JazznFunk
Supporting Member
$50 is the new $100 where I am for restaurant/bar/brewery work. 'Bar gigs' in the old sense don't really exist here anymore. Pay in general has decreased in the last 10 years, even though our city/town is a booming tourist location. For this reason, I stay home a lot more than I used to. My feeling is that a rising tide lifts all boats, and if people take $50 gigs on the regular, then that's what venues will expect to pay. And if you don't take it, someone else desperate to be heard.... will. I don't want to be part of a crowd/scene that encourages crap pay. The juice has to be worth the squeeze for me to leave the house.
That being said - there are still some places which will pay above the 'minimum', but not many, and I promote, play at them, and celebrate them. There's somewhat of a continuum that I'll function within. When a venue asks for mine or my trio's 'rate' I start at $450. That's $150 per musician as a starting point and yes - per-person pay as a metric matters. I will negotiate down to a point, but it depends on: the length of the gig, what else is thrown in as 'compensation.' None of us drink, so payment in beer or drinks is meaningless. Food at a decent restaurant might suffice, but not enough to chop the price by a major amount. If the gig is 2 hours vs 3, then I *might* agree to come down on the price a little bit, but not likely.
I have a day gig which thankfully pays well. But 10-15 years ago, I made most of my money playing music when 'bar gigs' generally paid $100-150 minimum, supplementing with at least 1 or 2 part time day gigs to fill in the gaps. I couldn't afford to do that now. I have been on ALL sides of the coin, and I work with people who ARE trying to make a living solely on music, so I don't expect or ask my bandmates or freelance contacts to work for super low pay, and I'm up front about that when we discuss booking gigs. I value getting my bandmates paid fairly as much as I advocate for myself (and others) to be paid fairly. It's the right thing to do. With hotels, restaurants, bars, etc. raking in $$ daily on our nationally-known food and drink scene, and knowing how much meals and hotel rooms cost here, it's pretty easy to figure out that music is not on the list of priorities the way it used to be when you're given lowball pay numbers, although there is no shortage of press touting the arts and music scene here.
That being said - there are still some places which will pay above the 'minimum', but not many, and I promote, play at them, and celebrate them. There's somewhat of a continuum that I'll function within. When a venue asks for mine or my trio's 'rate' I start at $450. That's $150 per musician as a starting point and yes - per-person pay as a metric matters. I will negotiate down to a point, but it depends on: the length of the gig, what else is thrown in as 'compensation.' None of us drink, so payment in beer or drinks is meaningless. Food at a decent restaurant might suffice, but not enough to chop the price by a major amount. If the gig is 2 hours vs 3, then I *might* agree to come down on the price a little bit, but not likely.
I have a day gig which thankfully pays well. But 10-15 years ago, I made most of my money playing music when 'bar gigs' generally paid $100-150 minimum, supplementing with at least 1 or 2 part time day gigs to fill in the gaps. I couldn't afford to do that now. I have been on ALL sides of the coin, and I work with people who ARE trying to make a living solely on music, so I don't expect or ask my bandmates or freelance contacts to work for super low pay, and I'm up front about that when we discuss booking gigs. I value getting my bandmates paid fairly as much as I advocate for myself (and others) to be paid fairly. It's the right thing to do. With hotels, restaurants, bars, etc. raking in $$ daily on our nationally-known food and drink scene, and knowing how much meals and hotel rooms cost here, it's pretty easy to figure out that music is not on the list of priorities the way it used to be when you're given lowball pay numbers, although there is no shortage of press touting the arts and music scene here.
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