Four years of pandemic impact have wreaked havoc on the lives of professional dancers like Jaramillo, a member of Sydnie L. Mosley’s New York City–based collective SLMDances. Most dance organizations, whether commercial or nonprofit, have been on a financial roller-coaster ride, too, whose tracks parallel ups and downs in the U.S. economy as a whole. Multiple reports published since last summer have shed long-awaited light on the fiscal health of the country’s dance sector. What those numbers say isn’t simple to summarize.

It’s time to start thinking about summer intensives, but their list of prospective programs reads like a cross-country tour. How can they make it to auditions in New York City, San Francisco, Houston, and Chicago—especially when the audition fee is just the tip of a financial iceberg that also includes plane fare and hotel rooms?

Most dancers have side gigs to pay the bills. Here, I share how I chose my nonperformance jobs and how the combination of careers has benefited my dancing.

Pre-pandemic, many dancers’ incomes were project-based, at best, and unpredictable at worst. Of course, once COVID-19 took hold, performance gigs dried up and artists’ finances, consequently, took a huge hit. For many, that meant reconfiguring their budgets, not just once, but often. For choreographer Tariq Darrell O’Meally, budgeting over the last year has been an […]

One of the upsides of having a tough year, career-wise? Odds are good you’ll get money back when you file your 2020 taxes. But as you organize your financial information ahead of tax season, you likely have some COVID-19–related questions looming. Will you be taxed on your stimulus check? Your unemployment? And can you write […]

Many dancers would rather do just about anything than spend time on their finances. They procrastinate when it comes to recording their income and expenses, and put off investing for another day. As artists, we would rather be in the studio. But looking after your financial health can actually lead to more artistic freedom. Here […]

How much does your dance job pay? And how does that compare to other jobs in dance? That’s the question Dance Magazine is asking in an upcoming feature about money. Right now, we’re looking to collect anonymous information about how much various professionals throughout the dance field make—from dancers and choreographers to teachers, administrators and […]

Freelancing is more common than ever. So why is it that, as the market shifts to favor freelance dancers, we do not pay them enough to subsist on their art? In Dance Magazine‘s August interview with four successful freelance dancers, not one reported making enough from the industry to cover their expenses. Most freelancers get […]