The entire level of this submit is to point out you that, sure, you may make a residing as a musician. It takes nice music, a variety of laborious and sensible work, and a stable music group. However you are able to do it. This submit additionally exhibits you the precise methods six indie musicians are making a living at the moment (and how one can too).
Vo Williams – sync licensing
Vo Williams’ first sync placement was in a Massive Sport trailer round 2014. Since then, he’s landed over 1,000 placements.
And he mentioned a trailer placement pays the artist $20,000 on the publishing aspect and $20,000 on the grasp aspect ‒ and that’s on the low finish!
He obtained began on this area of interest working with a music library (which is totally different from a sync licensing firm). And now he works instantly with music supervisors and others within the movie business.
Lucidious – streaming royalties + touring
Lucidious has garnered 200 million streams on Spotify. And as of this writing, he has over 300,000 month-to-month listeners on Spotify.
He makes round $20,000 a month from streaming alone. How is that this attainable? Regardless that DSPs pay fractions of a penny per stream, most of his followers take heed to a number of of his songs each month.
However streaming isn’t the one method he makes cash ‒ he additionally excursions and sells merch. However his profession is thanks largely to his success on Spotify.
Discover ways to promote your subsequent music (and your outdated ones too).
Carey Rayburn – particular occasions
There are about 1,400 Performing Arts Facilities (PACs) positioned in most main cities in america. And each books about 50 performances every year.
Trumpeter Carey Rayburn is without doubt one of the premier acts within the PAC market. He and his band, Good Co, have earned main company illustration, they usually’ve appeared at a lot of the main Particular Occasion conferences, enjoying over 500 exhibits within the Particular Occasions market.
They usually make over $200,000 a yr performing within the PAC market, based on Ari’s Take.
Regardless that Rayburn skilled underneath some famend trumpeters and obtained a level in Orchestral Trumpet Efficiency, that doesn’t imply that you must go that route too.
A PAC pays between $1,000 to $15,000 (or extra) for unknown performers. After which they’ll pay tens of hundreds for the identified, extra skilled performers.
The varieties of performers that do nicely in Particular Occasions embrace cowl bands, tribute acts, world music, reggae, R&B, lounge singers, soul, blues, funk, a cappella, comedy, and area of interest acts.
Discover ways to ebook high-paying personal occasions.
Dave Ruch – instructional performances
Dave Ruch is a full-time musician, primarily performing for households and at faculties. He began out enjoying 4-hour performances in golf equipment however ended up getting tendinitis.
That introduced him to the world of instructional efficiency.
He says you may make “$1,000-2,500 a day doing instructional performances in faculties, museums, libraries, and humanities facilities.”
He instructed me by way of e mail he prices $500 for a ~45-minute instructional efficiency domestically, and he’ll cost extra if he has to journey. And he’ll generally do 2-3 of those exhibits a day.
He’s additionally been providing on-line instructional performances, charging $149 per college.
So should you’re an entertaining performer, good with youngsters, and love to coach individuals, this area of interest may very well be excellent for you.
Pleasure Ike – reside efficiency + reside streaming + sync licensing
Pleasure Ike is a singer/songwriter/artist who left her publicist profession in 2008 to develop into a full-time musician. She confirmed by e mail she has been a full-timer ever since.
Her largest income is performing (in-person and reside streaming), which incorporates merchandise offered at her exhibits.
Her second largest earnings stream is licensing music by way of Musicbed.
Right here’s her earnings breakdown in percentages for 2021:
- 51% – reside efficiency + reside streaming (contains merch offered at exhibits)
- 26% – licensing music by way of Musicbed
- 12% – streaming and downloads
- 7% – on-line merch gross sales (on her web site and Bandcamp)
- 4% – musician teaching and workshops
Clare Means – reside streaming + road performing
Clare Means makes her residing from reside streaming and busking (road performing).
She began out enjoying on the streets of Los Angeles 5 days every week. She started reside streaming her road performances along with her smartphone, quickly streaming from her dwelling. And over the previous 5 years, she’s spent a mean of 20 hours every week reside streaming.
And he or she’s distinctive in that she primarily performs authentic songs. In actual fact, she’s had a lot success that Ari’s Take partnered along with her to make a step-by-step information on the right way to livestream on Fb, Twitch, YouTube, and Instagram. And among the college students are making a number of hundred {dollars} every week simply from reside streaming.
Clare has additionally arrange tip jars on PayPal and Venmo, and he or she has a small group of supporters on Patreon.
Principally, music is her full-time gig. And he or she’s now thought of one of many high consultants within the area of interest of busking and reside streaming.
How To Make a Residing in Music
As you’ll be able to see from this checklist, most of those musicians have a number of streams of income, often 2-3. That is sensible as a result of if one stream dries up, you might have others to depend on.
Nonetheless, just a few of those artists simply obtained actually nice at one factor. They’ve gotten so profitable at that one factor, they most definitely have sufficient reserves to fall again on if issues go south for them.
The purpose is, you may make a residing as a musician in many alternative methods. These indie artists are proof of that.