A couple of years ago, a class of students asked some questions about working in live performance.
These were the answers they received:
Val Gwyther - Tour Manager
Well, after some thought, here is my thruppence ha'p'ny. I did this interview with the Guardian about 7 years ago: http://www.theguardian.com/music/2007/apr/13/popandrock.genderI was discussing being a female roadie or TM. Things have moved on considerably more from then even & I have met a lot more female drivers & TMs. Richard Nowell Sound Services (RNSS) fielded the first entirely female only sound crew back in the 70s. The roles were Roadies, Stage Technicians, monitor & FOH engineers. I did my work experience there in 2007. He says he prefers women in crews as they look after the gear well! Lol i.e. On the load out, they're not hurling the gear in the back of the truck due to 'high testosterone levels' - his words not mine. But even in his crews the ratio is still about 6:1 male to female. There's no lack of opportunity if your female, if you're a gear nerd, you'll fit right in! If you refer to everything by its product serial number, then you'll get on just fine. E.g. The new X32 is going to make the overpriced LS9s obsolete! Or should we try a 414 or a U87 etc? It's not a glamorous job though, long tedious hours, early starts/load ins & last to leave exhausted at 1am. Venue house sound engineer is a much easier job because you don't have to build the PA every show of course. So when i was at the Islington Academy, i only had to get there for 1 or 2pm to prep the stage & EQ the monitors before the band got there at 3. I prefer TMing on the road of course, but once again, the bigger the band, the more pressure & longer hours. The sliding scale for money is around the £200/£250+ a day mark if you're working for a signed/profitable band. So that's pretty good. Idiots work for less, but it's a 24/7 job & pro rata that's only about £10 an hour! Anyway, this year i've worked for TMs for The Pogues, the Specials, stone roses, Killing Joke, madness, Björk, modestep, Kaiser Chiefs, Professor Green, Kraftwerk & many more & out of all of that there was just a female TM for The Specials & Pogues at the time. I also know New Model Army's TM Dawn. So I guess the ratio is maybe about 10 or more to 1 from my experience, though that's going up. The reason being that TMing a big band is more like full-on production management & you may or may not know? But production management in theUK festival scene is completely dominated by women. Go figure? Obviously TMing for smaller bands is more about driving & sound engineering, & the weird fact is, it's easy to get into it if you own a van. If you are a good sound engineer that is less important for getting the work but obviously much appreciated & respected! Get a van. That's my top tip for becoming a TM!
Steve Gurney - TM & FoH Engineer (Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats, The Subways, Cathedral)
Approximately how many days in the year would an average tour manager work?
Average of 200 days a year is good. Really all depends on the band / bands you are working with ……… if it’s a world album tour the cycle of work could last 18 months long with two or three weeks off here or there. If the record is selling the tours are often extended.
What happens if the tour manager doesn’t show up?
Somebody else would have to step up to the plate. Part of the TM job is to have every scenario covered and if you knew you couldn’t attend you would have somebody organised to step in and cover.
What happens when everything goes wrong with a tour manager?
The Tour Manager would be sacked and another brought in asap.
What happens if the TM doesn’t do their job?
The show would suffer drastically. Everything depends on planning in advance. Travel , parking for trucks / busses , Load in times , sound check time , door time , stage time , hotel bookings , catering etc If none of these are organised in advance then the day would be a shambles.
How would you get in touch with [gain contacts for] people with these roles? Would it be easier if you were signed?
Once a band is signed they normally have an agent and management. These people tend to be in contact with various tour managers with various levels of experience.
What is a TM’s rate?
All depends on your experience and the level the band work at. If it’s a pub gig and the band have no money you may work for free hoping that one day they may play arenas and reward you handsomely with time.
What is the relationship between a FoH engineer and TM?
It’s an important one as the F.O.H engineer often controls the sound check times which is oh so important in having a smooth running show. As a tour manager you do not want a sound engineer who often runs late and checks up until door time.
How many women are TMs?
Kunal Singhal- Promoter (Chaos Theory)
How many women are tour managers?
I've met lots. As long as you're very organised it doesn't matter what gender you are.
What's the relationship between the FOH engineer and tour manager?
The engineer knows the acoustics of the venue they work at and, if they're good at their job, will do their best to get the sound that the band want in the venue. The tour manager would know exactly what the band that they're looking after wants to sound like, so will advise the sound engineer as to what they need. The sound engineer will use their knowledge of the venue's equipment and acoustics to get the results that the band are after.
How would you get in touch with all of the people who work in these roles? Would it be easier if you signed?
It's incredibly easy to get in touch with people these days. As long as they have a website, email and phone number, you can send your information and requests to anyone. They can let you know if there's someone else you should be speaking to instead of them. You don't need a label to do that.
What percentage does a promoter get?
Every promoter has different ways of working, so just make sure you get all of the terms and conditions in writing in advance and make sure that you're happy with with them. Some promoters have a fee, some take a percentage, it really depends on a lot of variables. As long as you keep an open conversation with them you should be able to get all of the information that you need. I vary the percentage I get paid depending on the costs of each concert and how many bands and team members there are to pay.
What does a booking agent do?
They organise all of the concerts on a band's tour, dealing with all the different promoters, venues and organisers for each one. They make sure that the band gets all of the tour dates filled and they get everything that they need (being paid enough, accommodation, food, drinks etc). They will usually send a contract over to the organisers once they've agreed on all of the terms.
What would happen if a booking agent doesn't show up on tour?
I've worked with several booking agents who can't always make every gig on the tour. That's never a problem, providing that they have made all of the arrangements with the promoter and organisers in advance. The tour manager usually follows the band around on tour to every gig and makes sure that the band's needs are met.
I would like to know the experience of a promoter.
The promoter is the one who will make sure that as many people as possible know about the event. This means selling tickets and advertising them in every way that they can think of. The usual ways are getting posters and flyers made and getting them out all over the city/country of the event, making online events on social media sites like Facebook, listing the event in all the websites which show music events or general things to do, contacting the media and trying to get newspaper, radio and TV coverage of the concert beforehand. They will organise competitions offering free tickets and merchandise to help promote the gig. They may spend a lot of money on advertising if they're sure that it will help to sell the tickets. Sometimes they get very creative. I once hid download codes for a band's songs around the area of the concert a month before, for people to find. For smaller concerts and some large-scale ones, the promoter is often the organiser of the event as well.
What happens when one of these people is not going to do his/her job?
Most people in the creative industries are paid for each project they do, whether it's organising a tour, playing a concert, making up the artwork etc. There are no salaries. If someone didn't do what they had promised to do, then they would not be asked to work with that group of people again. If they kept doing it, they'd get a bad reputation and wouldn't be asked to work again with many people, which means that they wouldn't get paid. Your reputation is your money, so be honest, treat people with respect and do what you say you are going to do.
