Community Theatre musicians

[MidgeD79]

My local community theatre is having financial difficulties and one problem in particular is whether or not we should pay community theatre musicians and if so how much. Does anyone have any experience with this and what are your thoughts?

I am leaving for work (special needs pre-school bus driver because music doesn't pay so good lol) so I won't be able to check in often.

[golfgal]

I used to play in the pit orchestra for a community theater and we never got paid. They always had food there for us for rehearsals and performances-usually meat and cheese trays, veges and dip, etc. nothing fancy. That was a nice touch. I don't know that anyone expected to get paid because most people were in the orchestra because they liked to play their instruments and this was a fun way to do that.

[agnes!]

This is a hard one for me...

Performance rights to musicals, even for a community theatre, can be HORRIBLY expensive (Rodgers & Hammerstein or Andrew Lloyd Webber anyone?). If the group wants to do musicals, they should first take into consideration how much the performance will cost from the start - how much is the music & script rental, how much the performance rights will be. Sometimes groups get stars in their eyes(lol) about a particular show and realize after everything's decided that it will cost a lot of $$$$$ just to get the rights and to rent all the scripts and scores. Could the group do a talent show/review/small cast show strictly as a fund-raiser?

In every community theatre musical production around here, even if no-one else gets *anything* (like the actors or the director), the musicians always get paid. One reason might be because there are a lot of professionals and experienced amateurs in this area, so the good ones can afford to be picky. If possible, I think the musicians *should* get paid. That being said, if the choice was either pay the musicians or don't do the show... I suppose I'd ask the musicians what they would like to do (sounds like maybe that's what's happened with you?).

Here's something happens around here all the time. Local groups have a show all picked out (and the early stuff paid-for), but the performance rights will get yanked out from underneath them because a national tour will be in the area during the community theatre's run of the show. Now *that's* fun, scrambling-around to find a show at the last-minute.

agnes!

[laurie31]

No one gets paid for Community Theater here except the director.

The musicians are volunteers just like the actors.