Choosing a Music Venue

Series Summary

As a musician traveling is simply part of the job. We must be able to travel in order to support ourselves and play to new people and crowds all the time so that we build up a fan base. The problem arises when we begin to think about all the expensive equipment we have to lug around every time we travel. Whether it’s by boat, train, plane or car we need to be able to get our instruments to the next venue safely so that we can use it at the next show. This has always been a serious issue for the likes of touring musicians everywhere. The protection of their assets, their livelihoods, their gear. If you are a professional traveling musician then booking gigs is your life's blood and this video series will give you tips on booking a tour. It covers tips on traveling, where to stay, riders, booking and many more valuable and useful tips for any touring musician. Take our advice and live by these tips when you’re traveling. It could mean the difference between playing and not!

Video Transcript

"Now if you're a performing artist like myself, more than likely you're going to need a place to perform. How do you choose where you're going to perform? Well, the thing that I usually think about whenever I try to choose a place to perform is, I prioritize by how much money each place is going to pay me. I know that places like universities have budgets for student activities. Places like festivals have huge amounts of people. A lot of times people is a good trade off for money. And then I have clubs. I've got schools. I've got the possibility of churches. I've got theaters. I've got galleries. All these different places. You need to find the place that puts on events that are the types of events that you have. Say if I'm coming up and I'm saying, hey I want Spoken Groove to play at the Circle J Ranch country western bar. Do you think that they are really going to be interested in Spoken Groove? Not so much. Because they want to know that can you draw people to their place of business. They're running a business, so they're concerned about making money. So, you want to make sure that whatever you play, if it’s a university or something like that, that it needs to be the right place where you fit into, and where people naturally want to go to see you perform. If you are a Christian musician, you don't want to be choosing places where Christians aren't going to want to go. Unless you really want to reach out and get outside of that box. If you are a secular satanic musician, you probably don't want to be choosing churches to perform in, because your fellow satanist aren't going to want to go to churches and get trapped and hear about Jesus in there or something. Right? So make sure that you choose the right place where you are going to fit in, and you are going to make an impact in that place."