Bandcamp reveals musicians earned over $4million after waiving revenue shares last Friday

To support artists amid the current coronavirus pandemic, Bandcamp gave up its revenue shares for 24 hours last Friday, meaning artists received full payments for merch and music sold via Bandcamp.

Bandcamp launched the day-long initiative in the hope of providing musicians with some extra money following tour and festival cancellations.

Yesterday (23 March), Bandcamp shared an update and revealed how much money was spent across the site last Friday. They write, "The numbers tell a remarkable story: on a typical Friday, fans buy about 47,000 items on Bandcamp, but this past Friday, fans bought nearly 800,000, or $4.3 million worth of music and merch. That’s more than 15 times our normal Friday, and at the peak, fans were buying 11 items per second."

They go on to thank publications that have posted about the initiative, and also thank "the many labels who gave 100% of their proceeds to their artists as well."

Bandcamp add, "We don’t yet know the long-term impact of Covid-19, but we know that we all need music - to uplift and inspire us, to heal us, and to give us hope. We’ll continue working to make Bandcamp the best place for fans and artists to come together and sustain each other in the challenging times ahead. Thank you again, and we wish you all good health!"