wear these days but sometimes it’s not best to try to do it all. DIY means Do It Yourself but that doesn’t necessarily mean Do It ALL Yourself. Sometimes it’s a good idea to “pass the hat”. This can be for a number of reasons. The first being the age old battle of Time vs. Money. For example, let’s say your time is worth $25 an hour and you absolutely despise cutting your grass. If you can get someone to do it for say $12.50 an hour you can spend your time making that back times two. Unless you just don’t have the money to spend (which often musicians may not) or just LOVE cutting your grass you may want to consider passing that hat to someone else. No, this is not about yard work I just used that as an example ;).
Another reason you may want to pass the hat is there may be a better qualified person. You just can’t be great at everything and although there are some things you may not need to be “great” at to get it done some things such as maybe your graphic design, your website, or guitar repairs might better off being done by a pro.
Lastly though, a reason people may not consider at first is simply so you can focus on more important things. It would be rather difficult for you to be your own photographer (other than the proverbial “selfie”) and concentrate on your look and lighting while to look “cool” in your photos. I have begun working on a new album which is all solo instrumental acoustic guitar - one guitar, no overdubs. While I have a pretty good home studio and know my gear fairly well I would be splitting my focus up between trying to get a great performance and being an engineer also. Because of this I have opted to record my album at a good friend’s (Dave Harris) studio and let him do what he does best which is engineer while I can focus solely on my playing. This way I’m not trying to wear two hats at the same time ;).