You may be surprised.

http://www.musicianwages.com/musician-p ... -musician/

_________________


http://www.youtube.com/user/gmlasam

I was considering a cruise ship placement this morning. Glad I've a family to keep me home.

On whole I think theres a lot of location based guesswork going on in that article. Granted teaching music is a steady regular income, where gigging isn't and you have to deal with rip off promoters.
Don't think I'm ready for the Nottingham Symphony Orchestra yet.

_________________
No no and no

Lets be realistic, if your in a band you get at the most $90 for a gig which lets just go with the standard 4 man band you split it with, $22.50 per member, with 2 gigs a week so about $45. If your a guitar player you can make about minimum $10 a session so lets say you give 4 lessons a week, so about $85 a week minus $20 for gas,$65, minus $40 for eating for a week, thats $25. So extra money you have is $25 a week, times 4 you have $80 a month lets be nice and say your rent is only $60, you only have realistically $20 a month of straight extra cash which would go towards clothing or other necessities, if your a musician trying to make it your gonna need hella luck, low spending, tons of odd jobs lined up, and low ambitions. For my generation though, this will be impossible seeing as how 45 year old men who went to law school cannot find jobs, thus they go after all of the odd jobs to meet ends meet. You Boomers and X'rs are lucky f@#!?. The only way any of us can make it is if we hobo or stay at friends houses until we save up enough money to get a run down, $@!& roach invested, apartment.

_________________

Yea, I didn't realize how hard it is the make a living as a pro musician, specially the ones that have no major label record deal. One must really have the love for Music to survive in the Music Industry. Now, I can see why bands that play weddings charge the amount they do......they deserve it.

Check this link out on one Musician from Los Angeles.

http://blogs.payscale.com/salarystories ... a_mus.html

_________________


http://www.youtube.com/user/gmlasam

$90 for the whole band is one sh***y band or one cheap arse venue......

_________________
Favorite bands:

Melvins
The Jesus Lizard
Cows
Big Business
R***man
Minutemen
Flight
Minor Threat
Big Black
Shellac
Karp
Scratch Acid
Wipers
Pixies

4 X $90 is $360.
That's a tad on the low side, isn't it?
Maybe alright for a hobby band but for a regular working band?

For me personally? I'll play for free because I love playing. If I could just show up, plug in and play a set and then leave I'd do it just for fun. It's the travelling time and carting expenses, dry-cleaning my jacket and cleaning the spilled beer from my boots, eating some greasy spoon hotel cafe supper, setting up the stage, (that's a big issue right there) doing the sound check and tearing down in the wee hours of the morning, the feeling like hell the next day and just the general agrivation of organizing and executing a gig that I want to be paid for. For that I want $200 in my jeans or I don't play. $150 if it's close to home and I know the place and I know their stage is adequate, the crowd will be expecting the kind of music we play and not requesting songs completely out of our genre, I know the management and am confident he/they won't try to cheat us.

_________________

Just think of how awesome a guitar player you could have been by now if you had only spent the last 10 years practicing instead of obsessing over pickups and roasted maple necks.

OMG!! You meant $90 for the gig for the whole band?

No Thank You!!

_________________

Just think of how awesome a guitar player you could have been by now if you had only spent the last 10 years practicing instead of obsessing over pickups and roasted maple necks.

LOL I'd play for free before I split 90 bucks. I made more than $22.50 playing at family functions in the 60's when I was 13 years old. It has nothing to do with Boomers and X'rs having it made. Maybe we just played/wrote better music. Way back I made a decent living. My bread and butter was a wedding/corporate event band in the 70's and 80's and clubs for fun and sometimes really decent money. I was even in the musicians union for a little while. I didn't have to sleep in a roach motel and eat at greasy spoons. The wedding/event gig music sucked but financed much of my other stuff and fed us too. If you act professionally and play well you get the good gigs. if you suck, you split 90 bucks. It's a business. If you run your business properly you prosper, if you don't you go bankrupt or do something else. Most young players I see know nothing about the business end or their band or have a buddy "manage" them who also knows nothing about business.

_________________
Life...... It's sexually transmitted and always fatal

Consider the source. Hahn's opinion or views.

Just as with any 'gig ' or 'job' there are many different levels, not just that author's views.

_________________
Being able to play and enjoy music is a gift that's often taken for granted.

Don't leave home without it!

Sure there are. It's just like any job. Wages are regional too. But doing gigs for 90 bucks for a 4 piece band is funny. A couple of my friends are street musicians in Philadelphia and actually do between $75 and $200 per 6-8 hour day depending on a few factors like weather, location seasons and if they feel like playing. One guy I know is pretty consistent wage wise playing Blues on a Resonator doing Robert Johnson, Charlie Patton, Son House etc. He also plays on one of the boardwalks in lower Delaware.

_________________
Life...... It's sexually transmitted and always fatal

Yeah his gig wages are off, you can get £80 on your own for a couple of hours busking here.
You have to pick your spot and time though. 11am in a deserted park on a sunday morning may get you nothing more than hypothermia.
Notice the writer left out session work too. Theres a whole organized pay scale to that in the UK.
Last I heard the grade was something like £60 per hour, £100 per hour if you'd played on a hit, £150 ph if that hit was a hit in multiple countries. Going up to around £300 per hour for touring session musicians and platinum selling works.
Not hard work either when you get used to dealing with producers. 10 minutes looking at the score, another 10 minutes for a couple of takes, paid for the hour. So I'm told. Never worked on them rates, I'm too slow at score.

_________________
No no and no

In Library music world, it varies like with everything else and in different territories and types of program work involved. In the UK, general and broadcasting tv work, averages a rate of around £40 a minute with our top companies and don't forget composers are counting the seconds here. Sounds a lot and it is when you are busy but that ain't always so. Good Publishers are essential.

_________________

wow, guess i better stay in college then!

_________________


I got this guitar and I learned how to make it talk...

When you total up the gear cost and upkeep with transportation costs with gas, meals, insurance and what not and then add in the many hours you spend practicing,the amount of money a musician makes is a pittance compared to what he/she has put into it.Even though I played pretty steady for many years and made decent money when I played I still had to have a full time day job because after all the related expenses were taken into account,the money I actually pocketed from playing would never have supported me and my family.That's why I decided early in the game to devote every cent I made playing back into music either in instruments,gear or CDs etc.Very few musicians ever do well enough to support themselves purely through playing.

_________________
'65 Strat,65 Mustang,65 Jaguar,4 more Strats,3 vintage Vox guitars,5 Vox amps,'69 Bassman with a '68 2-15 Bassman cab,36 guitars total-15asst'd amps total,2 vintage '60s Hammond organs & a myriad of effects-with a few rare vintage ones.

How did you manage to work a regular 40 hour job and work as a Musician? I'm thinking there is a time constrain working two jobs! You must not get enough sleep and not have enough time for family. I dunno man, you must really have a deep passion for music to be so dedicated to it.

_________________


http://www.youtube.com/user/gmlasam