Are you a musician? Do you have health insurance? Take this survey and tell us about it.

Back in 2002, FMC asked that question and found that, of the 2,700 working musicians we surveyed, more than 44 percent of respondents did not have health insurance. This confirmed what we knew anecdotally, but it was still pretty sobering to see the numbers.

As a response, we launched the HINT project, which has been providing musicians with personalized, artist-friendly advice about their health insurance options since 2005.

With the debate about health care raging on, we have relaunched the survey during the month of March to see if artists have made any headway in terms of insurance coverage. If you are a musician or songwriter, we urge you to click here to take our survey about health insurance. This will help us learn:

• How many musicians are insured
• Whether the number increased or decreased over the last eight years
• What factors make it difficult for musicians to get insured
• Whether musicians know about the plans offered by some unions and professional organizations

Click here to participate in this important survey. And check out this guest post by FMC’s Alex Maiolo at KnowtheMusicBiz.com.

Help us with outreach

This survey will be open until April 1, and we want thousands of musicians and songwriters to take part. You can help by encouraging as many musicians as possible to take survey by posting information about it on your blog, your MySpace account, your Facebook page, or as a Twitter update. Sample text and links are available here.

Research results

FMC will aggregate and asses the survey data in April, and will release a report in May 2010. Keep your eyes right here, or follow us on Facebook or Twitter to see the results.

And if you’re planning on being at SXSW, stop by the Convention Center on Thursday, March 18 at 2:00 PM for a special Mentor Session on musicians and health insurance with FMC’s Alex Maiolo. It’s a great way to learn about the HINT program and schedule an appointment for a more in-depth phone consultation.

Speaking of South-By…

For a decade, FMC has descended on not-so-sleepy Austin, Texas to participate in discussions about, well, the future of music, and hobnob with the incredible array of artists, managers, entrepreneurs, visionaries, media gurus, rabble-rousers and just about anyone else you can think of. Since we’re a musician-centric shop, you can usually find an FMC staffer playing a show or ten.

This year, we’ve got lots of awesome stuff lined up. Our handy SXSW page has all the times, room numbers and details. Or, visit our networked schedule.

Here are some highlights:

Weds, March 17 @ 2:00 PM
Social Networks and the Future for Musicians
FMC’s technologies director Brian Zisk joins Dave Allen (Pampelmoose, Gang of Four), Raquel DiSabatino (Facebook), Charles Fishman (Cisco) and Ethan Kaplan (Warner/Elektra/Atlantic Music) to talk about where artist-driven social media is heading.

Thursday, March 18 @ 2:00 PM
Mentor Session 3: featuring Alex Maiolo, HINT Project Coordinator
FMC’s Health Insurance Navigation Tool (HINT) project coordinator, Alex Maiolo, will be on hand to discuss health insurance for musicians.

Thursday, March 18 @ 3:30 PM
Creative Capitol: Music, Culture and Policy under Obama
With just over a year since this administration took office, it’s a good time to reflect on how the creative industries are faring in the current executive, agency and legislative environments. FMC Policy Director Michael Bracy will lead a discussion with Beltway players including Austin Schlick (General Counsel, Federal Communications Commission) Tim Tuten (Hideout Nightclub, Chicago/Department of Education) and Christine Varney (Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust, Department of Justice).

FMC Board member Bryan Calhoun will also be a presence on panels, as will advisory board folks like John Strohm, Ian Rogers, Leron Rogers, Sandy Pearlman and Jim Griffin. Our very own Jean Cook will be performing with a bunch of different bands, notably at the Bloodshot Records showcase.

Check out our SXSW page for all the FMC-related activities, as well as some stuff we just think will be cool to check out. Hope to see you in Austin!

We’re incredibly excited about the upcoming Artist Activism Camp (our sixth!) and the Musicians Bringing Musicians Home benefit concert, which will take place at One Eye Jacks in New Orleans on Friday, March 26, 2010.

FMC and Air Traffic Control have been organizing Artist Activism Camps in New Orleans since 2006. From March 24-27, a dozen working musicians will convene in the Big Easy to share stories, tour affected neighborhoods, visit with the city’s notable musicians and community leaders and participate in strategy sessions about integrating activism and philanthropy into their musical lives and careers.

Musicians Bringing Musicians Home is the celebratory finale of our sixth three-day activist retreat. On Friday, March 26, camp participants Ryan Dobrowski + Israel Nebeker (Blind Pilot), Rebecca Gates, Thao Nguyen (Thao with the Get Down Stay Down), Toshi Reagon, Matana Roberts, Jill Sobule, Jon Theodore (One Day As A Lion) will join New Orleans trombone ensemble Bonerama for an amazing collaborative show that raises money for Sweet Home New Orleans.

The benefit concert is only $10 and open to the music-loving public. Get your tickets while they’re still available!

New Orleans music scribe and editor Alex Rawls of OffBeat Magazine has this to say about the Musicians Bringing Musicians Home concert:

“The shows always include at least a moment or two of the real stuff you go to live shows to see. Whether it’s Alec Ounsworth taking his first crack at ‘St. James Infirmary’ in front of a live audience or the Indigo Girls helping Al ‘Carnival Time’ Johnson learn ‘I Shall Be Released’ onstage, the shows are musically rewarding, and the ‘last-night-of-camp’ vibe is positive and contagious.”

Musicians Bringing Musicians Home VI and the retreats are part an ongoing commitment to helping Big easy musicians get back to their communities where they’ll help sustain New Orleans music and culture for generations to come. Please join us!

We’re amazed at the response to our online comments tool that helps you tell the FCC how you use the internet in your lives and careers. And we just got great news: the Commission has pushed the filing deadline for reply comments back to April 8, 2010. That means you still have time to add your own perspective to this historic proceeding.

Check out our comments tool page for more info on how to submit.

Words Beats & Life and Future of Music Coalition are teaming up for a hands-on discussion about music promotion and social change in a digital age.

IF I RULED THE BLOGOSPHERE: Hip-Hop Blogs and Social Change
Saturday, April 3
4 – 7 PM
Busboys & Poets
14th and V Streets NW, Washington, DC
RSVP
Not in DC? Catch the live webcast at: http://web.illish.us/

The event will feature prominent hip-hop bloggers in a dynamic conversation about how artists are gaining traction online, the impact of technology on music promotion and how bloggers and artists can raise awareness about important issues in the hip-hop community and beyond.

The first half of the discussion will feature some of the most influential hip-hop bloggers in the country including: Meka Udoh (2 Dope Boyz), Dallas Penn (Dallas Penn & the Internets Celebrities), Jason Reynolds (OkayPlayer), Frank William Miller Junior (FWMJ of rappersiknow.com) and Chris Rabb (Afro-Netizen) talking about why they do what they do and what they’re looking for to create compelling content. These dedicated champions of hip-hop will address questions like: “How do I get attention for my project?” “What should I be thinking about in terms of web presence?” “What kinds technologies exist to help me do all this?”

Following these discussions, FMC will talk about how policy shapes what the hip-hop community does, where it goes and what it says on the online. We will also present information that bloggers, artists, and fans can use to protect their right to free speech and entrepreneurship via the open Internet.

A question and answer/peer learning session will also take place immediately after, during which attendees will be able to network with peers, panelists and presenters.

For more details or to RSVP

Those who have followed FMC’s work over the past decade know that we’ve been strong supporters of establishing a public performance right for terrestrial radio. We want to see a public performance right that establishes a level playing field with digital radio services that already pay this right (satellite radio, webcasting, cable radio services, etc.), and we want it established in a way that allows community radio stations and smaller, independent commercial broadcasters to flourish. Why? Because compensating performing artists directly for the use of their work is simply the right thing to do. Check out our Public Performance Right fact sheet to learn more.

On March 3, FMC Policy Director Michael Bracy spent a couple of hours on Capitol Hill with one of our favorite artists, the wonderful and talented Erin McKeown. Erin and Michael attended a news conference hosted by the MusicFIRST Coalition that featured Dionne Warwick and top leaders from the civil rights community, all of whom endorsed legislation for a public performance right.

After the event, Erin weighed in on how she views the issue as a working musician and songwriter. Check out her blog post.

We wanted to remind you all about two upcoming events organized by FMC’s very own Technologies Director, Brian Zisk.

The Future of Money & Technology Summit brings together the best and brightest thinkers around money. This includes visionaries, entrepreneurial business folk, developers, press, investors, authors, solution providers, service providers and the organizations that work with them at the convergence of commerce and technology. Attendees meet to discuss the evolving money ecosystem in a proactive, dealmaking-friendly environment.

The Future of Money & Technology Summit
Hotel Kabuki, San Francisco, CA
Monday, April 26, 2010
9am – 6pm + cocktail party
http://www.futureofmoney.com

Register at this URL and get 10% off!
http://fomt.eventbrite.com/?discount=fmc

The next installment of Brian’s popular and provocative SanFran MusicTech Summit takes place on May 17th. SFMTS convenes the most forward-looking minds in the music technology space to talk about the ever-evolving landscape for digital music and the challenges and opportunities it presents.

SanFran MusicTech Summit
Hotel Kabuki, San Francisco, CA
Monday, May 17, 2010
9am – 6pm + cocktail party
http://www.sanfranmusictech.com

Register here and get 10% off!
http://sfmts6.eventbrite.com/?discount=fmc

Recently added speakers include:

Tom Conrad - CTO, Pandora
Jack Conte - Songwriter, Musician, Pamplomoose
Roberto Fisher - MySpace Music
Celia Hirschman - One Little Indian / KCRW “On The Beat” / Downtown Marketing
Ian Hogarth - SongKick, CEO
Dan Kantor - Founder & CEO, ExtensionFM
Roger Linn - Founder, Roger Linn Design
Alex Loscos - Co Founder & CEO, Barcelona Music & Audio Technologies (BMAT)
Reno Marioni - Nokia, Head of Strategic Internet Partnerships
Noah Maffitt - LiveNation.com, Executive VP & GM Global Digital
Dana Oshiro - ReadWriteWeb, Blogger / Startup Strategist
Michael Robertson - MP3Tunes, Founder
Tim Quirk - Rhapsody - VP of Programming
Ge Wang - Co-founder, CTO, and Chief Creative Officer, Smule
Chris Wiltsee - Executive Director, San Francisco Chapter, The Recording Academy
…and more at http://sfmusictech.com

You can always contact us at suggestions [at] futureofmusic [dot] org if you have any questions.

Thanks,

Jean Cook
Michael Bracy
Walter McDonough
Brian Zisk
Kristin Thomson
Casey Rae-Hunter
Chhaya Kapadia
Nicole Duffey
Alex Maiolo

Donate to the Future of Music Coalition!
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