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Audition Questions for Professionals

In the last article we looked at some basic questions to ask musicians auditioning for your band.
When your professional enough to become a working band, add these to your list:

Availability for touring? (if that’s where your heading)
If your a working band, how will you account for payments?
(It’s often left to one member to supply an IRD no. to employers, or each individual
invoices the venue. These options are both messy and unprofessional. Speak to a tax
consultant or accountant about forming a partnership so you can use one IRD number
with one invoice to present to the organiser).

In brief, when you do this,
- open a bank account in the band name
- all earnings go into the account
- all shared expenses come out (things like petrol, hiring lights, or P.A.)
- band members get paid from the account
Willing to contribute to cost of hiring PA if necessary ?– even if it belongs to a band
member it’s important to have a fair share in the cost of shared gear (usually the whole
band uses the PA, whereas the drummer uses the drum kit, the bass player the bass gear
etc, so they should each be responsible for both the ownership and maintenance of
personal equipment. It’s not a good idea to all go into shares of owning equipment, this
can get messy when members come and go from the band.

Consider that you really need to share a common goal if a band line-up is going to work
effectively.
E.g. If they can’t commit to weekly rehearsals is that going to be enough to make a happening
band? Not likely. Are they already committed to another band? If so, what opportunities for
performance will your band have? Not many, if any!! If they want to play hardcore and your
band is into techno, they may not be satisfied for very long in your line-up. If you’re wanting
to tour the country with your originals, they need to be a free spirit, find out their other
commitments and creativity.