My point exactly. 
Frankly my dear,I dont give a dam !!!
If you donât give a dam why are you botherin your hole responding.
Do you not approve of pipers making a living by playing their instrument.
Doran, Rowsome, Ennis, Touhey didnât do it for the good of their health.
I know times are different and I may not be in them ladsâ category butâŚ
Itâs my decision to do this for a living and Iâm proud to play and teach and support uilleann piping for a VERY humble annual wage.
If I canât ask for a decent amount on a peak day, Iâll have to find work else where. But Iâll say this, itâs not for the likes of you to make stupid remarks or quotes from old movies just coz you have a set of pipes for a few years and think you can make comments to me that has been playing it for 24+ years.
Either explain yourself or apologise.
Tommy
If it were up to me I would shop around for a better paying gig. Problem is that Iâm on house arrest and I canât. The only reason I have this gig is because I desperately want to play in public and since I work at the bar I can officially be âon the clockâ and therefore bypass the restrictions against me.
Iâm guessing that âhouse arrestâ is a joke for working all dayâŚ
Your situation is different. You work in a bar where the manager says, âHey Jason, will you play a few tunes on St. Patricks DayâŚâ
Well, you canât say no⌠can you. Your scenario is very different to the norm and that fine. I hope you can get someone to help out.
The fee is still low though.
Tommy
Thanks Tommy, this is precisely what I am talking about.
At the better venues, the owners and the audience members do know crap from the good stuff, but they are few and far between sometimes. For those playing professionally (what ever instrument or music) in the Pub Scene, it is hard to compete with the amateur crap while making a living. The more clubs that hire amateur crap for less, the fewer the bread making gigs for the good professional players. Reminds me of a bumper sticker I saw back in 1979-80 âGo Disco tonight, and help 10 musicians lose their jobsâ⌠I donât see any difference here.
I appreciate the fact that professional musicians need to make a decent living.
I also think itâs wrong to discourage people from playing music in public âfor funâ if thatâs what they want to do - (doesnât that undermine the notion of traditional music? Thatâs my rantâŚ)
That said, St. Patâs wouldnât be my choice of days for doing it (volunteering, unless itâs for a charity etc.). Perhaps it makes more sense for the âvolunteersâ to choose a day when thereâs less cash at stake.
I also agree that getting out and playing in public is a good thing, but doing so as a novice and for beer in the places where professionals work is killing those who rely on that work to make a living.
I have first hand experience in this and it is one of the reasons I left playing professionally. The club owners starting hiring amateurs for less, whatâs worse, my own home town would import them from out of state, driving me further afield to find work⌠let me tell you that rankled a bit.
SeriouslyâŚIâm really on house arrestâŚankle bracelet and all. And I volunteered to play because I wanted to play and have fun.
Well, at least you donât need to go flog yourself now. 
Isnât there a Musiciansâ Guilde or Union of Artists in your area ? They usually guarantee minimum rates for musicians.
In Quebec the minimum rate (when last I checked) is $125 per musician. If you get hired for a gig, itâs expected that youâll be paid at least that.
It costs $60 per year to be a member of the Musiciansâ Guilde. Some venues will only hire you if you are a member of the Guilde.
Unfortunately, down there they always tend to let the market decide such things⌠
A noted button accordion player that lives around these parts tried to lay down a pretty firm standard for the pro- and semi-pro (those of us who have day jobs) crowd to go by a few years back: bare minimum of $150.00 for the first hour + $50.00 for each additional hour. Sounds fare, if you ask me. Youâd be surprised how difficult it is for him or any of us to regularly manage to get such a price (on any day other than St. Patrickâs, anywayâŚ). The player I mention generally tends to do alrightâhe recently got back from doing some gigs @ the Temple Bar Trad Festival in Dublinâbut I know for a fact that there have been rough times when heâs had to play for a small fraction of his normal asking price. Most people just donât understand what hiring a musician entails. Donât forget, youâre not just paying them to knock out a few tunes, youâre paying for them to practice the material, drive to the event, and take time out of their day to do it.
Iâm not saying that anybody that hasnât been playing for a minimum of ten years and considers him/herself a âseriousâ musician should just clear off from the bars and leave things to the âprofessionalsââit doesnât sound like there are likely that many such qualified people in that part of Florida, anyway. But I wish there was a better sense of etiquette that was common knowledge for people to go by when hiring a professional musician for their event.
To me, what all this boils down is this: Is there really a market for professionals in traditional music (leaving the contradiction in terms aside) or are we just trying to uphold it by artificial means?
To me there is very little correlation between professional/amateur and good/bad. Some of the best musicians I know are amateurs, and I know some really bad professionals too (though they donât tend to stay in business for very long âŚ). Of course the average professional should be better than the average amateur, but there are lots of exceptions, both ways. And if an amateur can be as good as a professional, or even better, how can there be a market for the professionals?
And, even if you donât agree with me that an amateur can be that good, does that matter if the audience canât hear (or bother) about the quality difference? The customer is always right, right? If you want to keep it up, you must be so much better than the amateurs that the audience really takes notice. Thatâs a really tough challenge. Especially in a pub.
Most of the really good amateur musicians I know are well aware of this undermining-the-market problem and charges accordingly, and I do too, but in the back of my head I always felt that this is a bit like trying to keep something alive which maybe shouldnât be. Why should we amateurs help you uphold your market?
In the event I am confusing folks, here are my definitions for the following two words.
-
Amateur: Not a professional, not paid, does not rely on occupation for living.
-
Professional: Not an amateur, is paid, relies on occupation for living.
You will note there is no mention of skill, ability or quality.
The point is, by folks doing these gigs for free or for free booze (regardless of their talent and ability⌠though I suspect if theyâre any good theyâll charge appropriately), the club owners are going to ask them back and the poor slob whose livelyhood is performing for a decent wage is out of a gig. Itâs not fair and I believe it to be pretty irresponsible of the amateur doing such.
Sh*t, if I wanted to, I could offer veterinary health care out of the back of my wifeâs truck for next to nothing (though it would be highly illegal ) and undermine more than a few clinics (and their staffâs wages) around here. But because it would be illegal, I cannot do so. In the case of the pub musician, there is no legislation protecting them from others undermining their efforts. Donât even get me started on the musicianâs union⌠ASCAP and itâs affiliates can kiss my big old pimply white⌠um⌠nose.
[Edited to note that the original topic of this thread was âPartner needed for St. Paddyâs (sic) Day Gigâ or something like that - topic name was changed on about page 4 of this thread. Bill]
I didnât really want to get into it now, but this divide between amateur and professional, which seems particularly strong in the USA, is one of my least favorite things about âthe music scene.â
IMO music should be an avocation or vocation. Yes, people should be rewarded for their efforts and contributions. But the notion that anyone with a day job other than waiting tables isnât a âseriousâ (read: ârealâ) musician is bad for the spirit of music.
Most of the great figures in Irish traditional music did not, in fact, make a living from it. That may partly be because of the economic hardships and necessities of their times, but I believe the shared ownership of musicality by a community, not just an elite circle, is one of the things that gives traditional music in this country, and Irish traditional music of the great diasporas of Chicago, New York, London, etc. such power, grace, and attraction.
The notion of 'professional music" nearly prevented me from becoming a âreal musicianâ - that is, it formed a barrier that prevented me from meaningfully participating, until I moved into a community of musical amateurs who welcomed me and encouraged me to play in public. (For free).
(I say this, now, as an âamateurâ who will, in seven daysâ time, rely on the pipes for my sole livelihood)
OK, I should shut up now, or else this thread will go on either forever or until it is locked 
Bill
Well said Bill.
Willie Clancy was a carpenter. Seamus Ennis was a broadcaster. Performing music certainly wasnât their sole source of income. Itâs the nature of traditional music. Thereâs very little money to be made in it.
Never did I say that amateurs werenât serious or werenât good or werenât real musicians⌠where did I say/write those things? I certainly do not believe it.
Iâm belly-aching from the stand-point that as a former professional musician, I found it increasingly difficult to get gigs in the pubs that were my main venue, a lot of which were in my home port⌠the Twin Cities at that time. Instead, more and more non professionals were playing and for far less than I, in some cases without free suds. This was happening all over the country but I felt it more at âhomeâ.
I could give a rip what Clancy, Ennis and whomever else did for their day jobs, my day job (although it was at night ) was playing in the pubs to make a living and I was making out pretty well.
I really do not find fault for those who play for free, I wish they wouldnât, but I canât say they have no right. The fault is with the pub owners, looking for entertainment at the lowest possible nickle. The thing is, the more folks play for next to nothing or free beer, the more the publicans will expect it. As a result, the livelyhood of many is in jeopardy.
I fail to see what is so wrong with my notion, and why it is hard for some to wrap their thoughts around it.
Yes, but they could really play.
Pat.
My opinion:
As we are talking about a music in a pub, not a concert, music club etc ⌠the main issue should be who makes the pub customers most happy, who makes them spend most money and are most likely to make them return. I bet all pub owners see it as a business, public music education comes far behind profit.
And lets face it quite a few people even go and see people who clearly canât sing at all on Karaoke night, even pay to get in 
. Pub entertainment is not about quality, it is about having a good time.
When it comes to ITM, I have seen a number of pub performances by very talented musicians playing, very nice complex sets, with brilliant variations and ornamentations, but the crowd just donât get it. It is music for the few that already are involved and these few would rather have had the concert any place else, where they could actually listen to it.
The same musicians are too good, and could never stand the to play âBlack velvet bandâ and âWhiskey in the jarâ ten times in three hours even though it is what the crowd wants.
See it for what it is, if you have a pub that specialise in ITM music they will have a crowd that appreciate good musicians, and in the end the talented ones will get the job. If the aim is to let people have a good time, whats the fuss? Stealing job opportunities, lowering the payment? Hey, in Karaoke people even pay to get on stage
And how fun would it be if only pro singers were allowed to get up on stage, Karaoke would die out in a week. Zzzzzz!
/MarcusR
My gripe is with the âprofessional/non-professionalâ dualism, and the mindset that intentionally or unintentionally results.
Perhaps it may change with time spent in a professional capacity?
I really am not trying to be dualist, but the problem does exist and there doesnât seem to be a happy solution to it.