[MUSIC] I'm here today with Dave Pomeroy, who's the president of the Nashville Musicians Association, which is part of the American Federation of Musicians, this is Local 257. Is that right? >> That's correct. >> All right. He was elected in 2008, took office in 2009, and before that, had a long and successful career as a bass player as well, was very well known for his work playing music with people like Amy Lou Harris, Elton John, George Jones, Trisha Yearwood, many, many others that you've heard of. Dave, thank you so much for agreeing to spend some time with us today. >> It's my pleasure. >> I would like to start with a question that I've been asking a lot of the interviewees, a sort of big picture question. What are some of the big movements and changes and shifts that you see happening right now from your position in the music industry? >> Well, that's a good question, and it is a big one. I would say that probably the biggest change has been in the way in which music is distributed and shared. And I think the corollary to that is that live music, which back in the 1940s, a lot of people were sure that records would eliminate live music. And we have found that not to be true. So I think at the same time where there's been these very drastic changes in the way that people get recorded music, also to me, it's very interesting that the live music community and the audience continues to grow. Because that's the one experience that you can't fully appreciate through your computer. >> Yes. >> Is being in the room when it's happening and the air is moving, and so I find those two things to be kind of interesting parallel tracks. But definitely the distribution, and of course, all of the economics and the changes in the economics that have come from that are probably the single most significant hurdle that people have to deal with these days. And trying to predict the future and basing your moves on something that hasn't actually happened yet or is in the process of happening is very different from the old paradigm. >> Mm-hm. I know that a lot of young people who come to Nashville and want to be musicians come to the union and say, how do I start? What do I do? Who do I talk to? What do you say to these fresh faces that come to town and want to make it? >> Well a lot of times I start by trying to identify what it is that they do. And a lot of times people will come in, wander into the musicians' union, and perhaps they're really more songwriting oriented. But I also try to make sure that I understand kind of what their skill set is or at least what they think their skill set is, and then kind of maybe offer them advice about which kind of people they need to be talking to. We do send a lot of people over to the Nashville Songwriters Association. If they need to know the fundamentals of being a professional songwriter, that's a great education. We have a lot of singer-songwriters and artists that are members of our organization. And a lot of times, we have to educate people, both experienced people and people who are perhaps novices, that even as a singer-songwriter, your musical performance. If you accompany yourself, that performance has value and is a separate entity than your songwriting, the song itself, or even your vocal performance. Your instrumental performance is its own separate entity that can occasionally make a big difference for you financially. So, we do try to kind of identify what someone's skill set is, point them in the right direction. A lot of times, we say to people, here are the things that we can do for you, and only you can decide when these things are pertinent to your career and you want to come on board. It's not our goal to get people to join just to get their dues money if they don't really know what they're getting or they don't know how to access what we can do for them. So it is a bit of an education process on the front end. But I tell people a lot that if there's another way you can make a living that doesn't kill your soul, that that can be a real help because then you can make a different set of musical choices that may have more lasting value in terms of, not only musical integrity but also in terms of your career path. And if you're solely living from gig to gig it changes the kind of decisions you make. So, a lot of times, it's really just a little Q&A and figuring out where the path of this particular person is going to intersect with our path, or perhaps not. >> That's interesting. It sounds like you're saying that people should maybe have a lot of irons in the fire, a lot of maybe tools in their kit that they can work with in order to make it as a musician. Would you agree with that, or what kind of skills do you think- >> No, I think that's a good observation. I mean for me, I grew up in the sort of post-Beatles era, if you like, and all I ever wanted was to be in a band that people liked. I never thought about how can I make a living doing this, those kind of things. And so as I learned more and as I experienced more, more choices became available to me. I never considered myself or thought about being a songwriter. I love to jam, I love to play. I love to do those things in a band, but in terms of writing for other people, it's not something I thought about in terms of being a studio musician. It just wasn't on my radar until I was exposed to situations where I began to understand what it is a studio musician does. It was like, well, maybe I could do that. So, I think a lot of it is keeping a real open mind, especially in today's world. And one of the biggest challenges for me to talk to a young musician is to kind of put myself back 35 years, to where I didn't really know what I know now. But also, you can do that with your attitude, but you've also got to take into account the environment that we're in now. So it's kind of a bit of a time travel thing that you have to do sometimes. But sometimes people come here and they don't really know what they want to do. And that's okay as well because if you can learn by exposing yourself to these things in the real world as opposed to a theoretical exercise, living in a small town somewhere and going, well, if I went to Nashville, would I do this or that, or this or that? You really have to come here, it's the old must be present to win. >> [LAUGH] >> But I do think that it's important to let people know what the variety of choices may be. Because the more you go forward in a career, it's like things open up sideways as well and you kind of, you'll see something. There's every fork in the road leads you to something different. And some of the best things that ever happened to me in my career were very coincidental on the surface, but were part of a bigger thread of I was just turning over every rock I could find to figure out a way of not get a real job. [LAUGH] >> And now look at you, you've got a real job. >> Yeah well, this is a good example of the last thing in the world I would have expected when I moved to Nashville would be to become president of the labor union, but it was a very gradual and somewhat organic process. So I'm grateful for that, and I'm grateful that my parents taught me to pay attention. [LAUGH] [MUSIC] >> Can you tell us a little bit about the history of the American Federation of Musicians? >> Absolutely. The AFM, the American Federation of Musicians, was founded in 1896. I believe the first local was Cincinnati, Ohio. And Nashville, The Nashville chapter was founded in 1902. And, back in those days, I think the music was the only entertainment form there was. There wasn't television. I'm not sure exactly when radio began, but one of the early things that musicians needed representation for was working in movie theaters in the days of silent movies. And at one point it was just a piano player, you sort of see that cliche of the piano player accompanying the thing. But there were also orchestras that did that, and then of course when talking movies came along that was a huge crisis not unlike the kind of things that have happened to us many years later where sometimes we think that these crises are only happening now in our time. And so these musicians were challenged by the talking movies, suddenly it meant well, we don't need musicians except to play on the break. And then radio came along and all the musicians got gigs working at radio stations because every independent radio station, not every, but a lot of them had their own orchestra and their own programming. Then, of course, syndicated radio came along and all of a sudden one performance could be beamed to many other places and that was a terrible crisis. So there's been a lot of change, but a lot of commonality over the years. And Nashville has, for whatever reasons, I don't think it's just coincidence, part of it is the central location, but Nashville over the years became a place where people came to become a professional and get paid. And the Grand Ole Opry, of course, started back in the 30s and Nashville back in the day was called the Athens of the South, which was a reference to the educational institutions that are here. Of course, the Fisk Jubilee Singers were founded in the 1800s and performed for the queen of England and rumor has it that the queen said something along the lines of, you sound incredible, you must be from the city of music which is one theory of where the term, music city, came from. No one can talk to Queen Victoria and find that out, but Nashville has just kind of been a magnet and so the union here has been much more influential than one might think for a city of this size. In fact currently Nashville is the 25th largest city in the United States but we have the third largest musician's union, after New York and Los Angeles. And so the blue grass musicians from Virginia and east Tennessee came here because the Grand Ole Opry became kind of a beacon of, if I could just get on the Grand Ole Opry. And then of course Bill Monroe came down from Kentucky. Some of the session players that were part of the scene in Atlanta, Muscle Shoals, Memphis, a lot of those, the early groups of those session musicians migrated here because the pay was better, they were treated more professionally. And Nashville was also, the local here was one of the first locals to go to the American Federation of Musicians and say, we have incredible musicians who cannot read music and we can't give them, they're going to fail the entrance exam so can we waive the entrance exam because these country and hillbilly and blues musicians- >> There used to be a test? >> Yeah, there was and you had to demonstrate that you could read music, that you could hold a pair of drum sticks or whatever your chosen instrument was. And so Nashville, I think just became a real world kind of place where all these different kinds of music coexisted, and of course, the stereotype is that Nashville's all about country music, and frankly it's never been that way. There's an incredible rhythm and blues scene. The gospel scene, going all the way back to real traditional gospel music. There's always been a very healthy scene here, and the union has been able to create a sense of professionalism and respect. And so by the time Elvis got signed to RCA records, and RCA opened a Nashville office and they built studio B, and of course Owen and Harold Bradley had build their own studio. Owen Bradley was a big band leader. And Chet Atkins was, of course, an accomplished guitar player. But yet they stepped into these executive type roles and I think that is part of why the business structure of Nashville worked, because you had actual musicians creating this business model. And Chet and Owen and George Cooper who was president here for 38 years they were very adamant that if you're going to use our musicians, you're going to pay them under a union contract. And that's what built Music City. And in the beginning there was 15, 20 people who did the vast majority of the recording sessions. But it's always been a touring center as well. And then when Bob Dylan came here in the late 60s, it really shone the light on the music community here and the fact that even though these fellows like Charlie McCoy and Wayne Moss could play country music, and did play country music, they were also capable of a very wide range of stuff. And so when Dylan heard what these guys could do, he became the beacon for that. And so I think that was a real turning point to where Nashville has kind of continually reinvented itself. And the union has been involved in the vast majority of that. And so over the years the union has had to evolve and change which led to me getting more involved and wanting to make a difference. Because I stumbled into it. Somebody, I don't even know who it was, said kid you gotta join the union. I'm like, okay. What's the union? Where do I go? What? And so I joined and I was fortunate enough to get a really good job with a great singer named Don Williams after I'd been here in town just a couple of years and we did a television show. Actually, it was a concert, a giant stadium at Meadowlands. And of course, I was happy as a clam to be playing a concert at the Meadowlands. And then turned out they filmed it. And they took a song, a clip of a song called Good Old Boys Like Me that was Don's number one single at the time and it was on the American Top 40 with Casey Kasem television show and it aired at the end of December of one year, and then January it aired again. And I got paid twice, over $1,000 for a gig that I'd already done and had a great time at and been paid for. And I thought, wow, at the time I didn't know the term intellectual property didn't exist. >> Right. >> But that's what it was. We did a job and then it was recorded and the recording became its own entity. And that was my sort of wake up call as far as wow, so you do something and it lives on beyond the moment. And so, in Nashville, that tradition has been there that if you want to get the good musicians, if you want to do it right, if you want those musicians to give you 110% as opposed to 85 or whatever they feel like because it's not a legit session, it just creates this atmosphere of respect and professionalism. And the union has been able to promote that and we have collective bargaining agreements with every major entertainment industry and we negotiate these agreements every few years. We have an agreement with the film industry, we have an agreement with the jingle industry, with the record labels so you know the phono industry We also have many, many symphonic agreements. The vast majority of the orchestras in the United States are working under a union contract that is renegotiated. Here in Nashville we've been negotiating the Grand Ole Opry contract for decades and so it just, it's a way of not being alone, not being me against the world. And I think that's really what the union does more than anything is that as, we like to say, if we don't have your back who does, is anyone else looking out for you? And so even when people work non-union, there are standards that we have set that still are involved in terms of how people are compensated. But the difference between doing something on a union contract and not can be gigantic. >> Mm-hm. >> In terms of the intellectual property you create. We just billed Geico for a Roy Orbison song that was cut 50 years ago last July. And it's a great feeling that we're going to be able to get, there's three people who are still alive and two people who've passed away. And they're going to get paid as if it's a brand new recording for a Geico commercial. And it takes a few months to get it all worked out. But that's the greatest feeling ever is to get people paid for something they deserve to be paid for. And that's really what got me here was just, I was that guy in the band that said, hey can we talk about some stuff? [LAUGH] We haven't had a raise in a really long time and some of us are trying to feed our families and would that be? I was always that guy, somebody's gotta go talk to that club owner he's being a jerk and I'll go, okay I'll go. And this is all kind of extrapolated from that, but I can't even imagine what my life would have been like without the musicians' union looking out for me. >> What do you say to your union member musicians who say man, I'm just trying to feed my family? If somebody offers me $50 to record a song at their house, I can't afford to say no to this. What do you say? because I know a lot of tension is playing out right now, and you've been hosting conversations even here for, just sort of work out some of these things. >> Well, that's a great questions because it is a challenge to make a living as a musician, but it becomes a short-term and a long-term viewpoint, and the short term is, I've gotta work. But the long term is, what happens when I'm gone and all of these things that I've done have no paper trail and my kids are not going to enjoy these things? So it's, Tennessee's a right to work state which complicates things immensely for a labor union. There's just no sugar coating that at all. >> Can you say more about that? Explain what that means? >> Yeah well and I'm certainly not a labor lawyer, although I talk to a lot of them. [LAUGH] Right to work essentially, you know it sounds very noble but we actually refer to it as right to work for less. Because what it really means is that you are not required to be part of a collective bargaining organization if you choose not to be. And I think that, I don't want to guess what the intent of that was. But the result of it is that we really can't force people to do things in the way that you can in a non right to work state where you have various ways to coerce people and to convince people, which is maybe a nicer word. That hey, there's only one way to do that, and that's this way. And we're going to do it this way, because we can make you do it this way. And in the long run that's a good thing for the people who are working under the agreements. But in a right to work state, we can't really do that. We can point out to people the advantages of working this way, but we can't really deny anyone any services. Which becomes very problematic because we have members who pay dues and who pay work dues on the contracts that they work under and there's no way for us to enforce that everyone who plays the Grand Ole Opry for example is a union member. Some of these people may be coming from another state and they only play it once and they never come back. But it really, it unfortunately it lowers the bar as opposed to raising the bar but we, as a local of a national union, we have collective bargaining agreements in place. And the record labels here in Nashville have for decades understood that this is how you do it. This is the right way to do it. You don't try to circumvent these agreements. And so it is a challenge. And I would say to someone who's contemplating doing something that perhaps they shouldn't, would be to say, have you ever tried to have the conversation of, hey is there way we can do this the right way? And in Nashville there's always been a tradition of the players kind of organizing the work themselves in a non-traditional labor way. You work a couple of times for somebody, you do a great job, and then you have the conversation, as we call it. And some people are better at the conversation than others. I was one of those guys who asked enough questions on the front end to determine whether it was going to be a union session or not. And try to convince people, a lot of times it is just an education process of going, okay, all this means is that the play people that you employ, if you work under a union contract, they're going to get a pension contribution that's going to help them later. And they're going to get a health and welfare contribution that's going to help them pay for their healthcare since they're not part of a healthcare plan within the union. They do have healthcare plans in New York and LA. Frankly, it's a little problematic. And in Nashville, those health and welfare contribution just comes as additional wages and is literally intended to help defray that. But the biggest thing is creating the paper trail of the intellectual property. So for example, if you're working for an independent songwriter and you do it under a union contract, for example, or a limited pressing contract, which means you get a really good rate on the front end. But if you sell 10,000 copies, then the players are going to get another bump. Now in this day and age, if you get to 10,000 copies, you're feeling pretty good and you have made enough money to pay the players more money. But more importantly, if that song ends up in a movie or a television show or a jingle, there's a residual stream that a third party is paying and not the singer/songwriter. It's not like my song got in a commercial and I owe every body a bunch of money, which is kind of what happens when you work non-union, is you've kind of broken the chain. And it does become the songwriter's responsibility to compensate the musicians if they are an honorable person. But if you do it under a union contract that third party, whether it is Geico or Columbia Pictures, they are paying those additional uses because you created something of value. And that's the whole thing is not devaluing your own work by not using a union contract. So a lot of what we have tried to do in the last few years with the union I could sum up like this. We've gotten out of the business of no, no, no, no, you can't do that, you can't do this, you can't do this. And we're into the, how can we work together to help you understand what you need to understand to do this in a way that respects everyone involved? And to me, people say, what does the union do? And I say we promote respect for musicians and the work they do and that's the simplest part of it but you know it's a personal decision. Everybody, there are some people that have it in their mind that they don't want to have anything to do with the labor union. It's a stereotype and there are times when I wish I could go back and travel in time and talk to people like Jimmy Hoff and say hey man thanks a lot for ruining it for all of us because if I had a nickel for every Jimmy Hoff joke I've heard in the last seven years. [LAUGH] >> Yeah. >> I would be a rich man. But to me it's just a question of education and awareness and long-term thinking as opposed to I gotta have 20 bucks right now. When that 20 bucks or 50 bucks or 100 bucks, when you work for cash that's all you're ever going to make. You can just wave the rest of it goodbye and we don't have any guarantees in this world. As the older we get, we learn that. And so whatever you can do to create something that protects yourself and protects your family, going forward, is the best thing to do. And unfortunately, we have to marry the reality to the concept, and it's tricky sometimes. But I feel that the success of this union, this local long term says a lot about Nashville. It says a lot about the concept of doing it right. People wonder you guys are still thriving when the rest of the world is trying to figure out where the money is. And it's because we've created this culture of respect. And so I feel very strongly about it, but I also understand that you can't really get in people's face about it the way that you can in other places. But also to me it's just, it's an arts union. It's a different, it's a different thing in terms of, not the logistics but just in terms of the process of doing- >> Well, and the culture. >> The culture, exactly, is the word. And so it's just trying to promote a positive culture with the understanding that you can't really tell anybody what to do. But you want to help people make the right decision themselves. And that's the most powerful thing, is you know knowledge is power. >> Nashville is booming right now. And there have been a lot of media headlines here in town, about companies that are moving here, wanting to do recordings, that maybe are in areas that Nashville isn't necessarily maybe, or hasn't been known for in the past. Television, film, video games, are those companies coming here because they feel they can work more cheaply because it is a right to work state, and they can bypass some of the rules that they find in more traditional places that are more tightly governed? >> Well, that's a great question. I, my personal belief is, that people are coming here because it's a great place to live, number one. There is an incredible musician community here and If you are one of those people or one of those corporations that choose to take advantage of every way you possibly can to increase your bottom line and your profit margin, yes, there are less obstacles here in Nashville. That doesn't make it right and we have agreements that cover all that kind of work that is occasionally being done non-union. We process on the average about $12 million a year in scale wages for musicians and so a lot of people get it. And I would say that you can save money working on a union contract in Nashville because our musicians are tighter and faster than any other city on Earth. And I would say that on a stack of Bibles. Because you can, and again, which to me is an argument for why not work under a union contract? You're still going to be saving money and you're going to be respecting these musicians. And if you've got a room full of 80 musicians who are willing to do non-union work, you're not getting the best musicians. You're getting good musicians, and sometimes they're bringing people in because they can't get everybody here to, you know, play the non-union game. And there's a lot of musicians that have stood up and said I'm not going to do that because I know it's not right. And, I feel like in the long run, you know, we will the war even if we lose a battle here and there because I think there's been a fear to some extent of the level playing field. Well, if we have a level playing field where everybody is working for the same amount of money, then why would anybody come to Nashville? And which comes back to my first point, the musicians are tighter and they're faster. And you could get done in three hours in Nashville what might take you a whole day, or two or three days in another town. Whether it's a singer songwriter record, whether it's an orchestral session. To me, you know it's the efficiency and quality of what we do that trumps everything else, and if people want to. You know, big corporations want to run around Nashville doing this and hiding in the bushes and doing things they know they're not supposed to do. You know, I don't particularly want to play cops and robbers with them. But at the same time we have a very powerful force in the collective power of the musicians. And so the musicians are the ones who traditionally in Nashville have organized this work, and it's a process. And we're working very diligently towards creating that awareness and education that there's more than one way to do it and yeah sure you can know you can take the money and run but it's not right and Nashville was built on doing the right things. So it to me it go against everything that got us here and with the risk is that it will break down the system that made Nashville Music City and I'm not going to stand by and let that happen, at the same time, I'm well aware of the limits of what I can do legally and for me, ethically. Because I want to promote responsible behavior on everyone's part because in the long run it really is better for everyone. So we do have a short term issue with this right now and yeah I'm sure there are people in the top level of these corporation who don't get it. And go, you mean we can just go do whatever we want? And it's like, well you really can't and you shouldn't. And sooner or later someone's going to call you out on it, publicly or privately, or in a financial fashion. And so I'm cautiously optimistic that despite the rapid economic growth and the changes that are going on, that the principles that got us here are still very valid. And they are enforceable in various ways, but I'm trying to do it from the perspective of cooperation as opposed to conflict. [MUSIC] [INAUDIBLE] is happening on the legislative front that give a lot of musicians, really across the United States, some cause for optimism it seems. I want to get your take on a couple of those bills I guess that are being debated right now. And I know this is a little bit outside of where your normal focus is, but I'm sure that you have thought a lot about fair compensation. And I'm wondering first about the fair play fair pay act, which would provide means for players to get paid for radio airplay. >> Absolutely, well. That is a really critical issue for musicians just a little bit of background the United States is one of a very few countries that do not pay royalties to artists and musicians and copyright owners for what we call terrestrial radio, AM FM. And it's been that way for many, many years, the laws were written before the technology changed everything and the broadcasting industry has a very strong, powerful Washington DC lobby. And they have been able to keep this loophole that they enjoyed available to them even though all around the world, people get paid. The example that I use the most is Aretha Franklin, Respect, great record. In all around the world except for the United States, in Rwanda, in Iran, in North Korea and mainland China, Aretha gets paid a revenue stream when that song gets played on the radio. The record company gets a revenue stream and the musicians who played on that record share in 5% with the backup vocalists that sing on that record. But in the United States, the only person that gets paid is Otis Redding and his family because he wrote the song. And so it's never been the intention of those of us that have been lobbying for this, ridiculous loophole to be closed, to take anything away from the song writers. I think there was a fear at one time that this was a money grab by musicians and record labels taking money out of the song writers pocket. That was never the intention, it's not the reality of it, but it does need to change and we tried this in 2009. We went to congress, I walked the walls of congress with an acoustic bass playing a Bill Rose song that I had rewritten to talk about performance rights. And it didn't happen because obviously Washington has its own wonderful brand of dysfunction and it didn't happen in that time frame. But it has come along since because it's simply the right thing to do and a little Corollary in between 09 and now when we're doing this we, the AFM got involved with the UN in the area of intellectual property rights. And we went to Beijing, we had a seven person delegation, who went to Beijing in 2012 for a Enter a UN sponsored International Conference on intellectual property and audio-visual performances. And, which is something that started way back in 1960 in what they call the Rome Convention, which was the first time they established the concept of performance rights. And this treaty have been evolving over the years. In 2001, it kind of stalled. And this 2012 was the restart of this intellectual property rights treaty. And we went there for one particular reason, which was to protect a phrase in the language. Which was very important to us that says no collection without distribution. And what that means is that in Germany, for example, or Finland or all of the 95% of the countries of the world where they collect money not only for songwriters but for artists and the copyright owner which typically is the record label and the musicians. They've been collecting that money for years and if you think about American music being played overseas, it's a huge amount of music. And they, all these other countries have been sort of hiding behind the lack of a reciprocal treaty where we, America, the US, pays royalties for the German music that's played over in the States or music from Finland that's played in the States. And you know, frankly, it's a balance of trade issue. We're sending out a whole lot more music than we're taking in and so, for years, these other companies, the collectives that collect this money, have been saying, well, you don't send our people any money so we're not going to give you the money and we were able to get this treaty approved, protect that language. It's 131 countries, 45 labor organizations from all around the world, and now we have begun to get a revenue stream, even without performance rights in Congress. And so we've been collecting money from Germany, Spain, a number of countries over in Europe, and distributing that to musicians. And that was unheard of, and so now, we go to Congress, and we say, okay, here's another chance for you guys to figure this out. In the meantime, we figured this out, and to me, when I talk to a legislator or Congressman or Congresswoman, I always try to paint it in the sense of this is a balance of trade issue. We're sending all this music overseas and generating all this money that we can get some of and we're doing pretty good at getting some of it. But if you guys would just work this out it would open up the flood gates to a lot of money coming this way and very little money going that way. So to me it's kind of a no brainer. But it's really hard to compete against very, very powerful lobby. Just to give you a quick example, the radio industry like to call it a tax, which it's not. And they just put on all the Mom and Pop's side of business ignoring the fact that the big broadcasting corporations have already put a hole out of the Mom and Pop's side of business. >> I should disclose that I did talk to a mom and pop radio owner who did call it a tax and does have that perspective. >> Right, but for example, if you have a radio, the radio industry generated $16 billion in advertising revenue last year. If you have a small radio station that does less than $2 million a year, the amount of money you would pay is $500. Which is not going to put somebody out of business. And so again education awareness. >> Mm-hm. >> Which is so great that you're creating this opportunity for people to learn and I think it's really good. >> Okay, well thank you. It's been fun. I think that one of the things that mystify people who don't know that much about the music industry, and frustrates musicians is these boxes that you talk about. And that word actually comes up over and over again, whether you're talking about publishing, or record royalties, or. Are you optimistic that these sort of mysterious boxes full of money that should be distributed to musicians can because of technology. I don't know, be sorted out. How did we get to this place where there's all this money that's not being given to the creators. >> Well, it's a very different atmosphere in the music business than it was. Most of the record labels are owned by bigger corporations, there was a time when record labels were run by music people and that's increasingly rare. But I do think that technology is our friend and our enemy at the same time. It's all about how you use it, and so I think in the era of transparency, there is hope, but at the same time, it has to be proactive from the sense of the industry in that you have to recognize that hey, there's a new box over there, how did that get there and where do we connect to that? So, I think it is, I am cautiously optimistic because I do think that the conversation has gotten on to a much higher level intellectually then it ever has before. Where it's kind of like in the old days, and I think the rise of the independent artist has a lot to do with that in that it's much simpler now. I wouldn't say easier, but it's simpler to create and own your own music and essentially own your own intellectual property. Whereas that's sort of the antithesis of what corporations will want. And so technology evolves, but the legislation and the ethics of it need to evolve along with that. And there will always be a time lag in that process. But I do think that there are some things that have to be sorted out. The streaming situation right now, which applies into the Songwriters' Equity Act and really anyone whose music is being played on those systems. Because it's a new system, there was not a structure in place for that to be a way to compensate people, for lack of a better word, fairly. And so it's sort of like well, we have this big box of money and we can't figure out how to share it with you yet, so we're not going to, and that has gotta stop. And I think that one of the things that's encouraging me is organizations that are purposefully trying to break down the barriers between the different segments of the industry. For example, the content creators coalition. I think that's a relatively new organization, but they're trying to unite all of the people who are affected by these things and find that common ground and find that commonality. And the risk is that if there's not a way for musicians to make a living, that we destroy the music industry. And I don't want to be the last president of Local 257. I don't want to be in the last generation of people who were able to get paid because corporations figured out ways to work around and influence legislation and just not doing the right thing. If you're making a million times x in money, you shouldn't keep it all. And unfortunately the old formulas don't apply to the new technology. The idea that you listen to something that you have a, what we call interactive media, which is the Spotify as opposed to even Pandora which has a certain amount of choice involved, but it's still essentially a radio station. Whereas with Spotify, you're interacting with this content, but you don't have to buy any of it, you just pay for the service. And all that money is just building and building and building, and it's not being properly distributed and it's not a secret and it has to be fixed. And if it's not fixed, it is really going to create a problem. And I think what gets lost in the conversation a lot is the positive effect that music has on our society and our culture. In this country in particular, you can look at every significant political event of the last hundred years, and there's a soundtrack. And, we don't want to lose that, we don't want to lose the motivation. I would hate to see an entire generation of part time musicians because nobody can make a living. And so it is a critical time, but I am cautiously optimistic. Mainly because I think communication, mass communication is in all in how you use it. And again, it used to be controlled by a very small amount of people. Whereas now, communication is wide open to anybody. We've learned that in the good and bad. And there's an awful lot of just meaningless news items that come and go that I would personally like to see replaced with intelligent, long term conversations about how we're going to perpetuate the culture of arts. I mean, are we still having the conversation do arts help society? I certainly hope not. Certainly from an education of children standpoint, it's been proven over and over again what that can do. And so we don't want to take that dream away from our children if you really want to get long term about it. And so to me it's very important, it's challenging as all get out and it's a very difficult conversation to have. But I think that hopefully, my feeling is that these things will begin to reveal themselves because of the transparency that our society is able to have now. I mean it works both ways, but I've got nothing to hide, I've got nothing to fear. I'm going to try to tell the truth and try to make sure that the people that I represent, which is not just union members. I've discovered that I represent a much larger constituency of people who aren't union members but are musicians and don't have anyone else to look out for them. Not only locally, but from the national standpoint. So I want people's dreams to be able to come true the way that mine have. >> I want to get back to a sort of optimistic vision in just a moment. But I also want to ask you to elaborate a little bit more on what you said earlier about what, let's imagine for a minute, what happens if musicians can't make a living. Young musicians are just coming up. I mean, you and I are hopefully not at the tail end of an era where people can make a living doing it. But let's say we are, and what happens to the music that we hear? What kind of music do we hear if people can't devote themselves full time to music? >> Well I'd hate to think that it would become a culture of everyone in their own living room making music in front of a computer and sending it out to the world. But no one's listening because everyone else is doing the same thing. But I do think that, again, and something we referred to earlier. The power of live performance has, I think, been somewhat, the staying power of that has been a little bit unexpected. As we were talking about earlier, there was this fear that thousands of people were going to get together and listen to a record instead of watching the show. And we found that that isn't true, so one way to make a living is to perform, but you do have to get people to come and be willing to pay. And of course, you know the line that we hear all the time now, is this is great exposure for you, so I'm not going to pay you for what you do. And the line that we usually come up with the response of, people die of exposure in the frozen north. And you can die of exposure in the south as well if you keep up that idea. But I I think there will always be those people who have something to say that has broad appeal, but it's kind of like a pyramid. If only the few people at the very top of the pyramid are able to make a living, there are going to be other people that we would love to have heard but we never had that chance. And so to some extent, I think the tech generation, for lack of a better term, they are going to have to figure some of these things out for us. Because we're not able to fully comprehend what they may see as the vision of the future. And you can make music much more inexpensively than you used to be able to. And again, we've tried to address that where if you're doing a project with your friends, you can do it under what we call the joint venture agreement, which is essentially a profit sharing scheme. Where instead of hiring a lawyer for a couple thousand dollars to write a sharing agreement, you can just do it under a contract that allows for that. And so I think we've, as a union, we're trying all the time to come up with things that are applicable, but I think some of these things are just part of the evolution of time and I think there will always be fantastic musicians, it's a question of can we continue to support and sustain a business model that allows people who are really good, to be heard and to get paid? And it's an unanswered question but I think that the power of music, if it's not interfered with, hopefully, will continue to allow people to make a living playing music. But it may look very different then what it was for us. [MUSIC] >> [INAUDIBLE] say to our audience, about what are some of the things that you believe are the best things that people can do to support those music communities that they have locally? What can you do, or even you know for the general cause of new music? >> Well no that's a great question. Pay for music. Don't burn a CD for your friend of something that they should go buy. One of the things we talk about a lot in the old days of vinyl, you loaned somebody a record and you hope they gave it back. But if they didn't give it back and you really love that album, the only thing you could do was go buy it again. And I did that many, many times over, because I always forgot who I loaned a record to. But now in the age of, sure you can steal it. But you shouldn't, because every time you do that, you're taking a brick out of the wall that built the system, that has allowed the arts to thrive in our country. And it's sort of, it's similar to, painters who have somebody show up and take a really good digital photograph of their painting, and then send it to all their friends, when that painting is for sale. And so, I think part of it is creating a sense of responsibility in the consumer. And especially if you're aspiring to be in the music business, pay for the music you buy, don't ask to be on the guest list. Pay the cover. People want to put me on the guest list. The president of the union is here. Let's put him on the guest list, like no. And sometimes I pay double just because that's how I was able to sustain myself. Was people showing up at my gigs and paying five dollars. Not going, hey man, you know, like can I get on the guest list or can I sneak in the back door of the Bluebird instead of paying the cover? And it's like, well you can but you shouldn't. But I think a big part of it is again, I have to keep coming back to this word, respect. You respect the art that someone else creates, whether it's someone who's famous or someone that you just heard playing at a little coffeehouse. >> Mm-hm. >> I buy records from those artists playing live because sometimes that makes the difference. >> Mm-hm. >> So I think understanding that music has value and I think that our culture, I think we've gone to the darkest days of that with the Napster and the different out and out stealing websites. I think we've gotten through the worst of that to where people do understand. But there's no question that digital sales have not replaced physical product and I, myself, I'm a physical product guy. I still like vinyl, I still, even CD's as small as the print is I'd rather have the CD than a file and then maybe there's some other file that has the stuff. I like the tactile sensation, but I recognize that I'm a dinosaur in that way and that younger people don't really see it that way so I think number one is getting them to understand, and you know supporting your peers, being part of a community. That's what makes music special. It brings people together, in the bigger sense of the world, you know Madison Square Garden is full for a Steve Wonder concert, or Fleetwood Mac, or you know anyone. Cake, any band. Cracker. Sheryl Crow. And everybody's there. And they're all there for different reasons. But they're all sharing that experience together, in that commonality. That's what made possible to be a musician, was to try to create something that was bigger than yourself. And creates this connection. And that's what music does. It brings these things together. So we have to maintain that flame of understanding that it all begins and ends with the creative process, and respecting that, and being willing to pay for it if you enjoy what someone does. And then in terms of how do you manifest that, I think that it's a trickle down thing. You know, when an artist takes really good care of their musicians, they're not having a lot of turn over in their band. And that makes for better music, it make for, all these things. You're literally planting seeds everywhere and we may not see the trees that those seeds are going to become. But they will be there and I certainly hope that we can continue to understand how important music is in the vastly different world we live in, of entertainment. Because it used to be people on Saturday night, listen to the Grand Old Opry. And they're all, somebody's got a, this guy's got a radio. Let's all go to so and so's house, he's got a radio. And, I mean I've, I don't know how many musicians I've talked to and interviewed who talk about that. It was like Saturday night was, Uncle Joe's got the best radio in town. Let's all go over there, and listen to the Grand Old Opry. And, no visual. No idea what's coming next, but you can't even measure what that did. And so now you've got yeah, we can watch the reality show or the gossip channel or the bad news channel. And there are a lot of other things that you can do except just sit down and listen to music. In my generation it was enough to just you know it was our version of the Grand Old Opry. We would get the new album by so and so, we would all go over to somebody's house and put it on, and we'd just sit there and listen to music. And we didn't need a video, to explain what the song was about. You know, we all kind of had our own version of it. So, I think, you know, understanding the importance of music to making the world a better place and wanting to be part of that process whether you're a fan or whether you're a creator or anywhere in between. And that's what I love about Nashville. Is that this happened very organically. And it wasn't like somebody decreed that Nashville would be music city and people would come here and be respected. It was people's actions that did it and the lasting value of the music they created, you know? The last three Superbowls have had Nashville records that were cut cut more than 40 years ago in a Superbowl commercial. That says something about the power of music and the lasting value of music, you know? We're still reading the works of the great philosophers from, you know 50 BC, or 100 AD, and music is that vehicle for change. It's a vehicle for expression. And I think that there's enough people really paying attention to that now, probably more than ever before, and I think that people understand the stakes are high. Because who wants to imagine a world without any new music? It's like all the songs that need to be written, have already been written. All the bass parts that needed to be played, have already been played. I don't want to live in that world. [LAUGH] And I'm going to do everything that I can to try to preserve the good stuff and recognize that we have to change. We have to evolve in the way we do things, the way that we share things. And if I was able to do one thing in my job here it's very similar to being a bass player. It's you've got somebody over here and somebody over here and it's all here in the middle and if we can get together in the middle and find our commonality as opposed to focusing on our differences. And again I keep coming back to this. That's what music does. It suddenly go you know, you and I don't agree on this. We don't agree on that but you know what we both love this song. And that's the future to me is acknowledging and recognizing that and I certainly hope that it's not just a pipe dream. And I'm certainly going to do everything I can do to try to give back to an industry that frankly has been incredible to me. All my dreams have come true. I've gotten to do things that I couldn't even imagine. Gotten to work with people who I idolized growing up and have them treat me as a peer. I mean, how incredible is that? So, as lucky as I've been, I also know that it was a lot of hard work and a lot of determination on my part to try to do that. I'm very encourage by what I'm seeing in what I call more of the 20 somethings, maybe give or take a few years. But I think there was an earlier generation that was kind of overwhelmed with everything and didn't want to think about music as a business. And I find that the younger musicians who are coming and talking to me are asking very good questions and they are also multi talented. They write, produce, they play a bunch of different instruments. That's not how we did, I was a bass player, to me I'm still learning how to play the bass. It's infinite, I'll never learn all there is to learn about the bass. But these young musicians who can do all of these things, they're asking some very good questions. Because I think they see I can do these eight different things. Which of these is going to allow me to continue and make a living? So, I'm encouraged by that and I think that there's an awareness now. And if we can, if we as musicians and the music community, whether it is songwriters, artists, publishers, if we can assert ourselves in our crazy legislative system and make some of these changes that need to be made. Because frankly the corporations are not going to do that for us. We're going to have to make them do that. But there is a way to do it without being combative and contentious. And I'm always going to try to take that route, recognizing that it's a little bit naive. >> [LAUGH] >> And there are a lot of people that are ready to stick it to me as soon as I turn my back. But it's okay, because this is important, and I believe in it. >> We've been speaking with Dave Pomeroy who is the President of the Nashville Musician's Association, Local 257 of the American Federation of Musicians. Thank you so much for your time. >> My pleasure. >> Appreciate it. >> And it's really, I think it's a wonderful project you're doing and I look forward to seeing the end result. >> Thank you. [MUSIC] People who haven't done a lot of work with the union might not realize, first of all that there are different levels of wages depending on what kind of a project it is. And also might not understand really how you go from A to Z with a union project. >> Right. >> Can you give us just some basic information about that? >> Well, that's a good question, I'm happy to kind of fill in the gaps a little bit. A union session has to have what we call a signatory employer. So whatever kind of a session it is, someone who is the responsible party, whether it's an independent artist, or publishing company, or record label, or movie company, will sign papers saying basically I agree to work under a union contract and I will be paying a pension contribution, different things. So that is across the board and then we have different scales for different situations. In Nashville, most of the work we do is under the Phono Agreement, Sound Recording Labor Agreement, SRLA, and we have four different scales for that. Two of which are local and two of which are national so low to high. The lowest is Demo Scale which is essentially designed, it comes form the term demonstration recording which was an arcane term that basically meant I have a song that I want to pitch to an artist and I'm going to make a recording of this song to demonstrate to them this song. And it could also be stretched to use, you might be demonstrating a new artist. You might make some recordings with a new artist. But a demo cannot be released. So it is the least expensive. It's currently $156.00 for a three hour session, plus you get a health and welfare payment which is extra wages that is designed to help you with healthcare. It's $24.00 and then there's a pension component. In recording it's 12% and so 12% of the scale wages is paid in addition to a separate entity, the AFM Employer's Pension Fund and every session, every kind of session has a pension component. There are different percentages in the different types of agreement. So a demo is literally to show something to someone. You could even be a producer saying I want to show you that I'm a great producer, here's this recording I made. But if you're going to sell it that's a different level. And the next one up we call Limited Pressing. It's we set the scales here locally it's $196 for three hours so it's a little bit more per hour and with that you have the ability to release it. Whether you do iTunes or whether you press a physical product. And you can sell or manufacture up to 10,000 copies. And when you reach the $10,000 dollar threshold, you on the honor system, you contact the union and say I reached the magic number. And then you pay the musicians the difference between Limited Pressing Scale and Master Scale, which is the highest of the four. So moving upwards the ladder after limited pressing scale and those are, we set those rates here locally. The next two scales in Phono are set nationally. One is called Low Budget Master where you have to file paperwork saying that your budget for the project is under $99,000 is the current threshold. And you are basically saying in advance I am going to do this much work, this much. And you are able to get that scale which is $220 for three hours and of course it has the H and W and the pension on top of that. And then Master Scale is currently just under $400 for a three hour session so that is the highest and the best scale. In the days when things were really rocking, and still occasionally, there's what we call Double Scale Master where everyone on the session makes twice that. So you make $800 for three hours, which is nice work, if you can get it. >> I did that one time. It was awesome. >> Yeah. And the other component of all sessions is there is a leader. And this is a very important thing. So in all of those scales I just described, the leader makes double scale. And they're pension is equivalent, the same H and W payment. But the pension is also derived from scale. And the leader does many things. The leader makes sure that you call the right players. You don't call a heavy metal drummer for a bluegrass session. And he will write the charts, or she, write the charts. Confirm that the players know what studio on what day. They'll work with the producer at the time of the session and depending on the level of expertise of the producer, The session leader can often be the uncredited, unpaid co-producer. Because otherwise you're never going to get out of there. And then the leader is also responsible for turning in the paperwork. So that's how it works in the Phono world. We have Jingle Scales that are the same thing. If you're doing something directly for a jingle, the scale for that it depends on the length of time they use it. We now have the ability for a jingle company to pay for a whole year or they can do the traditional thing which is to pay 13 week cycles. Some work there is a variety of scales depending on the budget of the film. Different thresholds, I think there's 2 million, 12 million, and 45 million. And those, the scales are not that high on the front-end because in film work, if it's not under an AFM contract, musicians share in a prorated residual stream from that movie, from now, to the end of time. Which is different than any other residual stream. There's a residual stream for phono recording but it's based on the amount of work that you've done and not sales or the success of any particular project. So, those residual streams, can be life changing. Especially, in the film world. It's really important, and again it's that paper trail that can change your life if you happen to get on a song that gets into a movie. And the other concept that I'll address is what we call new use. When something goes from one contract to another, it pays as if it's a new recording in that. For example, the TV show Nashville. The music is recorded under the TV film agreement, which is actually a subset of the film agreement as opposed to the television video tape agreement, which is what we do for live television with the major networks. But in TV film, it's recorded under that. But then when they release a soundtrack album, that it becomes a new use in the sound recording. So everyone is paid again under that agreement. And so, again it's the power of the contract goes so far and the paper work seems intimidating at first. But it's really not and we're here to help make that simple. And go, okay you sign this then you do the session, you fill out the contract. We'll create an invoice, you pay the invoice including the check to the pension fund. We send the check to the pension fund and make sure that it's credited to you so when you turn 65, suddenly your mailbox is going to not only have social security, it's also going to have a pension check. And so that's really important. The last scale that I'll tell you about is something that I came up with a couple years ago to address the whole Internet recording thing and it's called the Single Song Overdub Scale. For the business model, when someone in Montana wants a session player to play on their thing and they'll send him a file over the Internet and they stay at home, there's no studio, there's no engineer, they do it themselves. We had no scale for that. We had no scale that was by the song. So this is a per song scale. With $100 song minimum, but it's a round number for employer and the musician pays their own pension out of that round number of $100. Or if you're doing, if you're playing every instrument and you're arranging a string orchestra, if it's $1,000 you can, it's a minimum, no maximum because that is the way things are being done. And so we're trying to capture as much as that work as we can. Because that is how people are working these days. So part of my mission has been to try to come up with things like that. We also have a scale that allows you to take a demo and release it as a limited pressing without having to break the bank. Which is the way it used to work where you'd have to go all the way to the top scale. So, you know, it's all in constant evolution. But our job is to make it easy for people who are frankly, naturally intimidated by the whole, well what am I signing here, what does this mean. All it really means is if something good happens people are going to share in that. And if nothing happens you're all good. >> [LAUGH] >> So that's kind of the short version of how the scales work. >> Indian scales 101. >> [LAUGH] >> Thank you very much. >> You bet, my pleasure. [MUSIC]
