Entertainment Gigs: Paid Professional Musicians

Series Summary

Today, musicians the world over are seeking for a way to transform their well-tuned craft into a money-making career. But since the days of patronage, court and king—even the minstrels and bards of old—musicians have had a harder time of making an honest day’s wage for an honest day’s work. Perhaps with the advent of other forms of mass market entertainment, such as radio, television, and the movies, live musical entertainment has taken a less important role in the everyday lives of people. Unless you happen to be a scenester, or a devotee of the local music scene, chances are that you may go see a live show once every three months, if that. And while the opportunity for a band or artist to become rock royalty is greater than ever before, it has grown more and more difficult for a regular, professional musician to pay his or her bills from month to month.

In these free video clips, get some professional advice on how to earn a decent living doing what you love. Our expert will discuss some of the major avenues successful musicians are taking to make ends meet. Topics include gigging as live entertainment, playing in a rock/pop band, classical musicians, music instruction, how to advertise your services, studio and session playing, and more. So take this opportunity to discover some potentially new ways to turn your starving artist mentality on its head. By working smart, taking good advice, making connections, and sticking with it, you could someday wake up and realize that you’re living the dream!

Video Transcript

"On behalf of Expert Village, my name is Jim Dufresne. I'm here to tell you about how to make a living playing music. In a nutshell, and I'm going to go right to the crux of the matter, is this is America, and in this country we provide services, and in exchange for these services we are renumerated, in most cases with money, but sometimes we're paid off in other things. So therefore you have to provide a service that somebody wants. Now, some people will go out and stand on a street corner and they'll play their songs. Songs they wrote, songs written by other people. And they'll entertain passers by. And depend on their gratuities. And, you know what, some people do really well at that. For example, in New York City and Chicago they have people that play in the subways, and they actually have to go out and get a permit to do that, because it's so lucrative. They'll play saxophone, they'll play the violin, they'll play the guiter, they'll play in the subway, they'll open the guitar case up and people will throw money in, and they'll make more money than a country lawyer. So, that's quite lucrative."