How much should you charge for weddings?

The topic of weddings has been coming up a lot lately and I want to write about musician wedding pay today.  I did an informal survey over the weekend on my Facebook page as to what musicians were getting paid and the results sort of surprised me. There were a lot of musicians getting paid around $75 and the sweet spot was between $100-$150.

Now before I give too many opinions, I want to say a few things. First, I know that money is sort of a taboo subject among musicians and especially Christian musicians. It shouldn’t be. Musicians have a right to be paid fairly for their work just as much as any other occupation. Yes, I know that there are a lot of people that don’t believe that; if you need proof, just visit YouTube and read the comments if a musician dares to try to charge for something. The ignorance is appalling but don’t kowtow to it.

Here is something I can bank on: every time I write about money and music, some people are going to push back, normally by private email. Some of those people are well-meaning Christian musicians that take the opportunity to gently lecture me that their musical contributions are a service and an honor and not about money. I appreciate that and I get it. I feel the same way. It is a privilege to play music (especially Christian music) publicly.

But all that being said, assuming you are a competent musician and assuming you are not playing as a gift for your friends, you should be adequately paid for your service at weddings. Just like the photographer and just like the florist and just like the caterers. They don’t apologize for earning money at weddings and you shouldn’t either.

The question is how much. And that is what I want to discuss for a few minutes.

Let’s take a common wedding scenario. Let’s say that the wedding is 30 minutes from your house. Let’s say there is a one-hour rehearsal on Friday night (you are invited to the dinner too) and the ceremony is on Saturday for an hour including the prelude. You are also playing a hour for the reception. Let’s also say that you have an hour of conversations with the bride ahead of time and one of her songs is new to you so you have to learn it.

How much should you charge for that wedding? In my opinion (admittedly a US-centric opinion so some of you may have to adjust), you should charge a minimum of $300. My calculation for that is simple. You are at the wedding venue for three hours so multiply 3 by $100. In other words, charge $100/hour assuming that there is nothing really unusual being asked of you.

If you are a musician and your jaw just hit the floor at the audacity of charging $100/hour, let me tell you why I think you need to adjust your thinking. First of all, the other professional services at that wedding are going to be thinking that $100/hour too. Do you think the photographer is making less than $100/hour? Not likely, even including the editing and other work that goes on around the wedding. The florist is making way more than $100/hour in all likelihood.

Second, that $100/hour is not really $100/hour. It is probably well less than $50/hour. In this particular scenario, you have an hour of prep time, two hours of travel and probably two hours of extra time at the venue (due to having to arrive early and the inefficiencies of the whole process). You have expenses too—travel, wardrobe, printed music, etc.

Let’s assume that the real rate turns out to be $50/hour. Are professional musicians worth $50/hour? Of course they are. An average music teacher earns $40-$50/hour and they are hardly getting rich.

The $100/hour is the baseline. There are other adjustments that you might need to make. Here they are:

The bride is a bridezilla. The first time you hear a bride say that the wedding is all about her or you see evidence that she is likely to mistreat you, triple your rate.

You are asked to learn a Chopin Etude. This is quite common actually. You will be sometimes asked to learn a very difficult piece of music for a wedding. At one point, I would agree to that but I don’t any more. If the music is going to take me time to learn, I decline to play period. There is no reasonable amount I could charge that would be worth it to me to invest 20 hours of time into music that I may never play again during my life.

Even though the music is not difficult, it requires practice on your own. I need to tell you that professional musicians really cannot charge for personal practice on music. Don’t try that. In theory, if professionals need to practice outside of the official practices, that is on them. You may be able to compensate a bit just by raising your hourly rate though.

You are asked to practice with other musicians outside the wedding rehearsal. Yes, you should charge for these practices. I recommend half of your normal hourly rate, so maybe $50/hour.

You are asked to spend ridiculous amounts of time going over with music with the bride and she wants you to research and buy the music on your own. Be very cautious with this. You should charge for that time when it gets unreasonable and be prepared because you are likely going to need to reference my Bridezilla advice from above.

You are told you can’t be paid for the wedding rehearsal but you are welcome to come to the rehearsal dinner. It always amazes me what people will do for a free dinner worth $10. Please stand firm and insist on real compensation for your time. Skip the dinner and go to Arby’s on the way home. Unless you have friends at the dinner, I promise you will enjoy Arby’s more. If the bride shows bridezilla tendencies, supersize or splurge on a milkshake.

You have to travel. My general rule of thumb is I don’t charge travel expenses if the venue is within 30 minutes of my house but do otherwise charge expenses (mileage/plane/hotel). There is no hard/fast rule in regards to this so do what you want. Unfortunately, you cannot really charge for the time spent traveling so you have to compensate for it with a higher hourly fee.

You have no experience playing weddings so don’t feel you should charge $100/hour. OK, do a few weddings on the cheap but don’t let me down. Start charging a fair price as soon as you can.

You are playing for a friend. Don’t bring up money and expect nothing. Graciously accept anything offered and be thankful for whatever you get.

That is about it. If you have thoughts, write them below. Some people that wrote on my Facebook page have done over 1,000 weddings so many of you have way more experience than me.