Studio musician, weekend wedding harpsichordist, or local music celebrity — do you really need insurance to do your job?100%
We’re breaking down what kind of insurance musicians need, measure-by-measure, so you can get what you need to protect your passion, your gear, and your gigs.
Types of Insurance Coverage Musicians Need
One unsteady speaker stand, spilled coffee cup, or social media misstep can turn into a financial or legal nightmare fast, for any musician. This is why musicians need (at least) these types of insurance coverage:
- General Liability
- Personal and Advertising Injury
- Damage to Premises Rented to You
- Medical Expense
- Products-Completed Operations
Free Musician Liability Insurance Checklist
General Liability Insurance
General liability insurance covers injuries and property damage to third parties during performances, rehearsals, and other gigs.
Third parties include audience members, fans, venues, event spaces, rehearsal spaces, and more. Basically, a third party is someone or something that is not you, anyone who works for you, or items that belong to you.
Another reason you need general liability coverage is to land gigs. Because this is the type of insurance most often required by venues, festivals, and organizers of other events.
Examples of things general liability can cover:
- An audience member trips over a speaker cable, breaks their wrist, and sues for injury
- You accidentally put a hole in the stage floor during your setup
- One of your speaker stands falls and hits a patron, injuring them
Personal and Advertising Injury
Musicians need this coverage for incidents that cause harm or damage that is not physical or bodily harm or property damage to a third party. It typically applies to things like libel, slander, and invasion of privacy.
Examples of things personal and advertising injury can cover:
- You’re accused of invasion of privacy after you share a BTS video online that includes you talking to an audience member, without that audience member’s consent.
- A local brewery sues you for defamation, stating you slandered their name at one of your gigs, and now people are boycotting their business
Damages to Premises Rented to You
You need this coverage for accidental damages to spaces you rent for rehearsing, recording, or performing.
If you occupy a rented space for more than seven days, coverage applies to damages caused by fire. If you’re in the space for seven days or less, coverage applies to damages from any unintentional cause.
Examples of things damages to rented premises coverage can cover:
- An outlet in a rented recording studio sparks when you plug in a piece of equipment, and it scorches part of the wall
- You accidentally break the espresso machine in the communal kitchen
- Someone lights a cigarette inside and leaves a cigarette burn on a curtain
Medical Expense
Medical expense coverage is no-fault coverage that can pay the medical bills of a third party who gets injured during one of your performances or around your setup, regardless of fault. It typically has a fairly small limit. It’s designed to help “make things right” or resolve claims quicker.
Examples of things medical expense coverage can cover:
- There’s jostling in the audience that causes one person to fall and hit their head on the stage, needing stitches
- An attendee touches a part of your lighting setup and experiences a mild electrical burn
- An unexpected wind gust at an outdoor performance causes your microphone stand to topple over and hit someone as it falls
Products-Completed Operations
This coverage applies to physical injury or property damage caused by a product you sell during or after your gig or event.
Examples of things products-completed operations coverage can cover:
- Someone buys a T-shirt from your merch table, but the shirt’s dye causes a severe allergic reaction
- You sell branded guitar straps, and when a fan later uses it for the first time, it snaps — causing the guitar to fall to the floor and break
Optional Coverages Musicians May Need
The above coverages are essential — and good news: Insurance Canopy’s musician insurance includes all five of these coverages. Depending on the kinds of gigs you play or the merch you sell, you might also want the additional protections provided by the optional coverages below.
Cyber Liability (If You Collect Others’ Data)
If you collect client data via electronic merch or sell tickets, store content, or process invoices online, you face the risk of cybersecurity attacks. You need cyber liability coverage to protect yourself if things like your website, booking platform, or email list are breached.
Examples of things cyber liability coverage can cover:
- Your fan club newsletter email list is hacked, and fan emails, names, and credit card information are stolen
- A ransomware virus locks you out of your computer that includes unreleased tracks and contracts, demanding payment to unlock it
- You sell tickets through your website and a hacker skims your fans’ credit cards through a vulnerability in the system
Gear & Equipment Coverage
Gear and equipment coverage (also known as inland marine insurance) helps with the cost of repairing or replacing equipment you use that gets damaged as part of your music business. This includes things like your instruments, speakers, amps, and more.
Examples of things gear and equipment coverage can cover:
- An audience member accidentally knocks your guitar off its stand during your set break and damages the neck
- The fire alarm goes off, triggering the sprinkler system, which damages your amps
- While packing up after your gig, a club patron tries to steal an instrument and ends up breaking the bassist’s guitar
Additional Insureds
An additional insured is another person, business, or entity that could also be held responsible for accidents you cause. It’s common practice for venues, event organizers, and other performance spaces to require being listed as an additional insured on your policy, for example.
Adding a manager or event organizer extends the protection of your liability policy to them, so they’re covered in case they’re named alongside you in a claim or lawsuit.
Additional insureds can include an employer, landlord, studio owner, event manager, city, and others. However, additional insureds cannot include friends, family members, your employees, or other musicians.
Get the Insurance You Need With Insurance Canopy
Musician insurance from Insurance Canopy includes all the coverages you need to protect yourself and your future performances. Depending on your individual needs, we offer both single-event and annual musician policies.
An event policy provides general liability coverage for three consecutive days and costs $59. If you’re only doing one or two gigs a year, you might prefer a short-term policy like this.
Annual policies with Insurance Canopy provide liability coverage for a 365-day period for $18.50/month or $199/year. An annual policy is the more cost-effective option if you have multiple gigs booked or plan to perform multiple times throughout the year. It also ensures you’re ready whenever your next opportunity to perform arises!
Plus, annual policies allow you to include optional coverages, like gear and equipment or cyber liability coverage. Event policies do not have those options. Get more details with our musician’s insurance information guide.
Here’s a quick side-by-side overview of our available policies.
| Annual Musician Policy | Event Musician Policy |
|---|---|
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Cost: $199/year OR $18.50/month; includes:
Ability to add:
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Cost: $59/event; includes:
Ability to add:
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*Some venues require higher liability insurance claims limits than base policies include
Frequently Asked Questions About Musician Insurance
What’s the Difference Between Public Liability and General Liability?
There’s no difference: general liability insurance = public liability insurance.
General liability insurance is designed to protect small businesses from third-party bodily injury, property damage, and personal or advertising injury claims. General liability is sometimes called public liability insurance because it applies to harm done to the public (aka third parties).
Do Musicians Need Public Liability Insurance?
All musicians need public liability insurance (aka general liability insurance). It protects you if someone claims they got hurt or their property was damaged as a result of your work as a musician. Here are some examples of why it’s a must-have, not just a nice-to-have:
- Someone trips over your electrical cords at a venue, sustains an injury, and sues you for the medical expenses
- You rent studio space to record new music and accidentally drop expensive equipment belonging to the studio, breaking it, and now you have to pay to replace it
- You start busking at your favorite park, a passerby trips over your guitar case, then sues you to cover their trip to the ER
I’m a Solo Performer — Do I Need Insurance?
Yes! Whether you’re a solo act or a “small-time” act, you still face risks like audience injury, property damage, or venue mishaps. Just one claim can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars — enough to cancel your tours for good.
Can I Name Multiple Venues or Promoters As Additional Insureds?
Yes. Both event and annual policies with Insurance Canopy allow you to add unlimited additional insureds to your policy. Annual policies include unlimited additional insureds, while event policies require a $5 fee to add them.
