If you can afford it, please consider making a donation to one of these organisations, they are all working hard to assist independent artists with urgent grants:
Help Musicians UK
Musicians’ Union (UK) Coronavirus Hardship Fund
Musicares (USA) – Coronavirus Relief Fund
As we all know by now, we’re facing an unprecedented public health crisis across the world due to the COVID-19 coronavirus. Live music and the arts in general have been particularly hard hit financially as concerts, festivals and tours are cancelled, aircraft are grounded and venues close their doors. Obviously the personal health and wellbeing of everyone in our communities is absolutely paramount, and we are fully supportive of these measures. But we also want to remind you how much touring musicians are suffering in these circumstances, especially independent artists. These excellent, world class musicians make a precarious living at the best of times, as few people buy recorded music any more. Most of them make most or all of their income from touring and performing, as well as selling their CDs while out on tour. That income has suddenly and completely disappeared, probably for several months if not longer.
Naturally we have cancelled those gigs which we had planned to personally host in March, June and July. We are also working to postpone re-schedule our May mini-fest – please see here for more details on that. All the tour booking work I’ve been doing for many months has also been wiped out in the last couple of weeks. I have cancelled six forthcoming tours already (please see individual tour pages for details), and await the impact on those tours currently partly booked for autumn 2020 and early 2021. But I am in a fortunate position compared to all the musicians concerned, who face severe hardship and possible destitution.
If you can afford it, please consider making a donation to one of the appeals linked at the top of the page.
Thanks to any of you who are able to give some support to musicians who have given us so much joy and who desperately need our help to survive. True North Music is definitely planning to be back after the crisis, with more wonderful, life-affirming live music – but we all need to pull together to help ensure that there is a live music scene on the other side of this, and that venues and promoters, as well as musicians, can survive this economic catastrophe in addition to the wider health emergency.
Most of all, our thanks go to the healthcare workers and other key workers out there, risking their personal safety to keep our society running. To everyone else, please stay home, stay safe and help to minimise the spread of the Covid-19 virus. Follow our Facebook page here, where we will be sharing live streams from all our favourite artists (and don’t forget to donate as well as enjoy, if you can).