Tour Smart: Why Musicians Need Specialized Travel Insurance on the Road

Soundcheck: one, two, three… SNAP. There goes the guitar string. You can get a replacement, but it’s just not the same. Second scenario: your plane gets delayed due to storms, and you miss a gig at an event. Touring musicians face countless risks, from gear damage to health emergencies, which can cost thousands and derail your tour. Tour insurance is crucial to protect musicians and crew members as they share their passion with the world.

Let’s go over what musicians need to know for travel insurance, such as coverage types, touring risks, and exclusions.

The Risks of Touring as a Musician

Fragile and expensive equipment in transit

Musicians often transport a lot of expensive gear while touring. Here are basic prices for common music instruments, equipment, and paraphernalia.

Instruments:

• Electric guitar and bass: $1000+
• Drum kit: $700 to $5000
• Synth: $500 to $1000+
• Keyboard: $50 to $150

Equipment and paraphernalia:

• Amplifier: $500
• Cables and stands: $50 to $500 each
• Microphone: $100 to $1000

If you have any premium equipment, it can cost significantly more.

Unpredictable gig cancellations

Tours can get cancelled for a myriad of reasons. Physical injuries, illness, mental health, terrible weather… The venue itself could have issues and disrupt your gig.

Health and injury risks

Vocalists, instrumentalists, and dancers are particularly susceptible to injuries while touring. Vocal cord inflammation, ankle sprains, broken bones, and tendonitis are just a few examples. You need travel health insurance to cover these urgent care expenses.

Crew and band member complications

Every member of your crew is valuable to the team. Inevitably, the bigger your crew, the more likely a last minute issue will arise. Possible issues include:

• Visa issues: If you’re touring internationally, it’s easy for a visa issue to prevent a band member from entering. If you’re touring domestically and someone is here on a visa, it could also become a problem.

• Last minute replacements: Life happens. If a crew member can’t make it, you will need to find a replacement. Hiring a last-minute contractor can be difficult, requiring both favors and money.

Financial loss from travel disruptions or show delays

If you encounter any delays or disruptions during your trip, it could lead to wasted expenses or missed events. Touring insurance for no-shows is also known as contingency insurance. Touring artists should definitely look for event cancellation insurance since it can cover financial losses in cases such as:

• Adverse weather
• Flight delays
• Injury or illness
• Venue damage

What Is Musician Tour Insurance?

Touring insurance is a specialized policy for artists and crews on tour. It can cover damages to instruments, show disruptions, medical emergencies, liability claims, and other common risks.

Musician touring insurance is great for:

Solo musicians and bands

Whether you’re a solo musician just bringing your voice and your guitar, or a part of a band, you need touring insurance.

Touring DJs and electronic acts

DJ insurance is crucial because it protects you from liability. Your DJ equipment, such as your mixer and speakers, is naturally important. However, a liability lawsuit against you could easily cost $100,000+. This is because DJs can get sued if an incident happens at the venue.

Plus, many venues and events require DJs to carry liability insurance as a contractual obligation.

Touring crew

Techs, managers, roadies, drivers, and other crew members should consider personal touring insurance or group options. Visiting different places to perform is exciting, but it can also be financially risky.

Orchestras, theater companies, and classical ensembles

If your orchestra, theater company, or ensemble is on tour, you absolutely need insurance. Orchestra instruments and equipment easily cost thousands of dollars. Members may want individual orchestra insurance that is more comprehensive than standard group policies. Orchestra insurance typically includes:

• Loss of value if instrument is damaged
• Coverage for rental instruments
• Fire, flood, and accidental damage
• Theft
• Add-ons for theft, earthquakes, and climate conditions

Key Features of a Good Musician Insurance Policy

Instrument & Equipment Protection

Your musician insurance policy should cover the value of your instrument(s). Standard instrument insurance caps at $1,000 to $10,000 per instrument.

How much equipment protection you require depends on the value of your gear. Choose a coverage limit that makes sense. Typical policy limits go from $10,000 to $250,000 depending on equipment value.

Worldwide Coverage

Are you touring internationally? If so, you will need to make sure your insurance has global coverage. Check if each of your locations is covered. High risk regions may be excluded.

Also consider whether you need air cargo insurance for your tour. It’s a good idea if you’re transporting valuables by plane.

Gig Cancellation Insurance

Gig cancellation coverage can save you from a financial catastrophe. If you need to cancel a portion or the entirety of your tour, you will likely owe a lot of different parties. Possible expenses and losses include:

• Crew and staff wages
• Rentals for venues and equipment
• Marketing and PR contracts
• Penalties for last-minute cancellations imposed by venues, booking agents, promoters, and partners

Plus, cancelling the gig means no pay. You forfeit your ticket sales share, your performance fee, and any guarantee.

Musicians event insurance can cover also cover tour delays. For smaller, private events, single night coverage usually costs around $60. Larger events will cost at least a couple hundred.

Reimbursement for lost income, travel, or lodging

If your trip gets interrupted, travel insurance for musicians can cover prepaid, nonrefundable expenses like lodgings and flights. Some policies also cover lost income due to trip delays and interruptions.

Medical & Emergency Coverage

If you or your band members get injured or ill, it’s important to have travel medical insurance. This will cover emergency medical expenses such as broken wrists and pneumonia. Domestic health insurance usually does not cover international expenses.

Emergency Evacuations

If an emergency evacuation is required, insurance can cover the costs. Medevac insurance will cover emergency medical evacuations, such as airlifts, air ambulances, and ground transport.

For tour groups, you may want a group travel insurance plan that comes with emergency evacuation for everyone on the same itinerary.

Not all plans cover evacuation for political unrest or terrorism. If that is a concern, be sure to look for a plan with these added benefits.

Liability Protection

Liability lawsuits can happen for countless reasons. If someone slips and falls during your performance, if a crew member gets injured, if a fight breaks out… And liability claims are expensive. A single liability claim can cost $100,000. A group lawsuit could cost you millions in settlements and legal fees.

Touring musicians need liability insurance to cover third-party damages and injuries caused by gear, setup, or other factors. Corporate events and many venues will require bands to carry business liability insurance.

Advertising injuries are also something to consider. Other parties can file advertising injury claims against you for copyright infringement, defamation, and other advertisement-related issues.

Reimbursement if key personnel can’t make it

If your key personnel can’t perform and you end up needing to reschedule, cancel, or find a last-minute replacement, touring insurance can reimburse you. However, there are usually conditions for this non-appearance and event cancellation insurance. The person missing the touring event needs to be a key person essential to the performance, and is unable to participate due to qualifying reasons such as:

• Injury and illness
• Death
• Unforeseen travel delays
• Personal emergencies

Real-Life Scenarios

There’s no need to catastrophize, but when you’re planning a tour, you need insurance to cover the worst. Real life scenarios where insurance can protect you include:

• Guitarist breaks their hand
• The airline damages your instruments
• Thunderstorm ruins a performance
• Orchestra instrument gets stolen before the performance
• Heckler at a DJ’s event gets into a fight, resulting in a liability lawsuit
• Touring singer injures vocal cords mid tour
• Visa messes with the sound engineer’s ability to show up

How to Choose the Right Policy

Don’t settle when it comes to music tour insurance. Let’s review the essentials to look for in touring insurance.

Worldwide or multi-country touring support

Touring insurance policies will be divided into domestic, worldwide, and multi-country. The more coverage you get, the more expensive the premium or per night cost.

The right deductible

Some policies may have a deductible, which is how much you need to pay out-of-pocket before insurance kicks in. You need to choose a reasonable deductible that balances affordable insurance cost with good insurance coverage.

Fast claim processing

While travel insurance claims are estimated to take 4 to 6 weeks, some claims can take many months. These typically involve the insurance company asking you for more supporting documentation and proof of the incident.

To choose an insurance company known for fast and smooth claims processing, read customer reviews and testimonials.

The right coverage duration

Some music tour insurance policies are more expensive if you look at them by their per-night premium. However, if you are only touring for a short duration, this could help you save money overall.

If you’re going on a long world or cross-country tour, a longer duration insurance plan will be better.

Questions to Ask

• Does the policy cover all crew and support staff?
• Are cancellations covered if a key band member is ill?
• What is the instrument depreciation model for claims?
• What perils are excluded from coverage?

Tour Prep Tips to Reduce Risk

Document, document, document

Keep serial numbers and gear receipts digitized. Save all the receipts related to your gear and tour. Digital copies mean a lower chance of losing them. Create a spreadsheet that tracks the expenses for each leg of the tour to facilitate smoother claims processing and just general budgeting.

Use GPS tags and smart locks

Attach tracking tech to your instruments and gear. That way, if they get lost during the tour, you can more easily find them or file a lost instrument claim.

Pack backups and travel with a performance emergency kit

Musicians may want to pack backup instruments or performance emergency kits, like a microphone. The backup can be cheap and low quality, since that is worlds better than if you don’t have a backup at all.

The Future of Touring Insurance

On-demand insurance and usage-based insurance

Insurance is a frustrating tool a lot of the time. If you end up using it, it could save you from bankruptcy. If you don’t, it feels like a waste of money.

On-demand insurance is becoming increasingly popular as it can benefit both insurance companies and policyholders. You can activate coverage as you need so that it isn’t wasted on days you’re not touring or traveling.

The future of musician touring insurance will likely include on-demand insurance for rental equipment and usage-based insurance per tour stop or show.

Tech integration

Gear tracking apps are a valuable tracking solution for touring musicians and crew members. They let you see the location of your gear.

Touring insurance may start linking you to gear tracking apps. That way you can more easily prove that your instruments and/or gear were stolen by thieves or delayed by a common carrier, causing financial ramifications.

Festival and label partnerships with embedded coverage plans

The harsh truth is that record labels usually do not provide any healthcare because they consider musicians as independent contractors. As more people become aware of the risks musicians undertake, it is possible for festivals and label partnerships to start embedding coverage plans into performances. This can attract more artists to their festivals and events.

Conclusion

Touring is risky. You need to protect yourself, your gear, and your income. The right touring insurance empowers you to focus on your music, not the cost of potential emergencies.

Touring insurance can cover a variety of risks, such as:

• Gig cancellations
• Trip delays and interruptions
• Damaged instruments and gear
• Emergency evacuations
• International medical expenses

Explore musician-specific coverage options using our curated list of the best travel insurance companies.