PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Off-Topic Could You Live From Making Music?

Hi Pat,

Perhaps not in that response, but in other responses in the same thread I think I made it very clear that being a career musician isn't for everyone. No career is for everyone.

And it works both ways. A band mate I played with 35 years ago went into the construction business. He eventually became a contractor building huge homes for the very wealthy and he makes a lot of money, has a big house, lots of expensive toys, and so on. He is burned out on construction and when I visited him a few weeks ago, he told me that he made a wrong turn and he doesn't want to be the guy who dies with the most toys anymore. But it's too late to go back to playing music. He still has his B3 but he has hardly played in in the last 35 years. And he has a huge mortgage, Porsche payments, high property taxes, and lots of other debts on his shoulders.

I know a surgeon who got burned out on the medical profession and is now teaching high school.

My father got burned out being a printer/typsetter and counted the days until retirement from the time he was in his 50s (very sad).

You can get burned out at any profession, not just Music. And the people who get burned out doesn't mean that the next person will do the same.

And a lot of people get into the music business for all the wrong reasons. Things like access to the girls, easy access to booze on the job, late night hours, it seems easy, it's 'glamorous', and so on. If you don't get into the music business because you absolutely love playing music in front of an audience and want to do that for the rest of your life, do something else.

Joseph Campbell's most famous quote is "Follow your bliss." If your bliss is playing music, building houses, climbing telephone poles, performing surgery on humans, driving a truck, being the I.T. rep, doing other people's taxes, farming, managing a retail store, writing websites, fixing motorcycles, selling furniture, landscaping, or whatever, then do it. On the other hand, if you are doing it not because you like it, but because it brings home a paycheck, gets the girls, or some other reason, you probably won't be very good at it and you will probably get burned out on it.

Back on topic. Yes you can live from making music. At least for the people born in my time. I'm not so sure about the youngsters though. I think there are fewer opportunities as the government becomes more merged with corporate power - in other words as our Republic becomes less democratic and more Fascist (per Mussolini the inventor of Fascism)

"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power." -- Benito Mussolini

The era of the small business is dwindling rapidly. Ma and Pa businesses are being replaced by the big box stores - the Mega-Marts (Wal Mart, Guitar Center, Target, Costco, etc.). Live entertainment is being replaced by the corporate sales/propaganda-media masquerading as entertainment-media in your living room - the TV. The USA is gradually turning into a nation of "wage slaves" (that's what the corporate bosses call you) and I was lucky to be born at the end of the era of small businesses. And a band is a small business.

If you are young and are thinking about making a living doing music, do it because you love music, because you love your audience, because you have to play music, and because it's your bliss. If not, find your bliss and make that work for you.

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