Kevin Nortness, Leigh Bezezekoff, and Joe Seamons photo by Daniel Sheehan

As Donald Trump steps back into office this month, many in the U.S. cultural sector are concerned about what his policies may mean for the arts. 

“Based solely on precedent, the near future appears to be grim,” writer Tessa Solomon reported on November 6 for ARTnews. As Solomon notes, his first term policies, including the travel ban, budget cuts, and COVID-19 response, were “disastrous for arts funding, diversity, and education.”

While it’s too soon to know what his next term will mean, predictions from some in the local music community are just as gloomy. Along with worry for the rights of women and immigrants, some Seattle jazz musicians are anxious about their careers.

“Inflation has already made it pretty difficult,” said Seattle saxophonist and composer Kate Olson. “I could see a world in which Trump creates all of these tariffs [and then] there will be retaliatory tariffs…I don’t see that kind of economic policy creating an economy where we are going to flourish as artists.”

At the same time, local musicians are finding hope in Seattle’s vibrant community of grassroots arts non-profits that have long worked to support creatives. Of this array of local organizations, three music non-profits: Sustainable Music Seattle, Washington Nightlife Music Association, and The Rhapsody Project are ramping up in 2025 in response to the new political context.

Giving Musicians Sustainability

Come 2025, there’ll be a new music non-profit in town. Sustainable Music Seattle (SMS), created in close partnership with Seattle’s music labor union, Musicians’ Association of Seattle Local 76-493, aims to create gigs and enhance the public perception of live music.

SMS has been in the works since early 2024, when the union’s president Nate Omdal,  began formulating an idea with other union leadership of an organization that could create more fair-paying and union-protected work for musicians in Seattle.

With 501(c)(5) tax status, a labor union cannot officially form a non-profit under its umbrella. So, the Musicians’ Association of Seattle decided to call on community in hopes of finding someone who would lead a separate entity that partners closely with the union. That’s when musician and educator Kevin Nortness stepped up to further shape the mission of SMS as executive director.

“I want to move away from the cult of personality that is how the public perceives musicians…. we’ve lost that identity as just blue-collar community members,” said Nortness, adding that, ultimately, “live music is a catalyst for bringing communities together.”

SMS will be to produce free, all-ages, neighborhood-based live music events by summer 2025. These events, presented in parks and grange halls, will generate steady, union-protected work for musicians and hopefully instigate in-person neighborhood gatherings.

Musicians will be hired and paid by SMS. While musicians will not be required to be union members to be hired for SMS gigs, they will be asked to become union members after six gigs with the organization.

Along with community donations, SMS hopes to generate funding through the Music Performance Trust Fund (MPTF), an invaluable fund available through American Federation of Musicians (AFM), the labor union representing professional musicians in the United States and Canada. 

Each year, MPTF makes a certain amount of money available to each union territory for admission-free live music events, which can be applied for by music professionals. SMS intends to apply for these funds to carry out their programming, and if approved, the MPTF will match what Sustainable Music Seattle spends on their work.

The MPTF was established in 1948 as the result of collective bargaining between the AFM and the signatory record labels. To this day, the fund draws its cash exclusively from the royalty streams of major labels, making the fund safe if federal arts agency budgets are in fact slashed.

Nortness is confident that SMS will be a vital resource for local musicians going forward. “We’re just trying everything and anything to better our position as a trade community,” he said.

Boosting Venue Resiliency

As SMS sets up shop, Washington Nightlife Music Association (WANMA), a coalition of approximately 50 venue owners statewide, is also stepping up to protect stages and those who play them.

In 2020, WANMA formed to help sustain live music venues during the pandemic shutdown. As of 2025, they are expanding their work after receiving two grants in 2024, including a big one from the Washington Department of Commerce called the Innovation Cluster Acceleration Program (ICAP).

“[ICAP helps] promising industry staff sectors assemble the ingredients they need to grow, such as access to capital,” said Leigh Bezezekoff, vice president of WANMA’s board. 

With this infusion of resources, WANMA’s transforming from a volunteer-run coalition into a non-profit with at least four paid staff. The staff’s first two main projects in 2025 will be to build out the organization’s capacity by establishing internal systems and to implement a statewide census of the nightlife industry to help identify where support is needed. 

Additionally, WANMA has identified goals they’d like the staff to work towards next year, including improving public transportation for nightlife workers and audiences, enhancing venue safety and accessibility, and most urgently, addressing the rising costs of doing business while maintaining affordability.

While it’s unclear how the incoming presidency may affect the nightlife industry, Bezezekoff, former marketing and ticketing manager at Seattle’s Tractor Tavern, says that finding ways for venues to adapt to the growing costs of doing business is of paramount importance to WANMA.

“A music venue’s profitability is based largely on beverage sales versus ticket sales…I can speak to my experience as a venue manager for a long time that average sales are down significantly,” she continued, adding that, at present, venues “aren’t making any money.”

While there isn’t one model to look to for increasing venue profitability, WANMA hopes sharing resources across their member community—and across the region— can inspire self-evaluation and fresh solutions for venue sustainability.  To that end, WANMA will share their census results in April at the Cascadia Music Summit, an annual gathering of regional music advocates, artists, and policy makers. Representatives from Alaska, Oregon, and Idaho will also be presenting discoveries from nightlife industry censuses in their states.

“I think it’s important in these times to work together,” said Bezezekoff. “The more opportunities that we have to build community and raise each other up and support what one another is doing, the better.”

Supporting Youth Musicians

When it comes to strengthening our local music industry, nurturing the next generation of musicians is essential. In 2013, this realization inspired local musicians Joe Seamons and Benjamin Hunter to found The Rhapsody Project (tRp), a non-profit that teaches music through an anti-racist lens.

“American music was created in a cauldron of despair and dire circumstances, but it was also created at fish fries and corn shuckings…people [were] learning from their community at the knee of the elders,” said Seamons. “What is the 21st century equivalent of that? [How] could we give that experience to our young people?”

With those questions in mind, tRp nurtures young musicians through in-person classes, cultural events, and virtual classes that utilize non-hierarchical, equity-focused frameworks and encourage youth leadership. Their education model empowers students to lean into their heritage and “to use the power of music and culture to confront injustice and enrich their communities.”

Seamons expects that as the President’s policies target public school arts programs and marginalized communities, tRp will see increased interest in their offerings, including “Face the Music,” a virtual course that confronts racism through the study of American music. Going forward, Seamons plans to offer courses like these more regularly, and to expand how tRp supports their diverse community.

While sustaining youth music education access, Seamons is passionate about taking care of “his people” by ensuring their staff have things like high-quality health insurance, and urgently developing an unrestricted mutual aid fund for the larger community.

“We want to have a fund [where] we can say, ‘Oh, you need $900 for your medical bill?  Here. We got you,’” said Seamons. “Trump being elected makes you want to ramp up the timeline on [creating these resources.]”

Fear and Hope

For many Americans, the era we are entering is a fearful one. But, amongst those concerned in Seattle’s music industry, there is an omnipresent buoy. 

Seattle has a network of scrappy grassroots organizations, like SMS, WANMA, and tRp, accustomed to rising up to support local arts.

“The community is strong,” said local saxophonist Alex Dugdale. “When the government is like, ‘Yeah, we don’t care about your music,’ there are certain people who will step in and say, how much do you need to get your music done?”

WANMA and SMS should have websites and the ability to accept online donations soon. The public can get involved with and donate to tRp on their website. Making a point to go out to local performances makes an impact, too.

“If you’re proud of living in this city then what you’re going to do is you’re gonna go out to places with live music,” said Dugdale. “And you’re gonna pay that cover and you’re gonna tip the band.”