Billboard: Why the U.S. Needs a Federal Grant Program for Individual Artists (Guest Column)
Every passing day, a new statistic emerges that would make any aspiring artist, producer, or songwriter feel foolish for trying to fund their dreams.
Over 100,000 songs get ingested to Spotify daily, but the vast majority of them fail to surpass the 1,000-play mark. Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group, and Universal Music Group reported record profits in 2023, but those numbers are largely driven by a small number of star artists. A 2017 study showed that out of 7,000 bands tracked, only 21 managed to headline a venue with a capacity exceeding 3,000. Limited opportunity and long odds face artists who don’t have significant industry backing.
Content saturation makes it harder to stand out, inspiring strategic conservatism from major labels, who, driven by data, fear financial risk and tend to invest in artists who demonstrate substantial market appeal.
What are musicians — and, frankly, writers, visual artists, filmmakers, or any creators — in need of resources to do when corporations appear more risk-averse than ever?
Why do we need a grant system for individual artists?
While art is often considered a luxury rather than a public good, it has been shown to provide both cultural enrichment and economic stimulus.
In 2023, Americans for the Arts found that the nonprofit arts and culture industry provided 2.6 million jobs, generated $29.1 billion in tax revenue, and provided $101 billion in personal income to U.S. residents. These numbers include the individuals who benefit from public arts funding to become working artists, who tour, show their work at museums, and fill movie theaters.
America’s nonprofit and for-profit arts sectors work together to promote cultural growth as much as they stimulate economic activity locally and nationally.
Public funding for the arts has remained relatively steady in absolute terms. However, inflation-adjusted spending on the arts by local governments has declined consistently throughout the 2000s. Local arts agencies now receive 27% less in funding than they did in 2001.
Other countries have shown a better system can exist.
For 37 years, Canada’s FACTOR grant program has supported Canadian recording artists in meaningful ways.
FACTOR covers costs that traditionally require the debt financing of a label deal: recording, music videos, and tour funding chief among them.
Notable FACTOR recipients launched into successful careers include Jessie Reyez, Grimes, Charlotte Cardin, BADBADNOTGOOD and TOBi. Drake’s vaunted company October’s Very Own has also received a variety of grants from Canadian governmental sources — including funding for the 2014 OVO Fest.
In Sweden, robust arts education in public schools combined with an internationally-minded grant system contribute to the small nation’s outsized influence on popular music abroad, particularly in the United States where Max Martin’s Swedish pop sensibilities have dominated Billboard charts since Bill Clinton was in office.
While in America, artists can gain access to grants through institutions like the Guggenheim Memorial Foundation or the Henry Luce Foundation, or via state institutions, there is no unified federal mechanism for arts funding akin to FACTOR or the Swedish Arts Grant Committee. The National Endowment for the Arts has an impressive grantmaking operation but does not give direct grants to individual artists.
Introducing the CREATE Art Act.
We need a better system.
In 2024, we are working to bring the CREATE Art Act to the American public. Created by Congressman Maxwell Frost, a drummer and musician himself and the first Gen-Z person ever elected to the United States Congress, the CREATE Art Act proposes a novel grant system for individual artists of all disciplines.
CREATE grants go beyond international models in the way they target emerging artists, those creators who may not yet have the good fortune of making a living off of their art or wish to avoid potentially injurious record and publishing deals. Recipients must show net earnings of less than $50,000 in the previous five years and not more than $400,000 in the previous 20 years from their art. The art produced must be relevant to the community and accessible to the public. The grants include:
- Progress Grant – Up to $2,000 to support a year of artist activities.
- Project Grant – Up to $100,000 per project that can be used over two years.
- Live Performance Grant – Up to $35,000 for live performances.
- Development Fund – Up to $10,000 to pay the living and working expenses of artists
- while they research, write, or cultivate stories or projects.
The purpose of the program is twofold.
First, and simply, more artists with funding means more art. The greater the creative output of our nation, the greater the diversity of voices with the potential to gain an audience, shift perspectives, inspire future generations, and tell new American stories.
Second, more artists creating means more economic activity in a sector experiencing an algae bloom of creators and consumers.
The current media landscape cuts a more jagged figure than ever. No monoliths. No starmakers. No obvious paths to success.
In a time of such noise and fragmentation, artists find it as hard as ever to fund their dreams and more difficult than before to cut through the clutter.
The CREATE Art Act would plant a foot on the right path forward, opening up possibilities for generations of American artists to come.
By: Rep. Maxwell Frost, Jon Tanners
Source: Billboard