How much to music producers earn
Hi guys,
i just wanted to know how much would an average music producer earn and if there are any people out there who would like to quote their earnings just so i have a clear idea on how to make
a living through music production…
loooooooooooooooooooooooooool 
yeah, you don’t make anything dude. Nobody makes a living off selling their music anymore. Even the top sellers on beatport don’t make enough to support themselves. Unless you own the label, you make >$0.25 off each track you sell, and a top spot on the charts is in the hundreds of copies sold, thats it. You will also not see that money for at least 4 months if you are lucky, as labels seem to send out royalties quarterly.
Ironically, in the music business, music is just a means to an end. The real money comes in playing shows. If you want to get paid doing this, hopefully you create good enough music so that ppl actually care enough to come see you play it live.
A few nick and dime bags here and there, sometimes some beer
Most I ever made off a single release was probably around $700, though that was in the vinyl only days. I probably spent 2-3x times that in postage over the years previous just trying to get a track signed
These days if I sell an album myself on Bandcamp, I can make $300-$500 on it over a couple of years. Maybe about 1/3rd that if I go with Beatport and the other usual outlets, those aggregator cuts add up. But I’ve also been doing this for over 20 years and have a very small but loyal following.
These days releases are almost like calling cards more than anything (if you want to make money anyway). Get the tracks out there to help build your name, but it’s the DJ and live gigs that actually pay decently (sometimes). I still find it odd that I can make almost as much for a couple hours of work in one night, as I can selling an album that took me year of work to create.
Then again, I put almost zero effort into promoting my releases these days too.
Agree with the above posts - no money really comes from production, you do it for love or PR. here’s an interesting read from re/code regarding where the money is probably going to be coming from in the near future.
If you’re just producing tracks in your own name, it’s not a viable career and won’t pay your rent or mortgage!
HOWEVER, you can diversify and manage to pay the bills. If you get into writing music for tv, video games, films etc then you can get paid enough to get by.
Don’t quit your day job just yet!