Petition outlines artist pandemic problems.
Group seeking extra support for artists from province
SYDNEY — There are few professional musicians in Cape Breton busier than Keith Mullins but even he was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic earlier this year.
“I was hurt big time,” Mullins admitted in a phone interview Friday from his home in Baddeck. “I lost a ton of work.”
Mullins, who makes his living from music, normally plays a minimum of 250 gigs a year, averaging five to six nights a week during the summers. This summer, he averaged two nights a week and says he felt lucky to even have that. He estimates his total number of gigs in 2020 will be closer to 100 since most of his spring and summer gigs were cancelled due to COVID-19 restrictions.
But even when work disappears, life is no less expensive. Mullins took advantage of the downtime to build his own studio where he’s been working with other artists, including Mi’kmaq fiddler Morgan Toney. He established a series of online songwriting workshops and he’s working on an online recording with a school. He’s managed to keep going but acknowledges the pandemic has been especially difficult for most artists, especially new performers trying to make their names known.
“Me, I’m established and I’ve learned to be adaptive,” he said. “But I worry for young artists who are trying to get their foot in the door, who are trying to meet people. It’s a really tough business for someone who’s trying to get started. Oh man, it’s nearly impossible in these times. Maybe when it’s all over it might get easy again but it must be really difficult for a young new artist.”
With that in mind, a group whose members work within island-based arts organizations has been lobbying the provincial government through a petition to consider further ways to help those adversely affected by pandemic closures. The Cape Breton Music Industry Co-operative represents Cape Breton musicians and is one of the organizations involved. The petition points out that value of the culture and creative sector to the economic and social wellbeing of Nova Scotia and the need for an emergency plan and funding to help the sector to recover. Earlier this week, after several delays including a change of ministers in the portfolio, they finally met with Communities, Culture and Heritage Minister
Suzanne Lohnes-Croft and according to Cape Breton Music Industry Co-operative operations manager Duane Nardocchio, some progress was made.
“It was generally a positive meeting,” said Nardocchio. “We didn’t come away with an answer that we were hoping for — we also weren’t expecting it just yet. But we wanted to convey the urgency once again now that there’s another minister sitting there.”
The arts organizations have been waiting to hear from the province since May about the possibility of emergency funding for their sector. That help is still needed, says Nardocchio.
“Artists are self-employed and had to go through that phase when they were unable to generate any income, were unable to hold any events of any kind and things were cancelled for a year in advance sometimes,” says Nardocchio. “Obviously we know that we’re not the only sector that’s hurting and we know that we’re not the most important sector but we’re just trying to keep our level of importance at top level so that we don’t get forgotten about because we do have a major impact. Just from 2019 alone, the cultural sector was responsible for 100 million in GDP in Nova Scotia so it’s not something to overlook by any means.”
Nardocchio remains optimistic that some form of help will eventually become available, hopefully sooner than later.
“I feel good about the meeting overall. I feel positive that they know the level of seriousness in the situation and that they know we are advocating as a group together to make sure that something happens and I feel I’ll be really happy when I know there is something in place.“
For Mullins, there has been a gradual return of gigs and he’s grateful for that. He had four engagements on Friday and he hopes other will soon get the help they need as well.
“I like being busy and contributing — feels like I’m doing good.”