Are pianists rich?

[shoenberg3]

Simply put, how much  does a top-class pianist, such as Ashkenazy, Kissin, Argerich, or Lang Lang(Actually, ignore the last one) earn each year?
For example, would Kissin live in a ten-roomed mansion with Steinway Concert G, Faziolli, Bechstein, etc. in each room respecitively, or would he have to resort to putting his Steinway D in his garage?

[Awakening]

Good question.  I really don't know the answer, but I imagine the range is quite great.  As we all know, a pianist can be fairly poor, barely making it as a performer, or can also be incredibly rich, touring constantly, making recordings, and getting paid tons of money for it.  However, I'd say that the "rich" portion are a minority, and most pianists fit into the middle category of being a college professor or teacher, making a decent wage, but definitely not living a lavish life.  That's just my educated guess without any real inquiry or application, though. 

[aki]

I know someone who is a concert pianist, well not very famous, but he has had his own recitals and concerts and records a few CDs.  But he is soooo rich.  He has a mansion and a Fazioli.  So I guess Kissin and people would be waayy richer than that.

[pianiststrongbad]

This is something I have often wondered also.  I don't know the answer.  I have heard Pollini and Pehria are well off.  Something that is interesting is whether or not they earned all of their money or it was handed down by daddy.  If one was born into a rich family, what better way is their to spend his fortune than to sit down and play piano all day and become the next great concert master. 

[Bob]

If they're rich to start out, that's definitely a plus for them.

I've know some world class performers (not personally, but a friend of a friend) that are supposed to make over $100,000 (USD).  "Blue collar musicians," the kind that do weddings and pretty much whatever ceremonies and such they can get can make about $10,000 -- And that's working their butt off all year.

The cruise gigs sound nice.  There's also Disney.  And the army.  Those are all inbetween those amounts I would imagine.

[kempff]

you look at Horowitz and you see he had a great house. He didn't buy his piano. he got it as a wedding gift. When you are as famous as Horowitz, you don't have to "buy" lots of stuff. You get them for free. But I read somewhere, one of the reasons he started giving concerts after his 12 year absence, was he didn't have enough money to pay for his painting insurances...

[Daniel_piano]

A pianist never get a specific amount of money per recital or concert, it depends on how people paid for the ticket
A pianist get more money when there's more audience and less money when there's less audience since his/her fee is a percentage of the box-office returns and the more the returns are the more is the fee
They're therefore not payed a specific amount of money but their fee is an established percentage of the returns at the box-office
So, when a pianist is contacted for a concerto or recital he is said that his/her will be 70% or 40% o(or wathever) of the total returns
Music performance is kind of a honest business in that you're not payed arbitrarily but you earn more when people like you and earn less when people don't like you, so they're deserved money and they come from several people tickets so they're not subtracted from someone else fee (as in many other jobs)
Usually the fee end up to be on the range of 2.000$ or 20.000$ for non famous or less famous pianist and between 5.000$ or 400.000$ for a famous pianist, it all depends on how many tickets have been sold

Daniel
 

[bernhard]

Any person who dedicates him/herself 100% to music will quickly become a millionaire.

Provided they start off as billionaires.

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

[Musicag]

Top flight concert pianists in US, the likes of Andre Watts, Emanuel Ax, E. Kissin, M. Perahia, etc.  normally commands a fee around $60,000 per symphonic concert normally playing just one concerto for the night. For recitals the fee as I understand is lower.

[fnork]

Any person who dedicates him/herself 100% to music will quickly become a millionaire.

Provided they start off as billionaires.

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

HAHA!!

Well said, Bernhard

[Sketchee]

Top flight concert pianists in US, the likes of Andre Watts, Emanuel Ax, E. Kissin, M. Perahia, etc.  normally commands a fee around $60,000 per symphonic concert normally playing just one concerto for the night. For recitals the fee as I understand is lower.

I remember while watching a video of Andre Watts' anniversary recital at carnegie hall my music professor mentioned how much he made per piece.  He also had figures of the pay of each of the orchestra members for the events.  I wish I kept better notes so I could say the exact figures!

[Jeremy C.]

shoenberg3, what the hell do you have against Lang Lang? He is a great pianist

[pianiststrongbad]

I am not sure if he has anything against Lang Lang.  In my opinion Lang Lang's popularity is not as great as Argerich, or Pollini, so the amount of money recieved for performance could be much different.

[Jeremy C.]

oh. true

[dlu]

i wish i were rich....

Only for the reason on buying massive loads of luxury pianos, music, scores, ect....I don't really care about cars and houses...I just want a little house with a couple steinways, bosendorfers, and faziolis, and i'd be set...I would eat ramen noodles every day if I could have that...

[galonia]

i wish i were rich....

Only for the reason on buying massive loads of luxury pianos, music, scores, ect....I don't really care about cars and houses...I just want a little house with a couple steinways, bosendorfers, and faziolis, and i'd be set...I would eat ramen noodles every day if I could have that...

A little house?  I want a BIG house - so I can fit pianos in many different rooms - the house will be so big that I need an elevator, and the elevator will be large enough to put a lovely baby grand inside, so when I ride the elevator, I can provide myself with my own real elevator music.   

[Bacfokievrahms]

I want a house made of men and I could punch them all the time and they'd be like, arrr your fists are demolishing us, and my girlfriend would be like, stop it you're demolishing them, and then i'd chill out for a while and take it easy.

[dlu]

I want a house made of men and I could punch them all the time and they'd be like, arrr your fists are demolishing us, and my girlfriend would be like, stop it you're demolishing them, and then i'd chill out for a while and take it easy.

uu?...

[timothy42b]

I knew a concert pianist once who won the lottery, the big payoff, nearly $100 million.

When they asked him what he would do, he replied, "Oh, probably keep going as a concert pianist until I run out of money." 

[DarkWind]

I wish I had a house with pianos protruding out of everywhere. I walk inside, there is a keyboard sticking out of the wall. The strings and pedals and everything are inside the walls. In other words, the whole house is just one gigantic pianos. Pianos in the kitchen. In the bathroom. Everywhere! Wouldn't that be fun?

[SteinwayTony]

The primary reason that I chose to attend a major university instead of a conservatory is so I would have a back-up career in case I burned out at the piano.  I'm majoring in piano performance and political science and minoring in French (a nod toward Emanuel Ax) and currently have plans to go to law school, though that may change.  The percentage of pianists who regularly perform is just staggeringly low -- too risky for me, a guy who's terrified of financial failure.  I'll probably become a corporate attorney who does occasional chamber music gigs on the side.

On another note, someone commented that "when you are as famous as Horowitz, you don't have to 'buy' lots of stuff. You get them for free."  Well, not all concert pianists get their pianos for free.  One of the reasons I respect Steinway instruments so greatly is the fact that under no circumstances do they give away their pianos; they don't sponsor anybody.  They have a roster of what they call "Steinway Artists" (pianists who only play on Steinways), but that's it.  You don't even get a discount, whether you're Joe Blow or Murray Perahia. 

The first thing that's going in my house is a big fat Hamburg Steinway D.

[mysKat]

Since when did we do music for money?!?!?! but yeah, it will be nice to get $50 000 for ONE concert and then spend the rest of the year practicing WHATEVER you want!! Instead of what some competition/presenter requires............

[dinosaurtales]

Some pianists are, I suspect, like Elton John, Marvin Hamlisch, Billy Joel, Ray Charles (before he died - a-HEM!) I think you get the picture.

[steinwayguy]

I can safely say that Kissin and Lang Lang are extremely well off... Everyday professional pianists have a hard time making a steady income unless they have a teaching position at a conservatory (I think?).

[Guirlandes]

Kissin and Lang Lang make anywhere between $25,000 to $50,000 a concert, dependng on the venue, as there are different classes and budgets. Cliburn commands $100,000 for a single appearance these days, which are rare, and I am sure he won't take a penny less. Why should he? Ashkenazy doubltess is paid a great deal more as a conductor than as a pianist; and Pollini, who was already a wealthy man before anyone knew his name, thanks to his family fortune, is handsomely compensated as well.  The Kravis Center in Palm Beach , for example, will pay top dollar, but a venue in Montana will pay next to nothing. Still, Kissin can command top dollar no matter where he goes, and yes, he is most certainly wealthy. So is Lang Lang at this point, but don't get me started on him.

Speaking for myself, I  was never an academic,  but thanks to  a combination of talent, resourcefulness, imagination, ingenuity, chutzpah, and friends in high places, I had some success. I got a lot of headlines in the international press, record contracts, and plenty of opportunities in music, performing all over the world. I made several successful recordings that did exceptionally good business.   Sure, I get paid reasonably  well for concerts-- the last two, for a single performance of Enoch Arden of Strauss I got $20,000.  In a few weeks,  a small but well heeled venue, also in Florida, will pay me $15,000.  For  producing recordings for others (writing pays bubkis) I also get a pretty penny, as I am one hell of a good producer.  Serving on competition juries pays reasonably well, but it depends on the competition. The Cliburn pays in excess of $25,000 plus expenses for a single juror, making that a plum of an assignment.   In Jaen, Spain, at its prestigious international competition I was paid  about $3000 plus expenses and travel, which I didn't complain about.   For more about the subject of compensation, fees and the business of classical music,  and its effect on artists and the public, I refer you to Norman Lebrecht's controversial but riveting  expose,  "Who Killed Classical Music?"

But nothing even remotely is as lucrative as what I make in real estate. Now I am going into the film and broadcasting business, too, as well as syndicating a gay resort  akin to the Club Med all over the world. In fact, I am looking now for property in Thailand, in resort areas such as Phuckit,  as the prices are particularly good there now after the tsunami. And yes, I've been a licensed broker and developer in the real estate biz since 1978 in New York and Paris, the very high end of it. You can find me now in NYC with Halstead Properties www.halstead.com,  Should anyone have a heads up on luxury properties in the Indian Ocean basin, by all means, let me know.  If there is a natural disaster anywhere, reat assured  I will be  there--gobbling up property.

JOHN BELL YOUNG
www.johnbellyoung.com
www.johnbellyoung.org
www.enocharden.net
www.concertartist.info/IMCA
www.masterclass.ws

[Guirlandes]

Daniel_pinao wrote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A pianist never get a specific amount of money per recital or concert, it depends on how people paid for the ticket
A pianist get more money when there's more audience and less money when there's less audience since his/her fee is a percentage of the box-office returns and the more the returns are the more is the fee
They're therefore not payed a specific amount of money but their fee is an established percentage of the returns at the box-office
So, when a pianist is contacted for a concerto or recital he is said that his/her will be 70% or 40% o(or wathever) of the total returns
Music performance is kind of a honest business in that you're not payed arbitrarily but you earn more when people like you and earn less when people don't like you, so they're deserved money and they come from several people tickets so they're not subtracted from someone else


JBY responds:
This is absolutely NOT true, in the US or in Europe, though there are a few artists and venues who will make such arrangements.  But that is the exception, not the rule.  The fact is there are many venues, most in fact,  which go to contract with an artist for a specific fee, regardless of the size of the audience. No pro in his right mind would ever be so amateurish to tie himself down to a risk it is the presenter's responsibility to take, regardless of how many people show up at the concert.  I don't know a single one  of my colleagues who would be quite so dumb, or whose agents, charged with negotiating contracts on their behalf,  are that dense or stupid, either. If they are, they should be fired!

Certainly,  I  would never enter into any such box office  percentage agreement absent a contract for a specific  underlying fee that is guaranteed no matter what. Last year, for example,  in Sweden, I performed on the concert series at the Royal Palace in Stockholm, where there was such an arrangement, but I made certain  that I had a a contract that specified my minimum fee ahead of time.  So in addition to that I received a  healthy portion of the box office and did pretty well.

Daniel is a bit naive I am afraid about the music business. It isn't a nice or honest  business at all, In fact, it is one of the most DISHONEST businesses of all, as national legislators have consistently failed to uphold the Law of Agency which governs much of what goes on inside it,  though the same laws indeed govern the business dealings of the  financial world.  I am at work on an article about this very issue right now. The music business is in fact  populated and run by those who, acitng as fiduciaries and brokers are supposed to be licensed under the Law of Agency in most countries, such as the UK and the US, but  usually are not. In most states in the US, including Florida, agents are required by law to put up a $5000 bond just to do business at all.  The sorry fact is that the music business is full of disreputable and dishonest people who routinely rob and cheat musicians.   Just look at the recent debacle in New York where Communtiy Concerts, once in the reliable hands of Columbia Aritists, was sold to a famous independent impresario who then proceeded to steal more than 2 MILLION DOLLARS  from her artists, who she never paid, though she was paid by the venues. She is now under investigation by the Attorney General of the State of New York, and will most certainly be prosecuted and jailed eventually.  I know of another agent in California who is likewise crooked, and has been robbing artists left and right over the last three years, and who will soon be exposed to the light of day by me and others.

Believe me:  The music business is ugly, very , very ugly.  The very laws that protect the public in the real estate and financial industries, which police those who work within it and keep those buinesses fundamentally and largely honest (notwithstanding  a few horrid anomolies, of course, and dishonest individuals who get the greatest media attention --such as Enron) , are ignored in the music business. The laws that govern the financial world were designed to protect the public. But they also protect its own workers and brokers, who all know what the limits are,  what ethics are all about,  and what they can and cannot get away with . Anyone in the financial sector know that to engage in risky, unethical  and illegal behavior will only result eventually  in the irrevocable loss of their  licenses  and livelihoods, and possibly their freedom.

Unfortunately, where the music business is concerned, our legislators simply turn a blind eye and presume that the so-called entertainment business is really not so serious or worthy of being governed or policed in the same way, thought the laws make absolutely no distinction when it comes to issues of fiduciary responsiblity, representation, agency , and negotiation on behalf of third parties. So you get a lot of people in the music business who routinely take unfair advantage of musicians, illegally requiring large retainers upfront, then illegally comingling these and their  clients'  fees and  funds likewise with their own monies, blurring the lines and  then  failing to account for every penny. It's scandalous.  A number of high profile lawsuits will be necessary to get things back on track, and plenty of media attention. Of course, there are musicans too, who are no better, and think they can get away without paying commissions to those agents who are in fact lawfully operating. Witness the lawsuit that bankrupted Andre Watts a couple of years ago, when he lost his suit, and several hundred thousand dollars, to his agent. 

Well  the expose  may be getting started now, in fact, and I am contributing to that attention for the sake of those musicians who have been dupbe,  thanks  to my international  press and media forums. 

So take my advice, kids:  NEVER  believe anyone in this business simply because they say something. Get a contract. Get it in writing. Spell it out. Make sure the contract is enforceable and not written under duress or coercion.

JOHN BELL YOUNG
www.johnbellyoung.com
www.johnbellyoung.org
www.enocharden.net
www.concertartist.info/IMCA
www.masterclass.ws

[SDL]

Not all are.  I know a concert pianist who is really really busy - concerts, recordings etc.  But he's always got no money.  Dont forget it depends on your business sense and other life factors.  If you are rich it doesnt mean you are rich purely from the sucess of your main profession.   Most musicians need more than performing to earn their 'bread and butter'.

[Dikai]

that's why j.s. bach was quite fortunate not having to worry about money...
but poor beethoven, poor mozart, poor many 1~200+ year-old musicians, how depressing, if they were to choose again, i bet they wouldn't wanna be musicians...

but it's true that you need quite a bit of capital for this road... think of my parents' generation, only rich people can afford a fair piano not to mention the lessons...  we're certainly lucky...  we don't live in poverty... i thank my parents for everything they've done to me... or i wouldn't be here today... but GOD, i thank those people who invented COMPUTERS!!

[chsbob]

Certainly. They all are. Bill Gates and Warren Buffett for example.

[johnnypiano]

I am rich in musicianship, talent, good looks. poetry of expression; but starving in a cold, unsheltered room at night, and in the day stepped over in the street.