{"id":1574,"date":"2020-04-22T18:21:15","date_gmt":"2020-04-22T23:21:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/?p=1574"},"modified":"2020-04-22T18:21:15","modified_gmt":"2020-04-22T23:21:15","slug":"musicians-face-the-music-with-covid-19-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/blog\/2020\/04\/22\/musicians-face-the-music-with-covid-19-crisis\/","title":{"rendered":"Musicians face the music with COVID-19 crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>During the COVID-19 pandemic, many states are under quarantine or a stay-at-home order. This has caused most public events to be canceled.<\/p>\n<p>Only essential personnel, including emergency workers and grocers, are able to work.<\/p>\n<p>What about musicians that relied on public events to support themselves?<\/p>\n<p>How are small bands trying to maintain or grow their public audience while respecting orders to stay isolated?<\/p>\n<p>Two years ago, In Brooklyn, New York, twins Talor and Jordan Steinberg started their band, The Moon City Masters.<\/p>\n<p>Talor Steinberg, a vocalist and electric guitarist, talked about what they are doing to keep their music alive.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur band is in that stage where we\u2019re trying to get as many people to see us as we can,\u201d Steinberg said.<\/p>\n<p>They\u2019ve taken their artistry to social media. One of the most successful uses of social media has been on Tik Tok, a video-sharing app which launched in 2016 in China.<\/p>\n<p>The brothers posted a video on Christmas doing a cover of \u201cBlack Dog\u201d by Led Zeppelin on Tik Tok and got around 30,000 followers in a week.<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 474px;\" class=\"wp-video\"><video class=\"wp-video-shortcode\" id=\"video-1574-1\" width=\"474\" height=\"316\" preload=\"metadata\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"video\/mp4\" src=\"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/video1-mcm.mp4?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/video1-mcm.mp4\">https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/video1-mcm.mp4<\/a><\/video><\/div>\n<p>\u201cIt is honestly the best thing for our band,\u201d Steinberg said. \u201cWe have 70 thousand followers. If all of them look up our music, that would be life-changing. We get a couple of thousand streams a week because of Tik Tok and it doesn\u2019t result in any money, but we still get to have our Moon City Masters passion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to Steinberg, because of the income he gets from teaching guitar lessons, he was able to pay rent and still \u201cbe comfortable.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The brothers did a livestream on Instagram and Tik Tok at the beginning of April and have plans to do it every month for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe cool thing is we got to play for people all over the country,\u201d Steinberg said. \u201cWe get a lot of requests to play in Florida and all over the Midwest that we would need to make more money to do so and it was just cool to play for them because I don\u2019t know when we\u2019d get to do it in person.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Steinberg said he read comments from fans in Russia and Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p>1,099 miles away, in Winona, Minnesota, a small-town band is dealing with similar things.<\/p>\n<p>Spencer Klausing, Tyler Steinley and Jackson Nielsen of Afflatus discussed how Minnesota\u2019s stay-at-home order has affected them.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1576\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1576\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/photo1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1576\" src=\"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/photo1-300x236.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"236\" srcset=\"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/photo1-300x236.jpg 300w, https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/photo1-1024x804.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/photo1-768x603.jpg 768w, https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/photo1.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1576\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo submitted by Afflatus of the members performing.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cAll our shows have been cancelled and we haven\u2019t been practicing keeping distance from each other,\u201d Steinley, the drummer, said. \u201cIt\u2019s come to a standstill for the most part.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to Steinley, the group isn\u2019t livestreaming on social media but, they have \u201ctalked about it, but nothing yet.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI play in three groups and we were all getting prepared for a busy festival season of playing shows outdoors for huge crowds. Summer is my favorite time of year and I just love playing outdoor gigs,\u201d Nielson, the bass guitarist, said. \u201cAll we can do is make the best out of a bad situation. Hopefully, we can get a tour going in the fall and play out a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The members of Afflatus admitted they don\u2019t make money from playing as it is more for the sake of performing right now.<\/p>\n<p>Steinley gave advice to other bands. \u201cDo what you want during this time. It\u2019s the perfect opportunity to focus on creativity and being productive,\u201d Steinley said. \u201cAlso the perfect time to rest and take a break from everything if that\u2019s what you feel like that\u2019s what you need.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During the COVID-19 pandemic, many states are under quarantine or a stay-at-home order. This has caused most public events to be canceled. Only essential personnel, including emergency workers and grocers, are able to work. What about musicians that relied on public events to support themselves? How are small bands trying to maintain or grow their &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/blog\/2020\/04\/22\/musicians-face-the-music-with-covid-19-crisis\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Musicians face the music with COVID-19 crisis<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":315,"featured_media":1575,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[338,566],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1574","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-art","category-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/04\/photo2.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1574","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/315"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1574"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1574\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1578,"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1574\/revisions\/1578"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1575"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educate.winona.edu\/winona360\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}