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See How Much It’ll Cost to Book Your Favorite Musical Act, From Taylor Swift to Phosphorescent

A booking agency says it knows how much it’ll cost to get acts from Taylor Swift ($1 million+) to a Dave Matthews tribute band ($5-$10K) for your private party. See all the numbers.

How much will it cost for ______ to play my wedding?

It’s a question we’ve all asked ourselves at some point—before waving the idea off as a delusion of grandeur and opting for a lame DJ or cover band.

The site Priceonomics recently reached out to Degy Entertainment, a third-party booking agency, to give curious live music aficionados a rough idea of just how much it may cost to book your favorite musical act based on “a list of rates suggested by the artists’ agents per show, pre-expense.”

According to the research, acts like Dave Matthews Band, Bruce Springsteen, Justin Bieber (ugh), Justin Timberlake, and Taylor Swift are the most expensive to book, with an estimated rate of $1 million-plus per performance, while it’ll run you around $125,000-$175,000 for “Happy” singer Pharrell. If you can’t pony up a cool mil for the real thing, you can opt for a Dave Matthews Tribute Band for a reported $5,000-$10,000. The biggest steal, according to the research, is the excellent indie band Phosphorescent, which can allegedly be booked for only $7,500 (and whose tune “Song For Zula” was one of our favorites last year). Jay Z and Beyoncé, meanwhile, are noticeably absent from the list, although your sorry ass probably couldn’t afford them anyway.

Now, the rates—we’re sure—aren’t perfect. They’re based on figures provided by a third-party booking agency specializing in putting on concerts for colleges, thus many of the prices may inflated (or deflated), depending on various factors, and perhaps the figures are up for negotiation. Still, the numbers give you a rough idea of the ballpark expenditure.

Priceonomics has provided handy charts organizing the artists in alphabetical order by their alleged booking fees, ranging from the highest range ($100K-plus) to the lowest ($1,000-plus). You can check them out here (and good luck):

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Marlow Stern

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