I'm going to cross my fingers and try to copy the other thread over to this one. If it works, I';ll delete the other thread and maybe things won't be so confusing.
-Joe Offer-
Subject: Has there been a thread like this
From: skarpi
Date: 27-Mar-99 - 07:12 PM
I was wandering, have you ever had discussion about what we get payed for playing at pup or what we can get for a concert. I know there has to be a more than one price, wheather you one or three or five. Do we play two set or more?.
In Iceland we play for four ours from ellewen in the night to three a clock in the morning, and you are getting from five hundred us dollar to one thousand and you have to pay tax, in my band are five peoble so we are not getting much in money, but a lot of good and happy memories and lot of fun.
sl n skarpi Iceland.
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: katlaughing
Date: 27-Mar-99 - 07:50 PM
Skarpi,
First: I always enjoy reading your postings so much! They are so interesting, fun and such an integral part of the Mudcat! Thank you!
From my most recent experience: I was asked to be a guest at an arts evening last summer, by a nonprofit arts organisation. I read my essays and poems for about 30 minutes then a really good jazz band played for 30 minutes, then I read another 30, then they played another 30.
We each were paid an "honourarium" of $50.00. Which, considering the actual time I spent reciting (1 hour) was not bad, for this market.
My guess is, a lot of people are going to say the market you are playing in has a lot to do with how much to charge.
This should be an interesting thread. Thanks for starting it.
katlaughing
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Don Meixner
Date: 27-Mar-99 - 08:02 PM
Skarpi,
$100.00 a man a night isn't bad pay for most of us out here in the business.
This is a hard topic for many of us to discuss. What we need to earn for playing music is sometimes hard to figure out. From your lowest estimate for what amounts to 4 hours playing time you are getting $25.00 an hour. Not bad wages. But add to that the time you take to set up and tear down after a job. Say an hour each and and now you are earning $16.66 and hour, this is still pretty good wages for what is to many of us a part time job. Did you have to travel far to get to the job? I some times travel an hour each way and if we add that to the mix we are now making $12.50 an hour. Many skilled laborers in the U.S. earn this wage and feed families on this money. Did you practice this week with the band? Say a total of four hours? That makes the hourly wage now $ 8.33 dollars and hour. These figures are off a $100.00 pay for a job. If you pay taxes on that money your hourly rate goes down considerably. Then add in the tangible expenses. New strings, gas for the trip, food on the road, New wires for the mics now and then, A new instrument, being a performer is very low pay for most of us in the business.
How do we earn more money and not price ourselves out of a job? The bar owner has to make money before he can pay us so we can't raise our prices too much too often. I have an Irish musician friend in Washington, DC who says he would play most jobs for free just to be able to sell his CDs and tapes. Last year he avereaged $3.00 from CDs and tapes for every $1.00 for engagement fees. We don't all do this well and some of us have nothing to sell, I'm thinking of a line of ties and recipe books myself. My friend would never do these gigs for free, imagine the precedent that would set, YIKES!
How I figure my worth? When I do a single I charge $100.00 for most performances based on an 8 hourday and $ 12.50 an hour. But I'm not doing this fulltime and I can very easily give the job away for a worthy cause which I do very often.
Some other things to consider. I am not a union musician and I won't ever be one. (These are fighting words to some and a yawn for others.) If there is a problem with some venues about hiring a non union musician for a job, I don't play there. I will not confront and I will not scab either, I just won't join the union. Never play for free just for the exposure or you will always be asked to play for free. Remember, no matter what you do, charge something for a job, people have to pay for the art. I charge a token fee for most benefits. But there are always exceptions.
This ramble is long enough others will have opinions I'm sure. Some will suit your situation and some won't.
Good luck
DonLine breaks
added. Izzat better, Don? -Joe Offer-
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: DonMeixner
Date: 27-Mar-99 - 08:05 PM
I just reread this post of mine. I used paragraph breaks and everything like that there. Sorry about the jumble of words, I hope they aren't too hard to read.
DRM
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Mikal
Date: 27-Mar-99 - 11:16 PM
This is interesting. As I have explained before, I am not a musician, nor would I ever be mistaken for one. But, I am a storyteller, and I get booked, (on rare occasions) for about $200 US a night. That would be about two hours of storytelling to a mixed audience, 100 or so at a time, 30 min. each set.
Of course I have given it away for free, (hey, I do it regularly for churches and re-enactors.) But then I usually take it off my taxes as charitable work.
Now I know. I am getting about the same wage as most Folksingers!
Mikal
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: SeanM
Date: 27-Mar-99 - 11:36 PM
Bravo to Mikal for getting as much as he does! Storytelling is a resurgent art, but still underrepresented.
From my experiences, I'd have to side with Don. My band averages around $100 each (5 members) per day. Sometimes, we can get more, but we usually concentrate on intangibles... lodging for multi day gigs, meals, beer, etc... whatever we can get. But compared to the hundreds of dollars a month we spend on commuting to gigs/rehearsals, parts of and entire new instruments, other equipment, etc., well, it's a labor of love. As much as we'd like to be, for the near future it looks like we're not doing it for the money.
In the meantime, on the off chance that someone who's a regular member of the folk audience crowd wanders through, Support your local Folkie! We appreciate it! Really!
Sorry... Couldn't resist...
M
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Allan C.
Date: 27-May-99 - 11:57 AM
I just re-discovered this thread and wanted to refresh it. I am sure there are more out there with useful comments.
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Susan-Marie
Date: 27-May-99 - 12:37 PM
Can one of the HTML gurus change the title or add to it so people know the topic is "what do folkies get paid"? There would be much more interest that way.
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Art Thieme
Date: 27-May-99 - 12:47 PM
Best pay I ever had (could demand) was when I was working playing steady every other day on steamboats 6 months a year for a decade. Having the security of steady work (rare for us folksingers who started in the early 60s and sought/mimicked a blue-collar image) gave me the freedom to quote higher than ever before. And usually I'd get it. When times were lean I'd quote less & come down quick when rebuffed. But when times were hard if someone offfered me $50.00 I'd often say, "If that's all you can pay you must need it more than I do"---then I'd offer to do a benefit for them free. Either they'd up the fee to at least a hundred bucks or accept the benefit--'cause they really needed it. And I was happy to do it. Good causes are everywhere in these flush times when so many are deprived but invisible in the blinding light if the Donald Trumps of this world.
Storytellers are not(generally) from the ethic of us lefty bluecollar emulators who put pebbles in our boots so we could have the same kind of pain Woody had when we hit those hot dusty roads. We thought it'd make us write like him. The storytellers come from the security of library jobs with good cash & health insurance & reliable cars. Being white collar, they are accustomed to big money and most get it at their festivals. They get much better cash than folkies in schools too. The schools are not inner city ones; they're affluent suburban beautious edifices that can afford a thousand a day for feel good tales with few supernatural references etc.
Just one man's opinion--and experience.
Art Thieme
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Matthew B.
Date: 27-May-99 - 12:57 PM
Whenever I sing "professionally," I introduce myself as Matt don't-quit-your-day-job Bram. Fortunately for me, my "day job" pays very well, thank you.
If I had to rely on folksinger's wages, I'd be totally broke. In fact, my potential income from singing is so scant that I just forgo payment altogether, rather than complicate my taxes. If my client insists on paying, I usually tell him to figure out a fair sum and give it to the charity of his choice.
Not exactly a career you can use for putting you kids through college, is it?
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: reggie miles
Date: 27-May-99 - 02:16 PM
Don, that just about sums up my experience as well. I've come to realize that this endeavor is more of a religion than a business, not quite sure why I'm so devoted to it. Given the financial success of most of the religions around today it seems to me they've all become much more like a business. I'm thinkin' we should just turn this music thing into a religion. We'll get that tax break we need. We can build concert halls, I mean temples, with all the donations we solicit. We'll get our own cable stations, in no time we'll be buildin' our own universities. Just think of it, graduating from Blue U., Swing U., Folk U., or Voodooacidsportsrockfusion U. Oh there I go dreamin' again. Reggie
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Allan C.
Date: 27-May-99 - 02:47 PM
I took Susan-Marie's suggestion and, though it wasn't possible to rename this thread, I created a new one with a title which more clearly identifies its purpose.
This is a link to the thread, "How Much to Charge?"
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 27-May-99 - 02:50 PM
Good thread.
Now go and read the MP3 thread and start figuring how musicians need protection under strong copyright laws to be able to make a living.
Also go and read the thread about how clubs survive when they have to pay musicians - and without clubs how do people start playing in public.
I play for nothing. But that's because the alternative is having people pay me to stop playing and singing and go away, or the club we run folding if too many of the residents opt out.
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Matthew B.
Date: 27-May-99 - 09:48 PM
Reggie, I LOVE your idea about starting a religion. I'll gladly convert, especially for the tax break. But seriously, I do feel closer to God (or whatever her name is) when singing than at any other time. And I'm not just talking about the "nice" stuff: a good Haul Away for Rosie-o can pull me closer to Heaven than an hour of Bible study.
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Cap't Bob
Date: 27-May-99 - 11:16 PM
We usually get somewhere between $100 and $150 usually doing 2 to 3 sets. The best was one St. Patricks Day gig when we received $280 apiece and they threw in dinner and breakfast. It was a long one however, starting around 6 p.m. and ending about 2 a.m. Of course time goes fast when you are having fun.
If it is a fund raiser for some local group we get $50 each and sometimes depending upon the cause donate the money to the group. Due to work, family matters, young ones in sports, we are lucky to play 3 or 4 times a year. Day jobs help as it would be rather difficult to live on 400 to 600 a year.
Cap't Bob
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Joe Offer
Date: 28-May-99 - 03:22 AM
Reggie, be careful what you wish for. Very few church musicians can make a living on their music. I think the going rate here is $50 a service. If you want to take the time to practice with the choir, that's on your own time, without pay. I sing with a pianist-choir director who does four services every Sunday (split between two churches). That's a fair income, but it runs her ragged. I don't get paid myself for the two Masses I sing at every Sunday, but I have a good time doing it.
-Joe Offer-
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: reggie miles
Date: 28-May-99 - 09:59 AM
Joe, I was merely drifting off into a bit of a silly rant earlier, not based in reality but rather jo-viality. I mean sometimes you just got to laugh to keep from cryin' about this situation. With all these years dedicated to this and so little financial success to show for it, as Don and the others mentioned. Hey I'm not complainin' really, there are other rewards less tangible that can't be counted. Once we throw a pebble into a pond or sing a song or post to a thread at a cyber site, one never knows what consequences will result or how our actions will affect those around us. My friend Robert Oneman Johnson has a good line in a song about his grandfather called "Grampa Shine", "Grampa Shine said to me Bob, it's a man's only job, to make as many people happy as he can." Reggie
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 28-May-99 - 10:57 AM
Let's end this thread as suggestion and move over to the other one How Much to Charge.
I am not a neatnik or a control freak, but I like things to be simple. I want to read this information on one thread instead of two. It will also make it easier for everyone to join in.
Good topic Skarpi although one that is somewhat sensitive.
Roger in Baltimore
<1>Here's the new thread in case you missed it!
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 28-May-99 - 11:03 AM
Oops, I checked my work and it was poorly done. I'm a'gonna try again. If'n it don't work, I'll give up. Perhaps Joe Offer can fix it if I mess up. Lord, I don't want to go back to HTML school. Maybe Joe could fix me instead of the thread.
Roger in Baltimore (hiding under the desk so no one will find me)
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Subject: RE: Has there been a thread like this
From: Mudjack
Date: 28-May-99 - 11:26 AM
How much pay to a non pro is really a matter of how much you can get or how much will they pay. I have recieved as much as $200 and as little as a bad lunch. Either case it was all worth while.
When a person accepts payment for something he or she is apt to do for nothing should probably be a "thank you" for helping them support their favorite hobby/pastime.
There is always the danger of harming relations between the pros and the hobby performers. I always respect the pros and support their efforts the best I can by attending their venues and buying their product. I truly envy them as I think I could have been a working performer, but my need for a steady reliable income dictates a higher prioity. Which simply means I don't have the guts to go out there and try it. I also think one might loose the lust for it if it comes down to wanting to do a gig verses have to do a gig. Wow! $200 for one hour I made, I came home telling my wife I'd like to do this all the time and promptly did some calculations and asked her if we could make it on $200 a week? Needless to say I went to work my day job the next morning.
This is a fun thread....Mj