You can help working musicians thrive
Everybody wants to be the sort of person who helps others, but many of us feel like our own needs aren’t met. And we get into the trap of thinking that, because we feel under-resourced or lonely or wounded ourselves, we don’t have anything to share with anyone else. We believe that if we only had more, we’d be generous. We’d serve our community, but only after our lives stop feeling so chaotic.
But I’ve learned a truth: if I just start looking for opportunities to help those around me, and do what I can to help even in small ways, I’ll eventually find myself surrounded by a community of folks who will take care of me too. My buddies call this the Abundance Mindset. We believe that there’s enough for everyone. So helping others actually helps create the kind of community where you get taken care of too.
Help for working musicians.
I’m a working musician, I play in a rock band, and a lot of my friends are in bands or have solo projects. I have met so many people who are kindhearted, genuine music makers and fans. People who love others faithfully, are curious about others, and who take mutual commitment and mutual aid seriously.
We’ve partnered with those kindhearted people to start a nonprofit community called Holy Fool. We connect with working musicians (folks in bands, singer-songwriters, etc.) and we help them build a creative life for themselves that feels sustainable.
Our goal is to help musicians figure out how to thrive in the real world as it is. Let’s say nothing changes systemically, Spotify still pays next to nothing, touring is still as expensive as it is, etc. How can you be as successful and excellent as you can be in the real world and the real business of music? If we’ve got any tips or tricks or best practices, we’re giving those away for free.
We also help each other through a non-competitive network of mutual help. Did your amp just blow up before a big show? Borrow mine! Need some help managing the merch table? Let me be a friend to you in that way. Need a little bit of cash to invest in better gear or to help defray some of the cost of recording? We’ve got a fund of money we can give out as micro-grants! We help take care of each other.
We want to thrive in the world as it is, but we also want to imagine together the world as it should be. What world could we create, where working musicians are honored and fairly compensated? We want to help musicians get organized and build diverse friendships and coalitions with others with a like mind and similar calling.
So we need your help!
You can support the Holy Fool community in three ways:
Dinner Groups. We host dinner parties for working musicians. Think of these gatherings as somewhere between a supper club, a professional development cohort, and maybe like a trade guild meeting. We make some good food, open some nice bottles, and we ask each other questions like, “What barriers and struggles are you experiencing right now that keep you from creating in the way you want to?” We discuss big problems and small problems. And we then give each other tips and advice and figure out if we can help solve these problems in the context of community.
If you’re in Colorado, and you want to join or host a dinner group, just send me an email (holyfoolco@gmail.com).
Holy Fool House Shows. A house show is a wonderful opportunity for music makers and fans of music to get proximate and start to care for and support each other. House shows typically have two bands / solo artists, and a short interview of both artists between their sets.
At house shows, we typically ask each artist three questions: What are some barriers you experience in your real life that keep you from creating sustainably? What are some ways that fans of your music could help? What are some ways that other musicians in your community could support you?
Our desire is to build empathy and commitment among a fan community and help move folks from a consumer mindset into a patron mindset. We can all do something, however small, to support the songwriters and artists that we love. We also want to help musicians move from a mindset of competition into a mindset of community and mutual help. We can’t all be out only for ourselves and expect the scene to thrive.
If you’re in Colorado and interested in hosting or performing at a house show, send me an email (holyfoolco@gmail.com).
Fundraising. We’re raising money for our Holy Fool Fund, which we can give out as micro-grants. We’d also like to hire a small team of part time staff to help keep us organized and do the work of mentoring and encouraging artists. If you’re interested in donating to Holy Fool, go to holyfoolco.com and click “make a donation.” Most folks give between $10 and $50 per month. All donations are tax deductible!
Thanks for reading! We can make something beautiful together, it just takes all of us moving out of scarcity into abundance and out of competitiveness into community.
Ben Sooy
Holy Fool
