07/10/2020
WHY BEING A MUSICIAN IS A ‘REAL’ JOB…
Our story! Our Statement!
Please read.
You do not awake one morning and decide you are a musician, and you can sing or play an instrument. That comes with YEARS of hard work and practice.
Many musicians will tell you they have spent hours of rigorous practice learning and homing their talent and to be honest, the practice NEVER ends!
Some seek formal training at college or university for years and costing them thousands to home their skills.
It is not something Alyson or I did, but we have put in the practice hours.
Besides the hours of practice, there is the gigs – our live entertainment spots. Some maybe for an hour, some for a few hours, some requiring time away from home, away from loved ones and home comforts.
If we are doing a fully self-contained spot, set-up alone for Alyson & I can takes us 45 minutes. That is without considering travel time, moving the gear, getting changed into our stage wear, chatting with people and that is before we have even done any entertainment.
The hours can be unsocial, there has been many a time where we have not crawled into our bed until 3 / 4am after a gig and we are just starting to settle and fall asleep as most of the UK is just starting to rise!
The other side of our work besides the practice and the performances is all the work that goes into emails, letters, invoices, telephone calls. Accounts to pay our taxes. Maintaining our website, social media, our instruments, and equipment.
Instruments and equipment cost thousands and like your house or car, they need maintaining and looking after to keep in top condition until the time come when you need to replace them. Without your tools, you cannot trade!
So, as you can see from above, being a musician takes up time, can be a full-time job, therefore it needs to pay to put food on our table. During such current times, like all musicians, it is tough! So why do we do it, Simple, we love it! We personally feel you cannot work in this industry just as a job, it needs to be something you are passionate about, it is a lifestyle, a way of life.
Whilst Alyson & I have not entertained publicly since February, we have turned down public performances to keep us and our loved ones safe as well as the well-being of what would have been our audiences. We respect how dangerous Covid can be and we intend to continue putting ours and other people’s safety 1st before our live public entertainment.
We have replaced what was going to be tonight’s post with this instead, in-light of Rashi Sanuk statement to musicians. We wanted to give people an insight into our lives as musicians. Express why this is a ‘real’ job, why it can be a ‘full-time’ job, the importance of how it can affect our lives financially. To re-train in another career is not that easy in any case, let alone in current times.
The music industry and that around it has been the worst hit with the least support. Whilst we have been left to fend for ourselves, and now been delivered the words of wisdom about re-training, it has been forgotten that the UK music industry alone generates over 5 BILLION to the UK economy.
This is just an insight on our story, there are millions of musicians out there with their own stories but in the same situation as us right now. Let alone all the other people we have the pleasure of working alongside with that have trained for their jobs, venue staff, sound, and light engineers, etc. The list goes on!
Besides the joy music brings it has been medically proven that music brings with it many health benefits such as: improves mood, reduces stress, lessons anxiety, improves memory, eases pain, provides comfort, improves cognition, improves sleep quality, enhances blood vessel function, to list a few, but important reasons why music should continue.
If you work in this industry or know someone who does, or just get our story, please feel free to share. We are just merely 2 musicians out of millions!
There can be NO MUSIC, without musicians!
Can you imagine your life with no music in it?
We cannot nor do we want to, and we have no intention of re-training to change our career paths, we only intend to learn, train, and grow as musicians, as you never stop learning.
Throughout history there has always been something to come along and changed the world from what we know it as. We fall, we learn to re-stand, we learn to adjust, adapt, and live in new times maybe that is what lies ahead for the music world, who knows? Maybe we need to work round it, drive through concerts etc.
Until we know what direction we are going in, in the meantime we hope and look forward to the day when we can entertain in public again be it just Alyson & I or we are blessed to share stages again, and stand shoulder to shoulder with fellow musicians and deliver once again the passion of music that lives in us all as the human race.
