Help me hire local musicians while I'm on tour!

Hi, my name is Ben Jones. I'm a New York-based singer. I'm taking my music on tour in the US in 2024-25, and I could use your help. I want to hire as many local professional musicians as I can while I'm on tour. Musicians everywhere have been hit particularly hard over the past five years, and I'd like to do what I can to provide employment to local professionals wherever I appear.

The ticket prices venues charge in various markets (normally $20-60) are really determined by the market, and not by our touring costs. In most cases, our "takeaway pay" at any given venue only covers the travel, lodging and a little bit more for my music director and myself. I want to keep ticket prices reasonable, so in order to hire local musicians to fill out the sound and put on a great show at various venues while we're touring, I raise money.

The funds will help pay for:

If it's helpful, think of it this way - each musician I hire to play this 75-minute show should get at least a couple hundred dollars for the performance alone. Rehearsal pay is extra, typically about $50 per hour. What that means is that for every musician I hire, we're budgeting $400-500. So far, the show is booked in 3 cities where we'll hire a band, and I'd like to add at least 3 local musicians to each of those shows. In bigger cities, I might try to hire an even bigger band.

I'll update this page with new performance dates as we add them to the tour. And I may increase our goal as we tour more.

Thanks for reading this far. Whether or not you're able to come to the show, I hope you'll donate. And if not, I hope you'll help us spread the word about the show and about this fundraiser. Every little bit helps.

See my tour dates and more at my website.