Play or sing for money. Almost everyone does it by stacking gigs, teaching and session work together.
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Pay, the path, pros and cons and the facts on one printable page. Counsellors: send it to a student from your own email in one click.
Programs in the fields this career usually comes through. Each has its own page: what it takes to get in, the courses you need and what it costs.
The median pay is about $33,000 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $33,000 at the lower end to about $75,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
2 to 10 years after high school, on the usual route.
$500 to $70,000 all in for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
No. There is no licence to hold, though many employers still ask for training or a certificate.
Limited demand nationally, from government outlook data. Demand varies by region, so check your area.
Or read the whole thing here
What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Median
$33,000
Lower end, the same as the median
$33,000
Upper end
$75,000
Job Bank's figures for musicians and singers come from the 2021 census, as yearly income: $32,867 at the low end and at the median, and $74,500 at the high end. Music income for most people is a pile of small payments from gigs, teaching and royalties, and many musicians earn less than the median from music alone.
$38,779 a year
The median in British Columbia, from the Census
Ontario's median is $38,308 and Quebec's $34,137. Gig fees are set by each venue or client and split between the players; the CFM (Canadian Federation of Musicians) sets union scale for recording and broadcast work.
Roughly, all in
$500 to $70,000
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
No credential is required to work, so the low end is an instrument and nothing else, which is why the floor sits so low. The high end is a four year university music degree at 12,000 a year, serious gear, and years of private lessons at 30 to 80 an hour. A degree matters for orchestral playing, school and studio teaching and further study, and matters very little in popular music. The largest real cost is the years of lessons that usually begin in childhood, which sit outside any tuition figure.
No degree is required to work. A degree matters for orchestral playing, teaching jobs and further study, and matters very little in popular music.
Live performance
Bars, festivals, weddings, corporate events, theatre pit bands, church services.
Teaching
Private students or a music school. Steady income for many musicians.
Session and recording work
Playing on other people's records, advertisements and film scores.
Royalties
SOCAN (Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada) collects and pays performance royalties when your music is played or streamed.
Grants
FACTOR (Foundation Assisting Canadian Talent on Recordings), Canada Council and provincial arts councils fund recording and touring.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
No licence and no exam. Skill, repertoire and a network of people who call you.
Start early
Age 6 to 14
Serious players usually begin lessons well before high school. Classical and jazz paths in particular are hard to start late.
High school
Grades 9 to 12
Music every year, school ensembles, youth orchestra or a band. Play in front of people constantly.
Training
0 to 4 years
A university music degree, a college performance diploma, private study with a strong teacher, or the band-and-basement route. All of these produce working musicians.
Build a working life
2 to 5 years
Take every gig, teach, record with other people, get known as reliable. Reliability gets more calls than brilliance.
Specialize or diversify
Ongoing
Audition for orchestras, chase session work, build your own act, or combine teaching with performing. Many people do the last one.
Music
Theory, ensemble and performance. Take it every year it is offered.
Business
You will be self-employed. Invoices, taxes and contracts are part of the job.
English
Grant applications, press material and lyrics.
Computer studies
Recording and producing yourself is now standard.
Anyone can perform for money. The Canadian Federation of Musicians, the Canadian wing of the AFM (American Federation of Musicians), represents musicians on recording, broadcast and orchestral work. It provides contracts, instrument and liability insurance, and help with work permits when you cross the border. It matters most if you do session, film or orchestra work.
Quebec has a 3 year college diploma for working pop and jazz musicians, and a public conservatory network where admission is by audition.
Finish Secondary V
Age 16 or 17
Keep playing every day and learn theory and ear training. College and conservatory programs test both your instrument and your ear.
DEC (Diploma of College Studies) in music
2 to 3 years
The 2 year pre-university Music DEC (501.A0) leads to university. The 3 year Professional Music and Song Techniques DEC (551.A0) leads to work. Both are at Vanier College in English.
Pass the audition
Before you start
Vanier's 551.A0 audition is on your main instrument or voice, plus an entrance exam in theory and ear training, with a second try about a month later.
Or the Conservatoire
Apply November to 1 March
The Conservatoire de musique et d'art dramatique du Québec (the Quebec public conservatory) has 7 music schools, from Gatineau to Val-d'Or. You audition with 2 or 3 contrasting pieces.
University, if you want it
3 to 4 years
A Bachelor of Music at McGill's Schulich School of Music, in English, with performance, jazz, composition, sound recording and music technology among its areas. Auditions are part of admission.
Quebec's status of the artist law gives the GMMQ (Guilde des musiciens et musiciennes du Québec, the Quebec musicians' guild) the legal right to represent everyone who plays an instrument professionally in Quebec, in any field. It is also Local 406 of the AFM (American Federation of Musicians) and is recognized under the federal status of the artist law too. It negotiates collective agreements that set minimum working conditions. A few Outaouais counties near Ottawa fall under a different local.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Teaching
Private students, school programs or a music academy. Predictable money that funds everything else.
Multiple instruments
Doubling on a second instrument gets you into shows a specialist cannot play.
Reading music well
Pit orchestras, session dates and church work all need fast, accurate sight reading.
Producing and recording
Making finished tracks yourself means you do not wait for a studio budget.
A driver's licence and a reliable car
Gear moves, and gigs are rarely nearby.
Grant writing
FACTOR (Foundation Assisting Canadian Talent on Recordings) and arts council money goes to people who can fill in the forms.
Basic bookkeeping
You are a small business. Track income and expenses from the first gig.
Being easy to work with
In every scene, the reliable player gets called more than the better player.
Per-stream payments are tiny, and most of what a recording earns goes to whoever owns the recording. The money musicians actually see from a release comes through performance royalties collected by SOCAN (Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada), plus live shows and merchandise. Writing your own material matters here, because writers keep a share that performers do not.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
Teach six students on Monday and Tuesday afternoons. Rehearse with a band Wednesday. Practise alone every morning, because the instrument does not wait. A recording session Thursday, a wedding Saturday afternoon and a bar gig that night, which means loading gear at 11pm and getting home at 2am. Sunday is a church service. Between all of it: chasing payments and booking the next month.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
SOCAN (Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada) serves more than 185,000 songwriters, composers and publishers, licensing their music and paying out royalties when it is performed or streamed.
Job Bank counted about 29,700 musicians, singers and private music teachers in Canada in 2023, and 43% of them were 50 or older.
Quebec law gives the GMMQ (Guilde des musiciens et musiciennes du Québec, the Quebec musicians' guild) the right to represent everyone who plays an instrument professionally in the province, in any style.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Film, TV and music first, then the rest of the field. See every career in creative.
Last checked October 2026. Pay figures are typical full-time annual amounts in Canadian dollars, based on Government of Canada Job Bank wage data and published salary grids. They vary by province, employer and experience. Tuition is for domestic students. How every figure on this site is sourced and checked.
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