Jay Leno reportedly nails down $25 to $35 million annually from the Tonight Show, so how much might a guitarist (and band leader) like Kevin Eubanks earn?
Obviously, Eubanks has sweet gig–playing here and there for an hour each evening. But I can’t decide if his salary is likely closer to, say, $250,000 a year or perhaps $2 million+. After all, the exposure alone must be worth millions in record sales.
Ditto with Paul Shaeffer of the Letterman Show.
BONUS QUESTION: What is Eubanks’ reputation as a guitarist anyway?
He thought he was there to be a serious player of jazz in an orchestra, rather than a comic sidekick. The chemistry between him and Leno was below nil, into negative.
When Leno completely revamped the show after firing his manager, Marsalis was one of the first things to go. Surely by mutual consent and relief.
I agree, but will go a bit further and say Bradford, like brother Wynton, doesn’t suffer fools gladly. Eubanks easily rolls with Leno’s jabs, some of which occasionally veer from light barbs into borderline demeaning treatment. Doesn’t matter. Eubanks chuckles, laughs or, at best, eeks out an “Okay, Jay” response that speaks volumes–at least to me. I saw one of these admittedly rare moments a couple nights ago. Eubanks was not happy with Leno’s shot and seemed to be biting his lip. And that’s what bothers me. Kevin is clearly on a short leash as to how he can respond, raising some interesting historical parallels.
By contrast, Bradford wouldn’t play the game. Toward the end of his tenure, Leno would jab at him and Bradford would give Leno an “up yours” look that spoke volumes. No doubt Bradford is a world-class musician–some say better than Wynton–but he was terribly miscast for that gig.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard of Eubanks’ name outside of the Tonight Show context (not to say he doesn’t do anything else, just nothing I’ve heard of).
But you of all people should remember how Johnny treated Ed McMahon, and how many times Ed had to bite his lip. (It’s in one of his bios how he got chewed out for coming up with a punchline faster than Johnny, who was planning on springing it as the next joke. After that he was doubly careful never to say anything too funny.) The sidekick is there for the host to score points on. They’re allowed an occasional comeback, but they’re not supposed to - ever - upstage the guy whose name is in the title. This is one reason why the fashion for having the sidekick on the couch has faded away. The humor today is nastier and it doesn’t look fair for one side not to have an even chance of scoring.
The fact that Eubanks is black complicates this a bit. OTOH, we’re supposed to be past that. In reality, we aren’t.
Fortunately, I think it comes across that Leno and Eubanks really do seem to be friends. That was never true for Marsalis. Eubanks has lasted 10 years (I think) as a foil. He’s better at it than Max Weinberg, and probably gets to do more than Paul Shaffer, who gets sat on all the time by Letterman.
I have seen him interviewed and he takes all of his $$$ from his stand-up. He says he is a comedian first, last and always, and never wants to be a "talk show host " or “television personality” so he’s never touched the TS money.
He does hundreds of dates a year, usually college campuses & stuff. And IIRC, he’s at the Comedy Store in LA to do a set every Sunday night.
My guess is, he pulls down something in the mid six figures. Does that sound paltry? Think about it: There are fewer than ten other people in the country who could do Leno’s job as well as he does (Top-tier stand-up comic who can make lively and engaging chitchat with celebs; Robin Williams could do one of those things, Oprah Winfrey could do the other. It’s a rare creature who could do both).
Eubanks, by contrast, has probably a thousand peers in the Los Angeles area alone. Lots of people are guitar prodigies, quite a few could lead a jazz-pop ensemble and musically produce a daily talk show, and gobs and gobs could look fairly handsome and be on the receiving end of Leno’s gags professionally.
If Eubanks makes roughly one-fiftieth of what Leno makes, just remember (a) how few gigs there are for that particular blend of talents and (b) how much more easily he could be replaced.
It’s my impression that Kevin dishes it out to Jay considerably more than the other way around. Very often it boils down to simply voicing doubt or skepticism: “Oh, is that how it is, Jay?”.
A lot of Kevin’s digs fall into the following categories: Jay really flubbed that line; Jay’s too white to know what he’s talking about (or to use that bit of hip-hop slang); Jay’s too upscale for his populist BS to ring true (i.e., Jay doesn’t really do his own shopping, let alone at Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Target, etc.); Jay’s too old, married, or staid to do risque material, etc.
Jay’s ribbing is pretty neatly the reverse: that Kevin’s too young and footloose, too single, too alone, too hip, and too stoned and irresponsible for his judgments and criticisms to have much weight.
I wonder if any court-jester routines from the Middle Ages ran along the same lines?
Oh, I think a musical director has to do a lot more than sit for an hour each day. I don’t watch the tonight show, so I’ll use Paul Shaffer as an example. Here’s what Shaffer does:
Select the music for the guest intros and commercial breaks.
Rehearse the intro and bumper music with the band.
Rehearse numbers that the band plays with guest musicians.
Score the music for the band. What’s the trombone part for ‘Smells like teen spirit’? Paul has to figure out what to do with everybody and rewrite music of all genres so that it fits in his ensemble.
Comedy bits. ‘Stump the band’, skits, etc.
Record and produce Late Night CDs
Live appearances, promo work, etc.
I also wouldn’t be surprised if he has a hand in picking musical guests and in musical production work for the show.
Then there’s the one hour of sitting, which is probably more like two or three hours considering setup, warmup, tuning, being in place during the audience warmup and for some time after the show ends.
It may not be the hardest job in the world, but it’s a far cry from ‘just sitting an hour a day’. I’m guessing he works as hard at his job as most full-time employees do, albeit with more time off and more pay. He probably works harder than the average professional musician.
And I bet the musicians don’t have it easy either. I remember one director I had, chastising the group because some of the brass wasn’t ready to play. It was something along the lines of “They’ve got to be ready all the time when Paul Schaeffer (that was the example) indicates whatever, hit it, and be on time and in tune. Sit around on your ass and not be ready and you’ll get fired.” How true this is, I don’t actually know, but it’s got that ring of truth to it. I know I probably couldn’t do it.
There is much to be said for chemistry above and beyond musical/arranging/bandleading talent. Paul and Dave have it. If you don’t think so, go back and watch Dave hosting the Oscars (which sucked, likely–maybe primarily–because Paul was not leading the orchestra and bantering with Dave). Kevin and Jay not so much, but they do OK. If you think Kevin could be replaced by any old jazz-band-leader-guy, you’re fooling yourself.
Back to the OP. Why do we know what Jay is making and have no clue about Kevin?
"Leno said it didn’t bother him to make less money than Letterman. Leno’s salary is a reported $17 million a year; Letterman’s is $31.5 million.
“I take a certain perverse pleasure in doing more shows per year, for probably half of the money Dave makes, and the show is more profitable, and I get along with the people I work with, and I’m very happy,” he said.
CBS disputes the contention that “Tonight” is more profitable than Letterman’s show."
http://www.allstarz.org/davidletterman/newsleno2.htm
P.S. Leno recently reupted to a 4-year $100 million contract–still much lower than Letterman. According to reports, Leno agreed to the deal within “5 minutes.”
Most of the above is true, except for the part about having a hand in picking guests. Musicians on such shows generally have little to no input at all into the situation; it’s made by management, often for reasons that have nothing to do with music at all.
I doubt he does much arranging, either; them players are good, they’re running it down in realtime, they all got ears like elephants, which is not unusual for NY pros.
I have it on good authority Shaffer can’t even pick who ultimately plays in the band; there’s some CBS suit who has the final say on all of that. They pick not only for musical ability but good looks. Some of his earlier choices didn’t get the gig because they weren’t pretty enough.
Paul Shaffer is an incredibly talented pianist . . . who mostly does not get an opportunity to show how great he is . . . but he gets paid very nicely to play this game, so whatthehell.
As for Kevin Eubanks, he’s the real deal, he’s a very talented guitarist. Sure, it’s occasionally demeaning and soul killing to bear up under what he does – I can’t stand to watch Leno because of this, among other things – but Mr. Eubanks is being paid handsomely to put up with it. Oh, and he wrote the theme you hear at the end of the program every night . . . he gets paid for that too. I believe they call that attitude “laughing all the way to the bank.”
You pocket the money when it comes and save your feelings for the material that really matters to you. It’s like everything else in life, sometimes you have to do things you don’t really care for to haul the freight for meaningful things. This is no exception, just more public and more numbers on the paycheck.
I wouldn’t mind being demeaned just a little too if it allowed me to play what I needed elsewhere, financed other projects. This is not an uncommon thing in the music business and everywhere else.
