Nashville Interactive recently launched a fresh website redesign for country music artist Amanda Nagurney. Amanda needed a website that reflected her maturing career and that could be updated easily. The solution was a self-hosted, open-source content management system. This means that Amanda controls her own website and doesn't have to worry about being locked-in to proprietary software which often involve fairly hefty fees for hosting, ongoing maintenance and licensing. We're very proud of this one turned out. A great example of a self-managed musician website design that is flexible and allows for easy content management. Check out Amanda's new site at amandanagurney.com
Alice Tan Ridley first made a name for herself singing in the subways of New York City. She also wowed judges on the popular TV show "America's Got Talent". Alice went from the subway to the big stage and needed a website to reflect the progression of her career. The website design draws inspiration from her days of singing in the subways, using fonts and design elements from the NY subway system signage but also reflects the new heights she's reached as well. The project included design and development of a full site built on a content management system for easy updates. Check out the new website at alicetanridley.com.
Nashville Interactive is proud to present elliotroot.com for your viewing pleasure. ER is a great up and coming group with "roots" (pun semi-intended) in Kenosha Wisconsin. These guys are not your typical Nashville artists. Great music so visit the site and have a listen (and check out the design while you're there).
A long time since the last post here at NI. Things have been very busy all spring and summer is shaping up to be just as great. Nashville Interactive has been lucky enough to work on a bunch of great music venue websites and a few fair and event websites as well during this time. These numerous, sub-contracted projects include The Orange Peel (Asheville, NC), Headliners (Louisville, KY), Hat Factory (Richmond, VA), State Fair of West Virginia (uhhh), Allegan Co. Fair (Allegan, MI), Flavor! Napa Valley (CA), Legendary Cherokee (NC), and a few others. Website design was done for all of these sites as well as key front-end development.
So back to the point… Arenas are dead. Going to see an artist in a smaller, more intimate setting is where it's at. The state (and county) fair is where it's at. Helping these people shine and achieve goals via websites is also where it's at.
The summer of 2010 will go down as one crazy summer of web design. Nashville Interactive has been very busy with some great projects that will hit the web design portfolio soon. Being busy with nice, air-conditioned office work during a very hot and humid Middle Tennessee summer isn't a bad thing at all. Since the real heat started in June, Nashville Interactive has played an integral part in over one dozen website design projects including work for music mogul Diddy, professional golfer Kenny Perry, country music artist and professional bull rider Justin McBride and Nashville School Volunteers. There's plenty more on the horizon slated for the fall so hopefully we'll be able to find some time for football and leaf raking. Stay tuned for design portfolio updates in the near future…
This past weekend, Nashville Interactive launched SpenshaOnline.com; the online home of inspirational musical artist Spensha Baker. The website design and development was handled completely by Nashville Interactive. I've said it before: creating an artist website design is always a fun project to work on. The creative freedom and ability to work with less "traditional" layouts allows the opportunity to stretch the creative muscles a bit.
The site was built using an Open-Source Content Management System so that the client has full control over their own online presence. Using open source software also means that there are no monthly licensing fees of any kind which often come along with bulkier proprietary systems.
Being in Nashville means that country music website design is a fact of life for most web professionals. This is definitely not a bad thing. Designing band websites is always a fun project for me. The nature of the work dictates that the aesthetic and layout can be a little outside the box. Although I love creating a nice clean small business website and as great as corporate website design is, having complete creative freedom every now and then is good for the soul. I recently designed a website for up-and-coming country music artist Jamie Tate. (Just the design work on this one). Most of my other projects at the time required a cleaner more "business-esque" look. This site design allowed me to step back and appreciate the occasional break from the norm. Creating unique, non-templated website layouts also allows me to subtly integrate some of these creative and unique elements into more "traditional" designs as well. The bottom line is that creating unique layouts for musician websites helps me keep the creativity flowing in other projects.
Nashville Interactive is proud to announce that we've developed and re-launched richardmarx.com. If you aren't familiar with Richard Marx's music (you probably are even if you don't know it), He's a Grammy Award-winning, #1 song-writing (13 of them), multi-platinum album selling artist.
The Richard Marx camp was in need of a new provider for website design and development services and Nashville Interactive is flattered to be able to help out. Richard's website was less than one year old when the need arose to redevelop the established website design on a new platform. Nashville Interactive was called in to rebuild the site. In order to avoid the all-to-common scenario of being locked in to a proprietary system, open-source content management technologies were implemented. Don't get me wrong, proprietary systems have their place but open-source is the preferred solution is this type of situation. The site is controlled and owned by the client and they can do with it whatever they wish. This is just one of the advantages of using open-source content management systems to develop websites.
Designing websites for musicians and bands is always a fun project for me. Seeing the response and interaction on artist and band websites puts a lot of things into perspective because the target audience is so engaged with the artist. I'm happy to provide the tools for the interaction and see my work bringing fans and artists closer.
Kelly Clarkson’s new website launched several days ago. You may be thinking, ‘Wow Chris. how much do you love Kelly Clarkson?’. To which I would reply, ‘Enough to design her website if I’m asked to’. While I’ve quickly developed a much more diverse style working for Echomusic, I’ve found several projects have helped that process more than others. Designing for a young, hip demographic is a nice addition to the much more professional business websites I’ve worked on in the past. The Kelly Clarkson website design was a good opportunity to expand my skill set just a little more by focusing on a younger female audience. The big takeaway from musician website design for me is that I’m designing for fans not customers.
