Parenthood and performance, do they work together?
After a
few months of realising I want to become a dad, it’s dawned on me that maybe my
music career would be taking a different direction. After all, how can I keep
climbing that musical hill and be a dedicated father to one or maybe more kids
at the same time? This is what I want to explore and discuss in this post.
Obviously, there are many aspects to this topic. Where to start being
the main one...
In my
opinion, it can work. I would of course personally make sure that everything is
provided for and maintained whichever my working situation, I would always have
the child in mind with everything I do, whether I’m working a regular day job
or a night shift, whether its evening or early morning work. That said,
performing music (in my circumstances) isn’t exactly a regular contracted, guaranteed
hours job. It’s more of a challenge to get the gigs in, making it financially
viable, and after that, landing a gig or two every week just to make a weekly
payday. Indeed I realised that even
before I started gigging, that I couldn’t rely on solely just performance to
make ends meet. And at the same time, I knew the challenges of the whole self-employed
situation before I became a sole trader, i.e. keeping the next week booked in
with enough work to keep going. But, I know that the music industry doesn’t have
the same demand regarding venues as plastering or decorating does, as much as
it is the same game for finding work.
I also think that, as
much as I want to be gigging, playing and rehearsing as much as possible, it wouldn’t
hinder my abilities and time to be with my future kid(s). It’s a definite no-no
to keep putting off family time. But it goes without saying that other immediate
family should see the child on a regular/irregular basis anyway, such as the
grandparents, which could potentially come to the arrangement of weekly visits to their
house for a night each, which may well in turn could open up the days of the week id be
behind the kit. I have a few friends who have kids and still manage to perform
and rehearse around their family life, who encourage the idea of still going out
and doing the things for your own self and also as a couple, just to maintain
sanity (this I find is a pretty standardised thing even if one of the parents isnt anything about a musician). However, it’s not like I’d
be gigging every single weekend of the year as it is, currently it’s more like
once or twice every two or three weeks.
I guess it could also depend on how regular, how far and how
many days away it would mean. The aspect of “touring”, be it round the world or
the UK, kind of means it would be weeks on end of not being home at all. This is
of course the extreme end of things, one of which I would not really see myself
doing within the next five years. And at the same time, I wouldn’t regard my
musical endeavours as a “touring” situation. As I said, it’s more like two or
three gigs every two or three weeks, and any of these gigs can be as close as
to be able to be back home that same evening.
Another important aspect is the other parent’s view/needs. If
it were to be a situation where there was no one else to visit and look after the
children, how can the musician expect the other parent to constantly be babysitter
while they’re out on a Friday or Saturday playing music? I think it depends on
the ability of anyone else to cover for the other parent while they let their
hair down too. I personally wouldn’t expect my partner to be at home every time
I’m at a gig, if anything, I want them to be with me at the gig anyway. I wouldn’t have them stressing at the fact
that I’m out of the house on any given evening, not if there’s another way
around it. But yes, there are so many different scenarios involved that I couldn’t
possible cover every angle on that. Thoughts??
My dad’s dad used to be in the CBSO on the French horn, and
my mum’s dad used to play gigs on a regular on the double bass in a good few
jazz bands. (They say talent skips a generation?!) And my parents have said
before that they remember asking mummy where daddy is, although not necessarily
overly upset or affected psychologically by the irregular/regular absence of
their parent.
All I’m asking is for some kind of input as to whether it’s
a good move to be still maintaining a level of dedication to making music with
a young family, or is it just selfish in that performing music can be seen as a
hobby, more so than a job that is enjoyed?
