Now is the right time to become an American Federation of Musicians member. From ragtime to rap, from the early phonograph to today's digital recordings, the AFM has been there for its members. And now there are more benefits available to AFM members than ever before, including a multi-million dollar pension fund, excellent contract protection, instrument and travelers insurance, work referral programs and access to licensed booking agents to keep you working.

As an AFM member, you are part of a membership of more than 80,000 musicians. Experience has proven that collective activity on behalf of individuals with similar interests is the most effective way to achieve a goal. The AFM can negotiate agreements and administer contracts, procure valuable benefits and achieve legislative goals. A single musician has no such power.

The AFM has a proud history of managing change rather than being victimized by it. We find strength in adversity, and when the going gets tough, we get creative - all on your behalf.

Like the industry, the AFM is also changing and evolving, and its policies and programs will move in new directions dictated by its members. As a member, you will determine these directions through your interest and involvement. Your membership card will be your key to participation in governing your union, keeping it responsive to your needs and enabling it to serve you better. To become a member now, visit www.afm.org/join.

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Meredith Snow

ICSOM Chair and Member of Local 47 (Los Angeles, CA)


ICSOM Musicians Unite to Show Support for Ukraine

As we are rising from the ashes of the COVID pandemic, we are facing another predicament. This catastrophic and unnecessary war is escalating already rising inflation rates. With more than half of our orchestras negotiating within the next six months, we will be hard pressed to keep pace with rising expenses, to say nothing of making up lost income from the previous two years.

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Symphonic Resurrection

by Meredith Snow, ICSOM Chair and Member of Local 47 (Los Angeles, CA) After 15 months of pandemic paralysis, our orchestras are going back to work. The quick nationwide rollout of vaccines by the Biden administration is creating the possibility of a near-normal summer season and the probability of a full return this fall. It […]

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Emerging from the Pandemic

I can hear the ice beginning to break apart on our frozen pandemic year. As the Biden administration streamlines vaccine distribution and our economy slowly begins to thaw under the economic stimulus of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), we will start to see the re-opening of our orchestras and a loosening of audience restrictions. […]

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Examining Our Orchestral Culture

We have reached a moment in our American democratic experiment where some very difficult and painful truths have been laid bare. The advent of the coronavirus has torn away the scrim that allowed us to soft-focus on—and avert our eyes from—the many social and economic inequities that exist in our society. The disproportionate number of […]

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