GARDNER — This past month, local songwriter-singer Brian Dickens had eight gigs lined up at venues around north-central Massachusetts, including locations in Greenfield, Turners Falls and Baldwinville. Thanks to restrictions necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic, all of his appearances were canceled, resulting in a substantial hit to his bank account, as well as to his visibility; and Dickens says other performing artists are in the same predicament.
“I thought initially I’d be good,” he said. “I thought, ‘I’ll be covered because I haven’t ‘made it’ yet. This is a good time to be on the way up, I thought. With limits on crowds of 30 or 40 people, now is the time to be playing to nobody.’
“When limits came down to no more than 10 people, I was like, ‘It’s officially not funny. It’s officially going suck, and it’s going to put all my friends out of work. I mean, my bills are covered, I’m not hungry, I will be fine.”
However, Dickens explained, cancellation of his March appearances — and others that were coming up this month — resulted in the loss of revenue he was planning on using to produce an album later this summer.
“I was planning on getting at least a thousand bucks over the next month or so,” he said. “I had done a pretty good job lining things up for myself this spring. I had a couple of big strokes of luck and now none of that’s happening. I don’t have less money; I have no money to produce any music with.
“I’m not suffering like some of my friends are, losing money, but all of my plans are out the window, and I don’t get to record my art. Furthermore, that means I don’t get to pay my friend because my friend is my producer.”
While some of the venues Dickens had booked are telling him they don’t know what the future holds, others “have been super kind, telling me, ‘Look you had a booking here; you will get another booking here, we just don’t know when it will be.”
He said the Rendezvous in Turners Falls has been particularly supportive of new artists and he hopes to reschedule his appearance there. In the meantime, he says he continues to write songs and practice his craft at home. Many new compositions, not surprisingly, deal with isolation and loneliness yet, despite the topics, he says he tries to keep the songs playful and positive.
“I’m always writing and throwing new stuff at the walls to see if it sticks,” he said. “What I’ve been doing is mostly practicing. The Youtube videos, doing live videos, is actually pretty challenging, but you’re not getting paid for it, so it’s a little less risk. But when you play online it’s good practice. I’m keeping up all the same actions in my life, other than walking out the door and packing up my car to head to a performance.”
“Some of my friends have a lot worse,” Dickens continued. “Their rent’s not paid, and their bills aren’t covered. Some of them are playing for tips on Facebook Live.”
He said some artists have joined private Facebook groups in order to stay in contact, offer one another support, and simply commiserate during this tough time.
“It’s very important to remember these things do change,” Dickens concluded. “I think that’s how I’ve been working with my friends, really, just talking about this stuff. For some of us, it is just so bewildering and awful, and I know some of my friends have been suffering and depressed. But just reaching out and talking to people who are also going through this really it helps. It provides some level of relativity.”