Wish to receives a commission in your musical skills?
As a musician, there are extra methods to earn cash than ever earlier than. Dozens upon dozens of the way, actually!
When you ought to, after all, prioritize sure income streams as an artist who creates authentic music, there are occasions — maybe whenever you’re first rising your profession —whenever you simply gotta pay the payments.
And in that case, placing your music abilities to make use of positive beats a job outdoors of music, proper? Particularly if your musical side-hustle helps you keep sharp as an instrumentalist, arranger, producer, educator, or content-creator.
That can assist you get a way of the big selection of choices on the market, I’ve put collectively an inventory of 75 methods you can also make cash out of your music, grouped by class for straightforward scanning.
Streaming & Digital Gross sales
1. Streaming Income: Earn cash from streaming exercise whenever you get your tracks onto platforms like Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Deezer, or TIDAL.
2. Digital Downloads: Promote MP3s, WAVs, or FLACs of your tracks on platforms like iTunes, Amazon, ReverbNation, Bandcamp, or your individual web site.
3. Social Video Monetization: Receives a commission when folks create social content material utilizing your music in movies on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Fb, and extra.
4. Monetize Your YouTube Channel: Generate promoting income from viewer exercise by yourself YouTube movies, and use extra creator instruments to monetize subscriber engagement.
Music Recording Work
5. Music Manufacturing: Put your producing abilities to work for different artists. Receives a commission in factors, upfront charges, co-writer splits, or no matter different association is sensible for you and your collaborator.
6. Engineering: Are you good at recording, mixing, or mastering? Let different artists know! This could be a nice income between your individual recording initiatives or excursions.
7. Session Participant: Obtained skills as an instrumentalist or vocalist? Are you fast at studying and arranging tunes? Recording periods might be an effective way to receives a commission whereas not tying up an excessive amount of of your time without delay. You may attend periods in particular person, or do distant session work from your individual dwelling studio.
8. Studio Operator: Do you personal lots of recording gear that goes unused whenever you’re not making music? Possibly it’s time to think about renting out your studio to different engineers, producers, and artists.
9. Cellular Recording: Whether or not it’s vacation spot recording (“My band rented an airbnb and we need to flip it right into a studio”) or capturing reside audio for different bands at their reveals, typically having a conveyable studio could make all of the distinction in getting the job.
Music Publishing & Licensing
10. Mechanical Royalties: Gather this type of publishing royalty when your authentic songs — together with covers by different artists — get streamed, downloaded, or pressed on CD/vinyl.
11. Efficiency Royalties: Earn this music publishing cash when your authentic music is carried out reside in venues or publicly broadcast on radio and TV.
12. Sync Licensing (Songwriter Facet): In the event you write your individual songs and retain the publishing rights, you will get paid an upfront charge — and in some circumstances, ongoing royalties — when your music is positioned in movie, TV, video games, commercials, and so forth.
13. Sync Licensing (Label Facet): Similar goes for the “recording” aspect of the equation. In the event you personal your individual tracks, you’re the label, and may receives a commission for sync placements.
14. Compose for Music Libraries: Prolific composer or producer? You can write music for music collections which might be particularly curated for sync licensing alternatives.
15. Promote Sheet Music: The unique supply of “music publishing” income! Relying in your style, this could be a large vendor. (New Age Piano, anybody?) However don’t simply consider notation; you may additionally do chord-charts, tablature, lyric sheets, and extra.
Dwell Music Performances
16. Touring and Dwell Exhibits: Play reside and receives a commission. This income might come within the type of ticket gross sales, door splits, bar percentages, or a assured charge from the venue proprietor.
17. Residency Gig: Similar type of fee choices as above, however a residency is a often scheduled factor. It could possibly be “7 nights in a row in July” or “Each different Thursday all yr.”
18. Home Concert events: Play intimate concert events in personal houses. These might be nice fan-building experiences and provide help to promote lots of merch, whereas decreasing stress for large turnout. Plus it can save you on journey bills if the host places you up for the evening.
19. DJing: In the event you’re not touring, you’ll be able to DJ occasions, events, or venues in your hometown. On the highway? Do a DJ set at a competition or venue between your tour dates.
20. Company Gigs: Wish to receives a commission large bucks whereas getting into The Twilight Zone? Play at a company perform. It’s surreal. And profitable.
21. Weddings and Non-public Occasions: Carry out at weddings, bar mitzvahs, anniversaries, household Christmas events, birthdays, and different kinds of personal occasions. These can usually pay higher than an ordinary venue gig.
22. Metropolis or Municipal Occasions: The annual Christmas tree-lighting ceremony, the summer season beer backyard within the park, the Arts Stroll. Test together with your native chamber of commerce or metropolis council for alternatives.
23. Festivals: It’s nice to play music festivals, after all, but additionally analysis non-music gatherings which have reside music as a part. Beer festivals. Balloon festivals. Meals festivals.
24. Busking: Play in a public area with plenty of foot visitors for suggestions. Subway stations. City squares. Boardwalks and piers. Simply verify the native ordinances first. Get a allow, if required.
25. Be within the Home Band: Just like a residency, the place you keep put and totally different audiences come to you, hunt down efficiency alternatives the place you back-up different singers. Might be live-band karaoke, an enormous band or jazz group, and so forth.
26. Play Cruise Ships: In the event you don’t thoughts small rooms and plenty of months at sea, cruise ship gigs provide you with an opportunity to play rather a lot (typically a number of gigs per day), and supply downtime to deal with observe, recording, studying, and so forth.
27. Nursing Houses: Whereas these aren’t glamorous gigs, they are often very significant for the viewers and also you because the performer. They’ll pay properly, are normally shorter units, and have the potential to grow to be reliable repeat gigs.
28. Digital Performances: Wish to mix the unique and intimate feeling of a home live performance with the comfort of livestreaming? Play a non-public, digital efficiency on Zoom, Google Hangouts, and so forth.
Music Merch Gross sales
29. Artist Merchandize: Promote merch at gigs, in your web site, and on platforms like Instagram and Spotify. Gadgets might vary from t-shirts to mugs to books.
30. Bodily Music Codecs: Regardless of what you will have heard, followers nonetheless buy CDs, vinyl data, and even cassettes. Provide them in all the identical locations you’d your merch, in addition to in file shops by way of bodily distribution or consignment.
31. Restricted-Version Releases: Provide limited-edition or signed bodily copies of your music to followers. For example, you may promote tour-specific recordings that can by no means once more be obtainable to buy.
32. Digital merch: Not all merchandise should be bodily. You may provide PDFs of your tour diary or poetry. A digital cookbook. An unlock of a secret video.
33. Digital “Field Set”: Similar goes for music recordsdata. You could have a trove of unreleased recordings. Give followers paid entry! Or bundle every little thing you’ve ever recorded right into a digital bundle with bonus tracks.
34. NFTs: “Non-Fungible Tokens.” These are crypto belongings on a blockchain that signify possession or engagement in some piece of music, imagery, group, art work, or monetary association.
Music Schooling
35. Educate Music: Whether or not it’s personal classes or a teleconference tutorial, you’ll be able to assist different folks get higher at an instrument, music manufacturing, or songwriting.
36. Music Remedy: Put your abilities to make use of in a therapeutic approach that helps folks enhance their well-being.
37. On-line Programs: Create and promote a digital course. It could possibly be about your instrument, or your music-biz and promo abilities. Plenty of upfront work, however with the potential for it to grow to be extra “passive” earnings as soon as your advertising and marketing funnel is up and working.
38. Music Workshops: Host IRL or on-line group gatherings the place studying and suggestions occurs in a bunch setting.
39. Visitor Lectures: Converse at faculties, faculties, or music seminars. These are sometimes paid alternatives, however even should you’re an unpaid speaker at a music convention, you need to have the possibility to make a fast gross sales pitch on the finish of your discuss or promote books afterwards.
40. Music Transcription: Are you good at determining advanced harmonies, blistering bluegrass breaks, or well-known saxophone solos? You can earn cash transcribing that music note-for-note. It may be work-for-hire earnings, or you may publish these transcriptions in a e book. Or on YouTube (with the potential of incomes advert income).
Crowdfunding & Fan Assist
41. Mission-Based mostly Crowdfunding: Use platforms like Kickstarter or GoFundMe to boost cash from followers to help a particular recording, tour, advertising and marketing, or video mission.
42. Membership Golf equipment: You need to use a subscription-model platform like Patreon, or construct your individual on-line fan subscription by way of your web site. In alternate for month-to-month fee, followers get unique or early entry to content material and different perks.
43. Fan Donations: Settle for donations instantly from followers by way of platforms like PayPal or Venmo. These hyperlinks might be listed in your web site, livestreams, and even pinned to the highest of your Spotify profile.
44. Livestream Assist: That is income followers provide you with for livestreaming. However in contrast to the Venmo or PayPal suggestions talked about above, it could actually come within the type of a platform-specific foreign money or motion: Stars, Bits, Subs, and so forth.
45. VIP Experiences: Provide your diehard followers the possibility to pay for an unique expertise. Backstage passes, meet-and-greets, watch the soundchecks, dinner earlier than the present, images and autographs.
Music Composition
46. Songwriting for Different Artists: In the event you’re a prolific author, you will have concepts to spare! Pitch your unreleased songs to different artists, publishers, or labels. Or collaborate with co-writers to make new songs. Repeatable success on this space takes lots of dedication, however might result in a publishing deal.
47. Write Jingles: Ya know, the catchy (and typically annoying) music that performs throughout commercials? There’s cash to be made the place artwork meets promoting.
48. Movie Scoring: Compose music for movies, TV reveals, and documentaries. Like many areas of specialization, this discipline can require lots of time and dedication. Contemplate accordingly how usually and whenever you need to settle for scoring work.
49. Video Recreation Music: In idea, this isn’t that totally different from movie scoring. Besides that gaming has its personal musical tropes, so the reference factors could differ from cinematic orchestration and sound design. Many video video games additionally function songs that grow to be a part of the sport’s soundtrack, which refers again to sync licensing. Lastly, there’s a complete huge ecosystem of VGM covers on YouTube, the place artists do their very own artistic preparations of well-liked online game music. So should you play a singular instrument, this may provide you with a solution to differentiate your self: Halo on accordion, Remaining Fantasy on metallic guitar, Zelda on harmonica, Mario Bros on banjo.
50. Promote Beats and Pattern Packs: Are you a prolific producer in a style that depends closely on digital music, akin to hip-hop, pop, or EDM? You may assist different artists get an enormous musical help by promoting your beats, production-starts, and pattern packs.
51. Write Customized Songs: Let your followers know you’ll compose and file personalised songs for particular events like weddings or birthdays. Simply remember to cost sufficient in your precise effort and time!
52. Sound Design and Audio Branding: Create “audio logos” and “sound identities” for companies. Or use your manufacturing abilities to make sound results and audio environments for media, public areas, or different commissioned initiatives.
Retail & Venue Work
53. Report Retailer: Gig at evening and work at a file retailer through the day. You’ll keep on prime of the most recent music releases, as properly brush up on the classics.
54. Music Retail: Somewhat be close to devices? Work at a music retailer and develop your experience within the newest gear, used instrument valuation, and extra.
55. Making or Repairing Devices: Good at fixing guitars? Carving violins? Soldering results pedals or synths? You can begin your individual enterprise or work out of an present store or retailer.
56. Expertise Purchaser: Already in communication with a big community of proficient musicians? Put these social and group abilities to make use of reserving the acts at an area venue.
57. Venue Workers: Favor extra of the “on the bottom” venue expertise? You can be a bartender, bouncer, field workplace assistant, or venue supervisor.
58. Dwell Sound Engineer: Each good venue wants good reside sound. You can be the important thing to creating that occur. Bonus factors should you’re not a grump!
Different Music Professions
59. Music Journalism: Write present previews, album evaluations, function interviews, and extra. It’s possible you’ll discover a possibility to do that as a side-gig in your native newspaper or arts weekly.
60. Musicology, Criticism, Editorial, and Curation: Put your deep data and fervour for a specific style to make use of. Educate others about that historical past. Or make music suggestions and thrilling connections for listeners.
61. Member of an Orchestra: Jazz, Classical, Ballet, or the pit-orchestra for Musical Theater. If in case you have nice technical facility in your instrument and reliable sight-reading abilities, you may make a residing in a big ensemble.
62. Spiritual Music: Whether or not it’s the organist in a cathedral, the guitarist in a praise-and-worship band, the cantor at a temple,… many religions have music as a part of their common service.
63. Voice Expertise: If in case you have singing voice, you may be capable to translate these dramatic abilities to supply voiceovers, audiobook readings, or character voices.
Model Collaborations
64. Model Sponsorships: Associate up with some firm who shares your values and aesthetic, and receives a commission whenever you rep their merchandise, providers, or mission.
65. Endorsements: Get discounted (or typically free) services akin to devices, music advertising and marketing instruments, or music manufacturing software program. In alternate, you agree to make use of that gear in public and supply testimonials.
66. Affiliate Advertising: Promote a sure product in your web site, do gear evaluations, and hyperlink to the producer or retailer, and earn a fee on any gross sales.
67. Be an Influencer: “Influencer Advertising?” Simpler stated than executed, however… when you have a big social following, you could possibly monetize that focus by doing product placements or promo shoutouts.
Miscellaneous
68. Books, eBooks, & Audiobooks: I suppose this might go below the “merch” part, however that’s extra in regards to the ultimate product and gross sales. Changing into an creator is an endeavor all its personal, after all. However should you already show a knack for lyric-writing, you will have longer-form literary expertise too. It could possibly be fiction, non-fiction about musicology, essays about band drama and tour mishaps, and even written instrument instruction with accompanying illustrations.
69. Music Running a blog: I discussed above that you may write evaluations for an present publication, however you may additionally host evaluations by yourself web site within the hopes of monetizing your weblog by way of advert placements and affiliate income.
70. Podcasting: Begin a podcast about your music, adventures, or different pursuits. In the event you get adequate engagement, you’ll be able to monetize by way of advertisements, sponsorships, or listener help.
71. Competitions: These could possibly be rap battles, songwriting challenges, bluegrass competitions. There could also be an entry charge, however that additionally means there could possibly be an enormous payout should you win.
72. Interactive Music Experiences: If in case you have blended media or web-development abilities, you may create an immersive real-world or digital expertise. Emma McGann’s multi-player “Monsterverse” RPG in Discord is a good instance. You may ask your followers to pay to take part, or you should utilize it as an opportunity to drive merch gross sales on the finish of the expertise.
73. Consulting Companies: Musicians need assistance, strong recommendation, and networking connections. Are you able to mentor somebody in administration, crowdfunding, digital promoting, or one thing else? Present that technique recommendation in alternate for a charge.
74. Open-Supply Collaboration: That is whenever you make some artistic work obtainable for others to make use of, and not using a clear thought of who will collaborate, or what precisely will outcome. Making stems downloadable for remixers is an apparent instance. You may approve your favourite remixes and formally distribute these tracks, splitting any income the remix generates. However artists like Holly Herndon and Grimes took it one step additional with AI fashions of their vocals.
75. __________: Sure, a clean area, as a result of if there are 75 gadgets on this record already, there’s sure to be many extra methods to earn a living out of your musical abilities. And I needed to depart room so that you can think about your individual potentialities. Have enjoyable!
Conclusion
Most musicians won’t ever deal with each merchandise on this record, and that’s fully high quality. They shouldn’t. All of us have our personal specialties and pursuits. Greatest to deal with what’s rewarding, each by way of private development and revenue.
However hopefully this lengthy record offers you an summary of your choices as you make a profession of your music, and as you complement your main music earnings sources with extra income streams.