How hard is it to make a living in rock music?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I was having this conversation with my 13 year old son, who is a very talented guitar player. I was making the case that unless you are incredibly lucky or incredibly good, you will never earn much more than pocket change as a rock musician.

This is based on the life experiences of several talented musicians I know. I don’t ask them how much they earn but none have given up their day jobs. And my son’s guitar teacher earns $35 an hour for lessons, which is never going to take you out of the lower middle class.

Admittedly, it’s been years since I was friends with any studio musicians, so it’s possible that they are doing better than the guys I know who are in bands.

BTW, I wasn’t trying to talk my son out of trying to make it in music, not that he’d listen anyway. I’d be happy for him to give it a try. Of course I’d be happier if he gives it a try while going to a great college, but that’s not up to me.

We’d be interested in reading about any real life experiences and real dollars and cents info. Thanks.

2

IMO, it’s harderr now than it’s ever been. 20-30 years ago, live music was very popular. Most bars had live acts at least on weekends. That’s mostly gone now. There was a time back then that if you were talented, you could find a place to work in live music. Now I’m not so sure.

I have a friend who is a professional musician, but he has to maintain a day job to make ends meet. A gig might pay $500, but there’s several band members, plus the cost of instruments, transportation, etc. They’re lucky if they take home $75 each. My daughter’s violin teacher is very talented, but she makes a very meagre living teaching and playing the odd ensemble.

Even as you climb up in the musical ranks it’s hard to make a living. I had a childhood friend who went into music. He gave lessons, played in his band, and lived like a pauper. His band became quite popular in Canada, filling 2000 seat rooms and having a couple of modestly successful CDs. He eventually opened his own recording studio and makes a living that way.

I read an article by Courtney Love a while ago about the record industry, and she said that if a band has a million-selling CD, the ‘rank and file’ members of the band will be lucky to make $50,000 from it. Most of the money goes to the record company, the songwriters, and expenses. Very few bands ever have million-selling CDs.

Expecting to make it big as a musician is probably about as likely as deciding you’re going to be a professional hockey player or basketball player. A real longshot. That said, the exception is for the truly gifted. Wayne Gretzky knew he was going to be a successful professional hockey player by the time he was 13, and so did everyone who saw him play. If your son plays like Clapton or Stevie Ray Vaughan at 13, he’ll find a way to be successful, and the audiences will find him. True genius is always worth following, IMO. In fact, it’s a waste to NOT follow where it takes you. The trick is deciding whether there is true genius involved in the first place.

3

I have a lot of friends who make ends meet playing music. I used to. Its inconsistent, and unless you are a star, you need to play what will get you hired, not just the style of music you enjoy. The standard super-accessable pop-jazz tunes get stale after a while, but every rich lady wants them played at her cocktail party, ya know?

I do have some friends who are way, way more talented than I’ll ever be. They are better than what you’d hear on the radio, and even better than most of the “popular with the college kids and audiophile” bands. Not one of them has a contract that pays the bills. One regularly tours with major (arena filling) bands as a fill in (usually when one member is in rehab), and he still has a day job. He’s fantastic, but he will never be famous, and most likely will never be able to live a comfortable, steady life as a rock musician. One actually scored a “million dollar contract” and was part of a major multi-band summer tour. The band made a pittance after recording fees, etc., were taken out and the money was split five ways. He quit the business. Lots of musicians can tell you similar stories.

On the other hand, I know some very mediocre guitarists and one singer who have struck it big- and by big I mean that they can support themselves on their music (and you have probably heard of them). Incidentally, they are all young and fabulous looking.

I would stress to your kid that the music business is not at all fair. In addition to the long-shot odds like pro sports, there is no correlation between talent/ability and financial success. If he’s going to do it because he loves it, great; he may need to supplement it with other income though. If he wants to make money and be famous, thats more of a craps shoot.

In short, the business isn’t fair. YMMV.

4

Here is the article by Courtney Love that Sam Stone references above.

The way that most major label bands get treated these days is mindblowing. I know a guy who is in a band whose first album went gold on Epic Records and his exact quote was:

"As for the majors? How can I justify their plight in any way shape or form, when a “major” sold my record to over 300,000 people and they claim to have made no money on it? When do they come clean?

Sorry, no mercy from me. Download [the first album] as aften as you like. Steal it from the shelves for all I care."

5

It is, however, possible to be in a band and make your money in the music business- as a sound engineer, etc. I have a lot of friends that are doing OK playing with their bands at night and working at recording studios and the like during the day. It’s not going to make you rich, but my friends are some of the happiest people I know and they are doing what they love with people they like all day long. Few of us are so lucky.

6

I’m 46 and a lifelong guitar player.

I long ago decided to get a non-music skill, and have no complaints. I live well, play every day and gig every week.

I know lots of muscians more talented and dedicated than me who are scratching out a living (keep in mind that corporate media wants you to think that ‘becoming a star’ is just a matter of luck). I know musicians with few options who had promise early on and found themselves without options later. Capitalism sucks, but I have yet to find a better system.

If I had a young child who wanted to play music professionally, I would want them to understand the things others have mentioned about how live music is less a paid profession than it once was. Technology has made it tough to draw paying customers.

That said, if your child gets ‘thumbs-up’ ratings from people in the know, don’t rule out the possibility that he/she could make future generations glad.

Education and credentials mean more than they once did.

Could he teach?

Could he repair instruments?

These are marketable skills I have great respect for, and are more closely tied to playing music for a living than plumbing or carpentry.

My two cents.

7

I’m not sure what to say about guitar playing as a viable profession – it’s possible to have a comfortable life as a professional keyboard player, but the dynamics and skills required of each instrument are rather different. I’d say, off the top of my head, that, no, a guitar player isn’t going to earn a living unless he or she joins a corporate band (the sort which might pay each member $40,000 per year, plus benefits, in order to play corporate gigs doing covers) or an R&B/funk/blues combo which gigs regularly (at the very least 2-3x/week). I don’t really know the intimate details of many guitarists’ financial lives, but from a pianist’s perspective, it’s possible to earn a decent living, with quite a bit of spare time to practice, but it involves significant investment in equipment (a typical pro keyboardist will have $5000-10000 in gear and amplification “invested”), technological savoir-faire, and a willingness to play just about any genre of music – well, and I mean spot-on – as well as have the sort of personality that makes people want to hire you. I imagine it’s a bit tougher for a guitarist, just because there are so many really tough guitarists out there, in every city. Doubling on bass – and I mean really becoming a top bassist – would help, as would being able to read. Anything to stand out from the pack. In rock music alone? I don’t know. I know lots of guitarists who led killer bands, but once they hit 30, they weren’t left with many options at all, except possibly try to learn a new trade (music engineering, or something unrelated to music). And if a player wants to get good, they really need to invest at least a few years doing nothing but playing music, which makes it difficult to succeed in the traditional college/vocational school (although obviously some people can develop both sets of skills simultaneously – Herbie Hancock, for example, earned a BS in EE just at the cusp of breaking out on Blue Note, but with a considerable repertoire and history as a classical prodigy).

8

Spending (misspending?) youth in search of rock star fame seems to be a rite of passage. Just make damn sure you have some other skills/education to fall back on. I can’t stress that enough. While you chase the dream, you’ll make the bar tab, gas to the next town, some food, groupie comforts etc. While you’re young, this can be a good life.

As you get older, however, the suckiness of poverty begins to occur to you–especially as your non-musician friends start making real livings.

If you stay in the business, the music becomes less fun, and you get bitter about the patent unfairness. I know too many bitter yet highly talented musicians playing bad cover songs in bars night after night, obsessed with “making it” while the likelihood of doing so shrinks toward nil with each passing day

Tell your son to make sure he at least finishes undergrad while pursuing the music. Then when he grows out of it, he can go to grad school and have a career.

Just my two cents worth, from a guy who spent ten years struggling to overcome his “misspent” youth.

9

I agree with most of the above. Great thing to do in your late teens to maybe late twenties, but if you haven’t had some kind of success by then, it gets rough. There are other styles of music with greater longevity for the musician (classical, jazz, some country & bluegrass to name a few) but with rock generally you need to make your mark early or not at all.

A drummer I know who’s ‘making a living in rock music’ is first of all talented but another thing is he was very pragmatic about pursuing a career every step of the way since he was around your son’s age. He went to a top music school in some kind of early bird program while still in our rinky-dink high school, stayed at the school through his college years and did wedding band gigs which led word-of-mouth to bigger and better things. He does session work, tours from time to time and teaches. He’s highly educated with Masters degrees in music and education.

Come to think of it, the guys I know who have what I’d classify as decent rewarding careers in music have all graduated from music schools. I’d only classify the drummer as a straight-up “rock musician”, but again - he has several degrees. Teaching can encompass everything from private lessons to secondary school to being on the faculty of a university.

Of course songwriting is where the money is, so if your son can do that, so much the better. If he can find a band with strong songwriting, that’s good, too, but there’s a certain amount of vulnerability there.

10

From Plan B’s son:

My dad and I just finished reading the posts. Thanks for taking the time to answer our question. I guess no one can really make it big in a band, unless you’re as good as Hendrix or someone like that. I’ve definitely started thinking about looking for another musical profession. Thanks for the suggestions, such as repairing guitars or recording engineer. Thanks for telling me that songwriting is probably what will make the difference between 4 gigs a year and 60. I didn’t figure that music would be a promising career anyways, but if I have talent, a band, original music, and nothing to do on a Saturday, then it would be a good experience to have. Thanks also for the tip about playing music live in my teens. I guess it is best to do that until I have rent to pay. I could probably have worse hobbies in college, and then who knows?

11

$35/hour for lessons sounds pretty good if he gets enough work. At a full time annualized rate of $72,800 it sounds like he could do pretty well teaching.

12

Your son sounds old enough to join us. When will we formally meet Son of Plan B?

13

Oops, I see where you gave his age. IIR the Board rules correctly, he can’t join for a year or so.

14

My teaching experience is semi-professional at best (I taught for several years while studying engineering in college), but I don’t know anyone who was actually able to book 40 hours of lessons a week, every week. Students start and stop, they will cancel unexpectedly, etc.

If you teach for some place (a music store, an educational institution, etc.) you could get help with keeping your schedule full, but said place would expect a piece of your proceeds.

I know of a few guitar players who get more than $35 a lesson, but these are older guys accomplished in fairly arcane genres who’ve been cultivating a reputation for some years. (Such teachers usually start giving workshops to small groups in lieu of one-on-one lessons). I would imagine a young rock player in such demand as a teacher who would have better opportunities as a live performer.

Having spouted all this cold capitalism, I want to say that you won’t go wrong giving music your best shot for a few years – even if it doesn’t become your life’s work, there is nothing in life more fun than playing good music for appreciative audiences.

15

I am friends with more than my fair share of “ex rock musicians”. One group that was fairly large in the 70’s and two that were really huge for a few years in the 90’s.

For the big 70’s group, one of the guys is still making boatloads of cash today as a musician but the other two aren’t making hardly anything. One cleans a church and the other does session work and engineering.

The two bands from the 90’s, one of the main guys is still going strong as a solo artist and all the rest are struggling, living hand-to-mouth for now but getting by on some music work here and there. They’d still list their main profession as “musician”.

My business partner was in a band that could have made it big in the 90’s. they did tour nationally. But the rest of the guys were flakes and they dropped the ball for him, so he gave up and went into business for himself, not doing music.

I worked with several bands in the late 90’s of high school and college aged kids. To me, they sounded brilliant and could have had great careers. One got signed to a tiny label but I think they have all given up by now.

Another friend of mine waited until she had already had an education and a career and owned her own business…then sold the business, learned guitar and took voice lessons, wrote some fantastic songs, did a ton of work, put out an album, played a bunch of shows - and got nowhere, and gave up.

My point is not to scare little Plan B. Because all of these people I know - they may be poor, they may have lost some good friends, they may have lost out on “other” important life experiences - but I can guarantee you that none of them has any regrets about being a musician. They still love it and still play as much as they can. They revel in the experiences they had and think it was all worth the good times and bad times.

Out of these 30 or so people 2 are very rich and famous. About 10 of them are still professional musicians. The rest have day jobs and play once or twice a week, or once or twice a year. I’d say they are all brilliant musicians in their own ways. And I am glad they took a chance on rock stardom because I love their music very much.

16

While this link has some profanity, it pretty much tells you the way things are: http://www.negativland.com/albini.html

17

My brother is an incredibly talented, schooled musician. He’s lucky if he makes $200 a year. The fact that he’s a jazz musician in an area that isn’t jazz-oriented has a lot to do with it. I think he’d do way better here in Chicago, buttthat’s another thread.

On the other hand, I have a studio musician friend that makes a shitload of money doing commercials. You’ve definitely heard him on oodles of national commercials. He once made $8K to whistle for 15 seconds.

Your son needs to study music so more doors in the music field are open to him, even if his preference is the less technically oriented rock sound. He needs to make connections. He needs to be prepared to do work in the music field that isn’t necessarily his cup of tea. Obviously, luck has a lot to do with it. Best of luck to him.

18

Thanks for all the responses. It was fun to read them and discuss them with my son. I think I may have serendipidously stumbled onto a way to avoid all those dumb fights that parents have with their teenagers. The next time one starts I’ll just suggest we start a thread here and pick up the discussion in a day or two with the benefit of some input from people who know something about the topic.

19

Just another post to pile on. I think most posters here have it right on - I have played in bands all my life but always as an avocation - I went to college and business school and did all the typical professional business type of things and kept music as the thing I did for myself.

I, like many other posters, have friends who have made it in music and many, many more friends that tried and ultimately have had to get day jobs. Bottom line - there are elements of talent, physical appearance, right place/time, dogged persistence, etc. - to truly “make it” in music. From the experiences I have seen, it feels almost like winning the lottery, where not only do you get this “once in a lifetime” type of chance, but you then also have to have the talent, drive, etc. to back it up. Can it happen? Sure. Are the odds favorable? Not by a longshot.

Having said that, there is a lot to be said for hope and for trying. If I have one regret in my entire musical career, it was when I was in college and was offered a chance to go with my then-band to play in a nightclub in Tokyo - very much like the Beatles in Hamburg. The Tokyo clubs would find both covers and originals bands in California, ship 'em over cheap, work you to death and you’d be back before the next year in school. I, however, got an internship in my major. Things have worked out great for me, but I can see that I could’ve done the music thing and still done fine with my career. There is nothing wrong - and a whole lot potentially right - with taking a year off and having fun chasing your dream…

20

oh, and Billy Powell - you have a great username and know a lot about keyboards - were you just inducted into the Rn’RHOF in real life?