SFMS Online: Using Social Media to Promote your Art
Wednesday, July 10, 2024 Live on Zoom at 6:30 pm Eastern
About This Event:
Social media platforms offer a dizzying array of ways for artists to reach broader audiences. Learning how folk and traditional artists can use them effectively is the subject of this informative webinar presented by our Susquehanna Folk Arts Center.
Social media strategist Skye Leppo
Cigar box guitar king Shane Speal
Musician and artist Bobbi Carmitchell
Social media platforms offer a dizzying array of ways for artists to reach broader audiences. Learning how folk and traditional artists can use them effectively is the subject of this informative webinar presented by our Susquehanna Folk Arts Center.
Our presenters are Central Pennsylvania creatives who have leveraged social media to create successful artistic careers. Together we will work through questions like, how do you decide which are the right platforms for you? How do you create engaging stories that draw your audience in and distinguish you from everyone else? How do you create a virtual community?
Skye Leppo, Shane Speal and Bobbi Carmitchell will share their experiences, offer tips for creating good content, and discuss challenges and successes. By the end, you will have a good sense of how to fold social media posts into your promotional routine.
Our Presenters:
Skye Leppo
Skye Leppo is a social media strategist and content writer. Skye got her start in blogging for WXPN and then started covering community and arts and entertainment beats for York (PA) Daily Record/Sunday News and the Reading Eagle. She currently resides in central PA, and handles all things social media for Yuengling Beer. In her free time she is a board member and organizer for the New Cumberland Collective as well as 3rd In The Burg, and is the principal music writer for TheBurg Magazine.
Shane Speal
York, PA’s Shane Speal is the world’s foremost master of the cigar box guitar, a primitive instrument made from discarded wood, guitar strings and and empty box. He has been featured in the LA Times, Guitar World and Premier Guitar magazines and the PBS documentary, Songs Inside the Box. He has devoted his life to music from an early age, voraciously studying a wide range of musical styles and their history. In the early 1990’s, he discovered historical accounts of the homemade cigar box guitar, and since then has crafted his on-stage performances around its unique sound and style. He began spreading the word about these amazing instruments online, in the glory days of the Internet’s infancy. In so doing, he launched the modern revival of cigar box guitars and the handmade music movement, which has grown to include hundreds of thousands of builders and players around the world — and earned Shane the tongue-in-cheek title King of the Cigar Box Guitar.
- Website: ShaneSpeal.com
- Facebook: cigarboxguitar
- Shane on YouTube
- Shane on Instagram & Tiktok: @cigarboxguitar
Bobbi Carmitchell
Bobbi Carmitchell has been a force on the Central Pennsylvania singer songwriter scene for 40 years, and has toured all over the country. Her music and singing supports many causes that she believes in: farmland preservation, domestic violence awareness, breast cancer research, AIDS education, arts in schools, and many others. During the COVID pandemic, Bobbi and her partner, cellist Ashley McFalls, started doing daily livestream performances on Facebook from their living room. They hit a milestone of 300 consecutive livestreams, building a community of viewers with a sense of personal connection who continue to listen in on her Patreon channel. As a multi-talented artist, Bobbi also does carpentry, woodworking, and stained glass, bringing together color, light and design in unique ways. She uses both Facebook and Patreon to integrate her creativity into her passion for community.
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