Need to receives a commission on your musical abilities?
As a musician, there are extra methods to earn cash than ever earlier than. Dozens upon dozens of how, the truth is!
When you ought to, in fact, prioritize sure income streams as an artist who creates authentic music, there are occasions — maybe while you’re first rising your profession —while you simply gotta pay the payments.
And in that case, placing your music expertise to make use of certain 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 a listing of 75 methods you can also make cash out of your music, grouped by class for simple scanning.
Streaming & Digital Gross sales
1. Streaming Income: Earn cash from streaming exercise while 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 individuals 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 expertise to work for different artists. Receives a commission in factors, upfront charges, co-writer splits, or no matter different association is smart for you and your collaborator.
6. Engineering: Are you good at recording, mixing, or mastering? Let different artists know! This is usually a nice income between your individual recording initiatives or excursions.
7. Session Participant: Received abilities as an instrumentalist or vocalist? Are you fast at studying and arranging tunes? Recording classes may be a good way to receives a commission whereas not tying up an excessive amount of of your time directly. You’ll be able to attend classes in individual, or do distant session work from your individual residence studio.
8. Studio Operator: Do you personal numerous recording gear that goes unused while you’re not making music? Perhaps 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 exhibits, generally having a conveyable studio could make all of the distinction in getting the job.
Music Publishing & Licensing
10. Mechanical Royalties: Acquire 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 Aspect): Should you write your individual songs and retain the publishing rights, you will get paid an upfront payment — and in some circumstances, ongoing royalties — when your music is positioned in movie, TV, video games, commercials, and many others.
13. Sync Licensing (Label Aspect): Similar goes for the “recording” facet of the equation. Should you personal your individual tracks, you’re the label, and might receives a commission for sync placements.
14. Compose for Music Libraries: Prolific composer or producer? You may write music for music collections which are particularly curated for sync licensing alternatives.
15. Promote Sheet Music: The unique supply of “music publishing” income! Relying in your style, this is usually a huge vendor. (New Age Piano, anybody?) However don’t simply consider notation; you might additionally do chord-charts, tablature, lyric sheets, and extra.
Reside Music Performances
16. Touring and Reside 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 payment from the venue proprietor.
17. Residency Gig: Similar type of cost choices as above, however a residency is a often scheduled factor. It may very well be “7 nights in a row in July” or “Each different Thursday all yr.”
18. Home Live shows: Play intimate concert events in non-public houses. These may be nice fan-building experiences and enable you to promote numerous merch, whereas decreasing strain for big turnout. Plus it can save you on journey bills if the host places you up for the night time.
19. DJing: Should you’re not touring, you may DJ occasions, events, or venues in your hometown. On the highway? Do a DJ set at a pageant or venue between your tour dates.
20. Company Gigs: Need to receives a commission huge bucks whereas coming into The Twilight Zone? Play at a company operate. It’s surreal. And profitable.
21. Weddings and Non-public Occasions: Carry out at weddings, bar mitzvahs, anniversaries, household Christmas events, birthdays, and other forms of personal occasions. These can typically pay higher than a typical venue gig.
22. Metropolis or Municipal Occasions: The annual Christmas tree-lighting ceremony, the summer season beer backyard within the park, the Arts Stroll. Verify along with your native chamber of commerce or metropolis council for alternatives.
23. Festivals: It’s nice to play music festivals, in fact, but in addition analysis non-music gatherings which have reside music as a element. Beer festivals. Balloon festivals. Meals festivals.
24. Busking: Play in a public area with a number of foot visitors for ideas. Subway stations. City squares. Boardwalks and piers. Simply test the native ordinances first. Get a allow, if required.
25. Be within the Home Band: Much like a residency, the place you keep put and totally different audiences come to you, search out efficiency alternatives the place you back-up different singers. Might be live-band karaoke, an enormous band or jazz group, and many others.
26. Play Cruise Ships: Should you don’t thoughts small rooms and plenty of months at sea, cruise ship gigs provide you with an opportunity to play quite a bit (generally a number of gigs per day), and supply downtime to deal with follow, recording, studying, and many others.
27. Nursing Houses: Whereas these aren’t glamorous gigs, they are often very significant for the viewers and also you because the performer. They will pay effectively, are normally shorter units, and have the potential to develop into reliable repeat gigs.
28. Digital Performances: Need to mix the unique and intimate feeling of a home live performance with the comfort of livestreaming? Play a personal, digital efficiency on Zoom, Google Hangouts, and many others.
Music Merch Gross sales
29. Artist Merchandize: Promote merch at gigs, in your web site, and on platforms like Instagram and Spotify. Objects 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 information, and even cassettes. Supply them in all the identical locations you’ll your merch, in addition to in file shops through bodily distribution or consignment.
31. Restricted-Version Releases: Supply limited-edition or signed bodily copies of your music to followers. As an illustration, you might promote tour-specific recordings that can by no means once more be out there to buy.
32. Digital merch: Not all merchandise must be bodily. You’ll be able to supply PDFs of your tour diary or poetry. A digital cookbook. An unlock of a secret video.
33. Digital “Field Set”: Similar goes for music information. You might have a trove of unreleased recordings. Give followers paid entry! Or bundle every thing you’ve ever recorded right into a digital package deal 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, neighborhood, art work, or monetary association.
Music Schooling
35. Educate Music: Whether or not it’s non-public classes or a teleconference tutorial, you may assist different individuals get higher at an instrument, music manufacturing, or songwriting.
36. Music Remedy: Put your expertise to make use of in a therapeutic manner that helps individuals enhance their well-being.
37. On-line Programs: Create and promote a digital course. It may very well be about your instrument, or your music-biz and promo expertise. Plenty of upfront work, however with the potential for it to develop into extra “passive” revenue as soon as your advertising and marketing funnel is up and working.
38. Music Workshops: Host IRL or on-line neighborhood 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 must 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 may earn cash transcribing that music note-for-note. It may be work-for-hire revenue, or you might publish these transcriptions in a ebook. Or on YouTube (with the opportunity of incomes advert income).
Crowdfunding & Fan Help
41. Mission-Primarily based Crowdfunding: Use platforms like Kickstarter or GoFundMe to boost cash from followers to help a selected recording, tour, advertising and marketing, or video mission.
42. Membership Golf equipment: You should use a subscription-model platform like Patreon, or construct your individual on-line fan subscription by means of your web site. In change for month-to-month cost, followers get unique or early entry to content material and different perks.
43. Fan Donations: Settle for donations straight from followers by means of platforms like PayPal or Venmo. These hyperlinks may be listed in your web site, livestreams, and even pinned to the highest of your Spotify profile.
44. Livestream Help: That is income followers provide you with for livestreaming. However not like the Venmo or PayPal ideas talked about above, it could possibly come within the type of a platform-specific forex or motion: Stars, Bits, Subs, and many others.
45. VIP Experiences: Supply 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: Should 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 numerous dedication, however might result in a publishing deal.
47. Write Jingles: Ya know, the catchy (and generally 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 exhibits, and documentaries. Like many areas of specialization, this area can require numerous time and dedication. Think about accordingly how typically and while you need to settle for scoring work.
49. Video Recreation Music: In principle, this isn’t that totally different from movie scoring. Besides that gaming has its personal musical tropes, so the reference factors might differ from cinematic orchestration and sound design. Many video video games additionally function songs that develop into a part of the sport’s soundtrack, which refers again to sync licensing. Lastly, there’s a complete large ecosystem of VGM covers on YouTube, the place artists do their very own artistic preparations of widespread online game music. So should you play a novel instrument, this may provide you with a approach to differentiate your self: Halo on accordion, Closing 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, corresponding to hip-hop, pop, or EDM? You’ll be able to 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 be sure you cost sufficient on your precise effort and time!
52. Sound Design and Audio Branding: Create “audio logos” and “sound identities” for companies. Or use your manufacturing expertise to make sound results and audio environments for media, public areas, or different commissioned initiatives.
Retail & Venue Work
53. File Retailer: Gig at night time and work at a file retailer in the course of the day. You’ll keep on high of the most recent music releases, as effectively 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 may begin your individual enterprise or work out of an current store or retailer.
56. Expertise Purchaser: Already in communication with a big community of gifted musicians? Put these social and group expertise to make use of reserving the acts at an area venue.
57. Venue Employees: Choose extra of the “on the bottom” venue expertise? You may be a bartender, bouncer, field workplace assistant, or venue supervisor.
58. Reside Sound Engineer: Each good venue wants good reside sound. You may 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. You might discover a possibility to do that as a side-gig on your native newspaper or arts weekly.
60. Musicology, Criticism, Editorial, and Curation: Put your deep data and fervour for a selected 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 expertise, you might make a dwelling in a big ensemble.
62. Non secular 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 an excellent singing voice, you may have the ability to translate these dramatic expertise to offer voiceovers, audiobook readings, or character voices.
Model Collaborations
64. Model Sponsorships: Accomplice up with some firm who shares your values and aesthetic, and receives a commission while you rep their merchandise, providers, or mission.
65. Endorsements: Get discounted (or generally free) services and products corresponding to devices, music advertising and marketing instruments, or music manufacturing software program. In change, 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 mentioned than completed, however… if in case 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 underneath the “merch” part, however that’s extra concerning the last product and gross sales. Turning into an creator is an endeavor all its personal, in fact. However should you already show a knack for lyric-writing, you will have longer-form literary expertise too. It may very well 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 might write evaluations for an current publication, however you might additionally host evaluations by yourself web site within the hopes of monetizing your weblog by means of advert placements and affiliate income.
70. Podcasting: Begin a podcast about your music, adventures, or different pursuits. Should you get adequate engagement, you may monetize by means of adverts, sponsorships, or listener help.
71. Competitions: These may very well be rap battles, songwriting challenges, bluegrass competitions. There could also be an entry payment, however that additionally means there may very well be an enormous payout should you win.
72. Interactive Music Experiences: If in case you have blended media or web-development expertise, you might create an immersive real-world or digital expertise. Emma McGann’s multi-player “Monsterverse” RPG in Discord is a superb instance. You’ll be able to ask your followers to pay to take part, or you need to use 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 change for a payment.
74. Open-Supply Collaboration: That is while you make some artistic work out there for others to make use of, with out a clear thought of who will collaborate, or what precisely will end result. Making stems downloadable for remixers is an apparent instance. You’ll be able to 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 checklist already, there’s sure to be many extra methods to generate profits out of your musical expertise. And I needed to go away room so that you can think about your individual prospects. Have enjoyable!
Conclusion
Most musicians won’t ever sort out each merchandise on this checklist, and that’s utterly wonderful. They shouldn’t. All of us have our personal specialties and pursuits. Finest to deal with what’s rewarding, each when it comes to private progress and revenue.
However hopefully this lengthy checklist provides you an summary of your choices as you make a profession of your music, and as you complement your main music revenue sources with extra income streams.
