What They Don't Tell You in Music School
How are we supposed to make a living?
Looking back upon my experience of getting a music degree, I am often surprised at how little I was told about actually making money as a classically-trained musician.
Now that I can comfortably say that I have “made it” as a musician, I must admit that I make an income in a totally different manner than I anticipated. If there is one piece of advice I can give to folks who recently graduated as well as those considering a music degree, it would be this: Be creative and be prepared to work for yourself.
Getting a Degree in Music
Much of the process of getting a degree in music is centered around becoming the best and most well-rounded musician possible, given your specific skill set. What you actually do with those skills is up to you, and there are many options. You may be briefly exposed to a few of these options, and if you are wise, you’ll turn a few of these opportunities into streams of income before you leave school.
As it turns out, I wasn’t immediately prepared for the reality of working as a professional musician until after I graduated and explored my options. In summary, I have learned that musicians often work for themselves as freelancers. This could be a good or bad thing depending on how you look at it.
Many students are counting on landing a full time position in a school, church, or similar institutional setting. However, these positions aren’t consistently available. You very much need to be in the right place at the right time (with the right experience).
Until then, what should you be doing? Working at Chilis? This is what I did until I figured out that teaching piano was far more lucrative for the time. Someone should have told me early on that I could make a good living as a piano teacher! I would have certainly leaned in from the start.
Musical Income = Part Time Income Streams
There are countless ways to make money as a trained musician. However, most musicians will typically have to diversify by combing several income streams together to form a single full-time income. Outside of teaching, it can be very difficult to make enough as a musician by focusing on any one thing.
In my case, I started out by teaching piano lessons and accompanying church services (and I still do to this day). Considering my personality and interests, I very much enjoy the way that I make my living. I generally set my own hours and my income is split across several sources. I can scale up or down as needed. I can make a full-time income with part-time hours. Overall, I’d say it’s been an interesting and rewarding experience.
One thing I particularly appreciate with this way of doing things is the variety in my workweek. My church position (as an organist) reduces the number of piano lessons that I need to teach. At the same time, my lessons limit the amount of services that I need to accompany. Not only does this offer me variety, but it also offers financial security as well.
I will definitely talk a fair bit about my experience playing for churches later on, because that is a big part of what stabilizes my income from month to month. However, it is worth mentioning at this point that the church position comes with the ability to play for funerals and weddings, which provides additional income opportunities.
None of this was explained to me while I was in school, even though many of my professors had this same arrangement worked out for themselves. Unfortunately, it just didn’t come up in any notable way throughout my educational experience.
Leaning in on Teaching
If I had to pick one thing (considering income potential), I would pick teaching. In my experience, teaching income is most scalable form of income that I have access to, and I have the most control over my work-life balance compared to other options.
Also, I particularly love that sharing the gift of a musical education can be such a lucrative endeavor. As it turns out, our current society needs music teachers far more than concert pianists. You have to be insanely skilled to be a concert pianist, and even if you are, you’ll have a difficult time bringing enough income by performing only.
In contrast, you don’t need to be nearly as skilled as a player to teach. You do need to have good musical skills for sure, but your ability to explain and break things down for students is more of the focus. Most folks looking for piano lessons are either new or have limited experience, and so this places even more value on your ability to teach rather than perform. This means that becoming a teacher is far more accessible, realistic, and reliable for most musicians.
Also, each student represents an individual stream of income. The consistency of this income depends on your policies and the way that you structure your pricing. With the right mindset and studio standards, you can do quite well as a teacher!
For example, if you charge $60 dollars per hour and teach 40 weeks out of the year, you can make 24k annually for every 10 students that you maintain in your studio. You can increase this by charging more and teaching more often. You can also pick some other part-time income stream to supplement this.
Reading Music Well is Incredibly Valuable
One last thing that I would like for you to consider is the value of being skilled at reading and preparing music. In my experience, especially as a church and “gigging” musician, being able to prepare music quickly (which relies on your sight-reading ability) really pays.
You would be surprised at how far I managed to make it in music school without being a particularly skilled reader. While I was able to get by, I certainly didn’t go out of my way to take on any opportunities that required good reading skills. In fact, I remember avoiding eye contact whenever one of my music professors needed a pianist to play an example for something in class. This ended up working to my disadvantage.
Luckily, I landed my first church position after graduating (and these folks really needed someone fast). This resulted in my rapid acquisition of sight-reading skills, and the rest is history!
This is a taste of the sorts of things that are floating around in my head. Subscribe if you are interested!