#37. Let's Talk: Work Load
How much did we work?
Musicians don’t get paid for the time they spend on stage - it’s for everything else. Here’s what I mean…
In the late 70s, early 80s, a typical beverage room entertainment contract called for SEVEN shows per week: 9PM to 1AM, Monday through Saturday - with a matinee* on Saturday, from 3PM to 6PM. And this was before any smoking bans. If you were in the room…you were also a smoker.
(*Matinees were often a slog. It was every local singer’s opportunity to get up on stage with a band - regardless of talent. While I’ll be the last person to criticize this practise, some who got up on stage…really shouldn’t have.)
The rule was: 40 on / 20 off (40 minutes on stage, with a 20 minute break per hour).
That’s approximately 18 hours on stage - per week.
Using our previous numbers, if I was making a weekly wage of $125, that works out to be less than $7 per hour.
That only covers the time we were on stage. It does not account for:
Rehearsal time: Easily one hour per day - 7 hours per week.
Travel time: Anywhere from 2 to 20 hours in the van per week.
Set up time: Easily two hours per week.
Tear down time: One hour per week.
Gear maintenance and repairs: One to two hours per week.
With these sums averaged and factored in, my pay drops to: $3.13 per hour.
We would spend at least five hours per day in a bar.
How do you kill this time? There’s billiards at a quarter a game. If you were good, there was money to be made…and lost. There’s the juke box - where we’d find new music to play. (I liked to play B sides of the hits. Found some gems that way.) And then there are the drinks…
Usually, fountain drinks were free and you could help yourself. Everything else however, cost money. If you drank alcohol, or engaged in other vices, you can see how your money wouldn’t go very far.
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