AFM Initiatives for Freelance Musician Engagement

May 1, 2025

Tino Gagliardi  -  AFM International President

If the delegates to the last AFM Convention made one thing abundantly clear, it was the desire for the Federation to step up its support for locals seeking to organize freelance musicians. These are the musicians least likely to perform under a traditional trade union collective bargaining agreement.

While freelance, indie, and self-produced musicians comprise the biggest population of musicians in Canada and the US, they are especially disadvantaged when seeking employment protections that are available to almost every other worker. Consequently, they are the most challenging for local unions to represent effectively.

The freelance musicians of this decade have entered into a very different music industry from that experienced by the previous generation. When called to play a job, the musicians of the old generation could expect a paycheck from the bandleader at the end of the gig, in an amount at or better than local union scale. The succeeding generations of musicians have had to navigate the burdens of “pay-to-play,” self-marketing, insurance requirements, exploitative streaming platforms, a commercial culture that eschews the very idea of contracts as a way to secure compensation, and a consumer culture that considers itself entitled to free music.

With that as background, I am pleased to report that, with the support of the International Executive Board, we are focusing on increasing our services and visibility to the upcoming generation of musicians. Freelance Services Department Director Wages Argott is leading the effort to enhance AFM’s presence in the lives of freelance musicians and its significance for their careers by engaging in music industry events and trade shows, improving the GoProHosting web hosting service for members by introducing new features and functionalities, and updating the Federation’s musician-specific websites—such as Venuology, a “Yelp-like” place for musicians to write their own reviews of performance venues to improve access and functionality.

Just as important, however, is new partnering between the Federation and its locals to equip the locals to develop and foster vibrant connections with freelance musicians in their communities. The Federation’s Education Committee, which I appointed at the beginning of this administration, has embarked on a new education model for 2025 to assist union locals with exactly this task.

The committee, chaired by International Secretary-Treasurer Ken Shirk, has tasked the heads of the Freelance Department, Organizing Department, and Electronic Media Services Division (EMSD) to develop an integrated education program, combining aspects of traditional labor and community organizing together with the building blocks of the Freelance Department programs and indie musician-specific electronic media structures, designed to facilitate live, functional connections between the working bands and their local unions.

Freelance Director Argott, together with Organizing Department Director Gabe Kristal and EMSD Director John Painting, have designed an excellent two-day workshop for local officers to bring those specific aspects together. The overall goal of the program is to provide locals with a clear template of how a local can start the process of transitioning into an active, community and power-building entity to assist this large, under-represented segment of the industry in gaining influence and control over their economic lives.

The first presentation was given to a very receptive group of local representatives just prior to the Western Conference, held last month in Tacoma, Washington. Responses from the participants were quite enthusiastic. Similar workshops will be presented across the Federation at the Eastern, Southern, Midwestern, and Canadian Conferences in the months to come.

The Federation is funding hotel and per diem for up to 15 participants for these sessions, and participation is open to any local leader or representative who wishes to bring the important information and skillsets back to their own communities. My hope is that as many local officers as possible attend these workshops and implement the concepts and tools learned to rededicate themselves to this union’s primary mission—for all of us as musicians to live and work in dignity, be fulfilled, and be compensated fairly.

---