You are a talented musician with a charming and fun minstrel act and you're ready to share your magic at Renaissance Faires worldwide. But how do you capture the attention of fair organizers in a world of talented performers? For my recent client, a globe-trotting minstrel who performs at Renaissance Faires and private events, the answer was a professional Electronic Press Kit (EPK).

An EPK is your digital promoter, a collection of essential marketing materials that effortlessly reach fair organizers, communications teams, and marketers. A personal website housing your EPK is more than just a convenience; it's a powerful statement that shows organizers you are serious, professional, and dedicated to your craft as a Ren Faire performer.

The Essential Elements of a Renaissance Performer EPK

Marketing teams at faires typically look for a few key components in an EPK. Here's what you'll need to stand out:

Biography or Act Description: A compelling narrative about you and your character.
High-Resolution Photos: Professional visuals that capture your personality and performance style.
Video Clips: Dynamic performances showcasing your talent and personality.
Audio Samples: Quality recordings of your music.
A List of Instruments You Play: Important details for fair planning.
Your Contact Information: Making it easy for organizers to reach you.

Let's delve deeper into each of these crucial areas, offering recommendations to help you build out a stellar electronic press kit and personal website that gets you booked.

Crafting Your Character's Story

Your biography or act description isn't just a resume; it's your chance to tell a captivating story about your, or your character’s journey. You want to be descriptive about your act and who you are, but the true magic lies in storytelling.

It's important to be pithy and engaging. You'll typically need two versions: a short description (under 150 words) and a longer one (under 400 words). The challenge isn't just about length; it's about creatively constraining yourself to tell a compelling story that quickly captures attention.

Don't just list your training or past performances. Instead, tell a story about why you love music, why you want to share it at a Renaissance Festival, and especially why you embody your character so deeply. Try to capture your character's personality and voice in the language you use.

Creative Constraints: Honing Your Narrative

While it's difficult to distill your rich experience into 150 or 400 words, these narrow constraints force you to be direct and connect deeply with your audience. While AI tools or online writing aids can facilitate professionalism, clarity, and language, it's important that you retain your authentic voice or your character's voice in the text. I often recommend dictating your thoughts into a speech-to-text app. This helps the words feel more natural and genuinely you.

Visually Capturing Your Character

My client, like many talented performers, had some great social media photos taken by friends. While charming, these weren't high-resolution or professional quality. They simply didn't deliver what a professional EPK requires for print marketing and promotional materials.

High-resolution photography is crucial for your EPK. Not only does it allow people to see what you or your character looks like, but marketing teams will use these images to promote the fair and your performances. Having professional photographs a must.

While professional photography can be expensive, there are effective alternatives. Enlist the help of a friend or loved one with a high-quality digital camera and a good lens. Or you can achieve satisfactory results with a DIY photoshoot at home. Plenty of tutorials online can show you how to use materials in your own house to take high-quality images, even using a smartphone with adjusted settings.

Key Photography Tips for Renaissance Performers:

In Costume: If you're a character performer, it is essential that these pictures are done in costume and reflect your character's authentic look.
Instrument Showcase: If you play a variety of instruments, take pictures playing or holding each one.
Varied Locations & Backgrounds: Seek out diverse locations that fit the Renaissance theme to add visual variety.
Shot Variety: Ensure you get full-body wide shots, as well as medium and close-ups, to give fair organizers options.
Curated Selection: Limit the number of photos on your EPK to four or five of your absolute best. If you have more beloved photos, make sure they find a home elsewhere on your website and keep a folder of high-resolution options readily available for marketing teams who request more materials.

DIY Photo Solutions: Crafting the Perfect Scene

For my client, we conducted two photo shoots. One was indoors with a neutral-colored backdrop that subtly complemented the Renaissance theme. A simple neutral sheet hung from a wall or curtain rod can create a professional-looking backdrop.

Another excellent option is to go outdoors. Greenery and trees make natural, authentic Renaissance environments. Just be sure there are no modern intrusions like cars or houses in the background. We were fortunate to be near a university with old buildings that evoked a historical feel. Regardless of who's taking your pictures, have them take a lot. Inevitably, you'll capture that one expression, laugh, or look that perfectly embodies your character's personality in a still image. We ended up with some fantastic high-resolution images for his website and EPK that have proven very effective for fair organizers and marketing teams.

Capturing a happy moment

If you’re DIYing a photoshoot, take a ton of pictures and keep on shooting. You can capture that special smile, that happy look just when you least expect it.

Of course, my main suggestion is always to hire a professional photographer. A good professional will have an extensive online portfolio of beautiful photographs you admire, and it's a huge bonus if they have experience shooting Renaissance Fair performers.

Videos: Bringing Your Performance to Life

Videos are an incredibly dynamic part of an EPK, offering a prime chance to showcase your performance energy and personality. If you're active on social media, you likely have plenty of vertically oriented videos. These are certainly useful for your EPK, but it's useful to also have horizontally oriented videos of your performances.

Dedicate time to shooting horizontal video, ideally with your camera on a tripod. Using multiple cameras or phones from different angles can create a rich, varied presentation. The goal is to provide a diverse selection of videos that highlight your performance style and musical talent to event organizers and marketing teams.

Keep your videos relatively short, ideally one to two minutes. However, if you have playful social media videos you truly love, it's worth including those too. Again, limit the number of videos to around three or four of your best, ensuring a mix of horizontal and vertical formats.

The Welcoming Video!

Consider recording a fun, welcoming, or greeting video in character. Talk about who you are, what you love to perform, and perhaps even introduce yourself and then play a short tune. This gives people viewing your EPK an immediate sense of your character's personality, your professionalism, and your musical skills.

Make a GIF

My client had many videos that he shot for social media that were playful and captured his personality. We edited a few clips together and made a .gif that plays on the top of his EPK. It immediately shows off his performance personality and really connects with people who land on the page. You can use online tools like Ezgif.com to make your own GIF from your videos.

The Sounds of Your Talent

Many performers play multiple instruments. Creating a clear instruments list is a great idea for fair organizers, helping them understand your performance setup and unique offerings. If the details of specific instruments are particularly important to your act, include a brief description of each.

Alongside your instrument list, audio samples are a must. These don't necessarily require expensive studio equipment; you can even record high-quality samples on a smartphone. If you have performance videos, you can use computer software or online audio converters to separate the audio from the video and export an MP3 file for your EPK website.

Making Connections Easy

Your contact information is arguably the most vital part of your EPK. How do you want people to reach out to you?

The Importance of Professional Email

Providing an email address is fundamental. If you're playing a character, consider a Gmail account that uses your character's name (e.g., YourCharacterName@gmail.com). However, if you're serious about getting hired and building a professional brand, the gold standard is a custom email address at your new custom domain (e.g., Hello@YourCharactersName.com).

This demonstrates professionalism. It shows fair organizers and marketing teams that you are established, have your own polished website, and are truly dedicated and reliable in your work. Make it incredibly easy for people to get in touch by prominently displaying your email or having an easy-to-fill contact form directly on your website or EPK page.

Additional Considerations for Your EPK

Website Hosting Platforms

For the DIY enthusiast, many subscription-based, relatively inexpensive website hosting platforms are perfect for those with a design eye who know exactly how they want to format their EPK. Platforms like Squarespace, Showit, and Framer are all excellent options for building a professional DIY website.

Optimizing for Speed and Quality

You want to provide high-resolution images for download, but these large files will significantly slow down your website's loading times if displayed on a page. This is where an image resizer comes in handy. Use tools like TinyPNG or other image downsizing platforms to optimize images for your website.

If you've hired a professional photographer, ensure you receive both high-resolution images (for print and download) and web-optimized versions. From there, it's easy to post your smaller web-sized images on your site, linked directly to the high-resolution versions that marketing and press teams can easily download for their needs.

Have fun and enjoy the process!

Through the process of building your EPK, just have fun! From photos to videos to web design, it is important to share your love and passion! If you’re having fun with it, then that will come through in the final product. I wish you luck in building your Electronic Press Kit. If you have any questions, reach out!

Chris Irr
chris@recaesthetics.com

How to Build an Electronic Press Kit (EPK) for Ren Faire Performers