How much money does a trumpet player make in a year?

Answer 1

That's basically an impossible question to answer. Regarding what most people would call "professional" players, on the high end, a select few extremely famous players are probably very rich, possibly making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, or even millions. On the low end, some players make "scale," which varies depending the locality, and how much they make in a year depends on how many jobs an individual player takes, or how many the player is good enough to get. Then, there is everything in between. Then you have people like me, amateurs that make money playing wherever they can. I make several hundred dollars (around $700) each month at a regular gig I have, and on ocassion, an extra hundred or two when I get an extra gig somewhere. I don't know if you're asking this, but if you are wondering if you can make a living playing the Trumpet, the answer is, for most people, probably not. There are tens of thousands of trumpet players in the world, but only a few, relatively speaking, actually make their entire living playing. Locally to me, all of the regular trumpet players in the symphony give lessons and teach at various universities to make extra money. I don't know your circumstances, but many times, young players who have a little talent mistakingly begin to believe they can make a lot of money playing because they are good, but the odds of that are small. There are lots of good players out there, and as general rule, many players aren't really as good as they think they are. Being a pretty good player in high school and being an accomplished professional player are, in most circumstances, nowhere near the same.