Professional Musician Rates
in NZ

For nearly a decade, New Zealand’s professional musicians have asked a deceptively simple question:

“What do I charge?”

This uncertainty has caused national ambiguity across venues, studios, and contracts—resulting in underpaid artists, misaligned expectations, and inconsistent industry norms.

The NZ Session Collective has resolved this. We conducted a full-scale economic and historical review—backed by CPI data, wage growth trends, and Cost of Living Adjustments (COLA)—and integrated it with qualitative input from retired musicians, circuit players, pedagogues, and institutional leaders.

What follows is New Zealand’s first formal rate benchmark for professional musicians—aligned to 2025 conditions, and scalable for global adaptation.

The NZ Session Collective, Musician Rates

Historical Overview

Through detailed conversations with circuit musicians, retired professionals, pedagogues, and industry stakeholders—as well as analysis of surveys and market trends—we’ve compiled the following timeline. It forms the foundation for modernising and standardising
professional musician pay in New Zealand.

  • Musicians typically earned $100 per gig—regardless of length—performing in pubs and bars. Many earned a living playing 3–4 shows per week.

  • The end of tax deductibility for business dining caused a sharp drop in restaurant-based live music. Many musicians lost income as bookings dried up.

  • The scene began recovering. “Fillers”—musicians who covered rehearsals or gigs for others—emerged as a new professional category, helping many sustain income.

  • Despite inflation and rising costs, the average per-gig rate remained around $100. Some leaders began negotiating higher pay, but overall compensation lagged behind economic trends.

  • The industry gradually shifted toward hourly billing. By early in the decade, $50 per hour was a typical rate, replacing the flat gig fee in many cases.

  • By mid-decade, $100 per hour became the informal national rate among circuit musicians. Despite increased competition and cost pressures, this rate has remained largely unchanged—until now.

$100—that’s the benchmark New Zealand’s working musicians have leaned on since 2015. Widely adopted by professional musicians at the time, it reflected the market value for live performance and session work. Yet since then, that rate has remained static—despite rising costs,
industry growth, and increased competition.

This stagnation has resulted in declining real wages. In response, The NZ Session Collective developed a modernised base rate for 2025 and beyond, grounded in
economic data and real market conditions.

2025 National Base Hourly Rate

NZD 176.44 | Rounded to NZD 177.00

Building on our rigorous framework, we increase the 2024 rate by 4.1 %
Comprising 2.2 % CPI and 1.9 % (50 % of 3.8 % annual wage growth)—to reach NZD 177.00 for 2025.

This rate is now integrated as the platform-wide minimum bookings made through The NZ Session Collective.
A full list of our data sources—including Stats NZ CPI, LCI, HLPI, RBNZ and IRD.

Key Economic and
Industry-Specific Factors

Our analysis draws from historical data, economic factors and real-world trends.

1. Annual CPI

What it is | Consumers Price Index (Inflation) tracks rising prices over time, reducing the real
value of money.

Why it matters | Without inflation-based adjustments, musicians lose purchasing power
year-on-year.

Source | Consumers Price Index rose 2.2 % in the year to December 2024.

Rationale | CPI reflects general living-cost inflation for households.

2. Why Not Full COLA or HLPI?

What it is | HLPI tracks essential living-cost rises—rent, food, healthcare, transport.

Overlap Risk | Household Living-Costs Price Index increased 3.0 % to Dec 2024, but it largely overlaps with CPI components.

Clarity & Parsimony | CPI + ½ LCI provides a clear, defensible adjustment without
double-counting.

3. Labour Cost INdex

What it is | LCI measures wage growth—general increases in income across the economy.

Why it matters | Partial inclusion ensures musicians don’t fall behind broader labour earnings.

Source | Labour Cost Index (wage rates) rose 3.8 % in the year to Sep 2024.

Approach | Use 50 % of wage growth (1.9 %) to keep musician pay competitive without overstating due to overlapping indices.

4. Compound Economic Adjustment

By applying inflation (CPI), and 50% of wage growth (LCI) cumulatively year-by-year, we updated the 2015 $100 NZD per hour benchmark to match 2025 conditions:

  • 2016 | $100 × (1 + 0.003) × (1 + 0.0173) × (1 + 0.0073) ≈ $102.78

  • 2017 | $102.78 × (1 + 0.0063) × (1 + 0.0165) × (1 + 0.0008) ≈ $105.22

  • 2018 | $105.22 × (1 + 0.0185) × (1 + 0.0198) × (1 + 0.0198) ≈ $111.17

  • 2019 | $111.17 × (1 + 0.016) × (1 + 0.0223) × (1 + 0.014) ≈ $116.02

  • 2020 | $116.02 × (1 + 0.0165) × (1 + 0.0183) × (1 + 0.0125) ≈ $119.95

  • 2021 | $119.95 × (1 + 0.017) × (1 + 0.0223) × (1 + 0.0311) ≈ $128.44

  • 2022 | $128.44 × (1 + 0.039) × (1 + 0.0365) × (1 + 0.075) ≈ $158.56

  • 2023 | $158.56 × (1 + 0.0575) × (1 + 0.042) × (1 + 0.0733) ≈ $169.42

  • 2024 | $169.42 × (1 + 0.022) × (1 + 0.019) ≈ $176.44

Professional Musician
Market Rate

Annual Review
NZSC will update this rate annually to maintain accuracy, integrity, and relevance across the live music sector in New Zealand.