We’re Here to Help Local Musicians Thrive.
There’s no need to navigate your music career alone. Local 99 is an organization of over 500 musicians in Oregon and SW Washington, and the American Federation of Musicians includes over 60 thousand musicians in the United States and Canada. The U.S. union movement is 14 million workers and growing.
With those numbers comes solidarity and strength that has fueled many of our accomplishments to improve musicians’ lives. Together we can continue to make our government and society work better for musicians and working people.
Resources to Support Your Music Career
You’ll have access to resources and benefits that your predecessors and peers have fought for, created, and continue to support. This includes legal services, contract protection, rehearsal space, insurance, business guidance, performance grants, scholarships, emergency relief, and more.
Political Advocacy and Community Service
Local 99 is actively engaged in advocating for musicians’ interests, fighting for positive change in our industry, and giving back to the community. You’ll be part of a growing movement of workers that understand that the way forward is through collective action and support: we can achieve so much more together than alone.
Contract Protection and Expert Advice
We negotiate union contracts which create good pay and working conditions for musicians. You’ll have the opportunity to learn from us about how contracts benefit both musicians and clients, and get advice about minimum wage scales for a variety of music gigs.
Are you ready to join your fellow musicians in standing together to improve our working conditions?
By working together, we create the power we need to achieve our goals for the industry.
Here are just a few things musicians have achieved by working together:
In Portland:
- Musician Loading Zones — We successfully advocated for a pilot project opening some loading zones in Portland to musicians. The pilot project has been extended, and we are working to expand the sites. Learn more here: https://pdxmusicloading.com/
- Music Education Assistance Project—Local 99 members created the Music Education Assistance Project, which provides scholarships for private instruction to musically gifted students in financial need.
Nationwide:
- The Music Performance Trust Fund — through negotiations with the recording industry, the AFM created a system where industry-contributed royalties from record sales flow into a fund to employ musicians for admission-free, live, public performances. When the MPTF began disbursal in 1947, it became the largest single employer of live musicians in the world, and is funding live performances around the country to this day.
- The National Endowment for the Arts. AFM advocacy helped create this independent government agency, and helps keep it strong: In 2021, the NEA budget was $167 million.
Experience the benefits of unity and collective power.
Interested in what we do? Learn more about The Union, and start building community with fellow musicians.