""the last time anybody made any money taking a photo of a folk musician was about 1968" you got any proof or facts to back this up, Joe, or is it an unsubstantiated statement?"

I know a lot of freelance photographers. Several of them music photographers, who take photographs when they go to gigs/festivals etc. They are offered risible fees. I also work in publishing. I've seen picture budgets slashed: much as I don't want to, I have to use as many free photos as I can possibly get. So yes - plenty of substance to that comment.


But let's, for the sake of argument, pretend that bottom hasn't fallen out of the entertainment industry. Let's pretend that magazines, record labels et al still have budgets to pay photographers a decent wage. Let's pretend that professional photographers weren't a dying breed, and were still scraping a living by taking photographs of musicians. Is anybody *seriously* suggesting that someone with a press pass by the side of the stage at Cambridge festival taking photographs of Seth Lakeman or Bellowhead ought to be paying the band some kind of fee?! It would never occur to me to expect that! That'd be like living in a police state!