The Day The Music Died

Thursday, March 19th, 2020

It's been coming for several days. For many friends and colleagues it has already arrived. For me though, it was this morning, when a few annoying, inconvenient cancellations and postponments became a deluge. My income for the next two to three months vanished completely in the time it took to take a couple of phone calls and open a few emails.

This has decimated our industry in just a few short days. Musicians with no other source of income are struggling to find ways to survive, and in the face of a mounting crisis it is heartening to see our community looking after its own. Offers of assistance, constructive and often creative ideas to generate alternative income streams are welcome, helpful and just as importantly can help dial down the despair that is confronting many.

We are a bit of a race apart at the best of times, and as big a problem as financial hardship is for so many there's the question of social isolation too. Ours is the most sociable of professions; the idea of likeminded souls coming together to make music and get paid handsomely for doing so seems almost too good to be true.

That's because it is.

There's a common misconception among the wider public that ours is a well remunerated profession. For perhaps the top one percent (if that) it is. For the rest of us we do what we can to scrape by, surviving on incomes at which most people would turn up their noses. Don't get me wrong though, we don't require sympathy, it's merely the price you pay for pursuing something you love at a professional level.

Normally that's fine but this is different. Due to circumstances beyond our control we are now unable to go to work. Many are struggling to make ends meet, have no safety net whatsoever, and are facing the glacial process of getting themselves assimilated into the benefits system, yet not wishing to and only because they see no alternative. For the foreseeable future our livelihoods are on hold. Some may never reestablish a foothold at this most precarious of coalfaces. Careers will be cancelled.

Our astonishingly wealthy trade union is conspicuously absent too. Having pontificated (either rightly or wrongly but mostly inconclusively) about the consequences of leaving the EU for our profession, it does seem that when real difficulty comes knocking they are hiding behind the sofa.

Personally I am moderately well insulated. I'm still seeing a few brave souls for one-to-one lessons, doing some online tuition, as well as selling a few instructional videos and books. Somewhere I have a few quid stuffed in an old sock so all in all I am cautiously optimistic that I can get through the next quarter unscathed if a little depleted. The thought of not playing with others for the foreseeable (following a great day yesterday recording at Abbey Rd) is a bit like having a kidney forcibly removed. (I wonder what the current market value for a kidney is.....just a thought).

Typical gallows humour notwithstanding I'm one of the relatively lucky ones though. Not everyone is quite so fortunate. So if you take pleasure from the performing arts don't forget us when the curtain comes down and the venues go dark.

Support the performing arts as best you can in the good times so that when things do go wrong we are in with a chance of supporting ourselves.

Read This blog post to learn how you as an individual can bring about change to how performing arts are supported and sustained.
For details of live performances (as and when they return) books, DVDs, CDs and any other professional enquiries please visit my website or contact via email