Out of work gigging musicians - what are you doing now?

  • Here in Brazil every pub or venue are closed.

    I lost 14 gigs on Match, 18 on April, 2 weddings on June and another on July.

    Now, learning some Digital Marketing strategies and focusing on studio Job and live streaming. Life goes on...

  • No gigs for me, but I’ve thought about just busking around my local town to get my kicks. Started travelling again with work (technical rather than musical) to some theatres and concert halls in Vienna and they intend to open at 50% capacity next month.
    Back in the UK, there are rumours that the live hire places I deal with are dusting off their consoles and wheeling them out in anticipation of things starting to pick up a little bit. I really hope so, but it’s difficult to imagine still.

    Ed / Audio Systems Engineer / Kemper Stage + Fender fan

  • I am happy to see some people here at least try to stay positive..but me personally..I can't..


    Having friends all around europe and north america the big picture I see is rather a huge catastrophe for everything connected to music and arts in general.Adding to all this the general economic tsunami coming until winter..I dont know..


    Things are not easy.Lets just hope for the best.

  • While the industry has always found ways to take advantage of musicians, from bars expecting you to play for almost nothing to some of the ridiculous record contract clauses I've read, in the past few decades music has become devalued like never before. It's become socially acceptable to say that copyrights are bad, and recorded music should be free (and thus it's okay to just steal it). Streaming services pay rates so low you need a magnifying glass to find the decimal point. It seems the prevailing attitude is that art is no longer something worth paying for. And how dare we claim ownership or charge money for it?


    And yet...


    One of the best ways to demonstrate value for something is to simply make it disappear for a while. Although it certainly wasn't our idea, the general population is starting to learn what life is like without live music . I suspect it will be much more appreciated when it returns.


    I don't know when this will end, but it will. Probably with a sputtering start and stop motion, but end it will. And when it does, people will fill venues in throngs, with crowds larger than before all this happened, because they've been taught an object lesson in how important it is to connect with fellow humans to enjoy their art.

    Kemper remote -> Powered toaster -> Yamaha DXR-10

  • Chris Duncan


    I hear you. I think things should be mostly back to normal by mid 2021. I think that things will begin returning to normal soon after the new year .... but this year is likely a bust IMO. Any area that really opens up, inevitably seems to get closed back down when cases and deaths spike. I live in North Carolina. Colleges opened, and closed 2 weeks later going to all on-line classes after many outbreaks sprang up.


    I think that there will be a vaccine around the end of the year, but these things take time to make, distribute, and consume.

  • We are currently just rehearsing with the band (had around 15 shows planned in the beginning of 2020, all cancelled) and writing new songs in my home studio. We all have a job next to making music, so we are waiting out covid and hope for a better 2021.

  • First gig in 6 months next week to a sold out 70 people in an outside gig in the UK.


    It’s been a tough year for sure and I’ve really missed playing with others!


    Can’t even remember half the songs :)