Aotearoa Music Community Covid-19 Resources

Sunday's Red traffic light announcement from Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern brought with it tighter restrictions for gigs throughout Aotearoa, impacting directly on our music community and prompting numerous festival events and tours to either postpone or cancel. Tāmaki Makaurau gig-goers will be familiar with the new restrictions — notably live events can still take place at Red with a maximum capacity of 100 physically distanced attendees where My Vaccine Passes are used (with the specific detail of "no dancing" in hospitality venues). For the full official details on life at Red head over HERE.

A silver lining to this unwelcome turn of events is this isn't our community's first rodeo with Covid restrictions. For those who have the means to do so, we encourage ticket holders to consider supporting artists and organisers by opting to hold onto tickets, opting out of refunds and opting out of booking fee refunds. Below is an updated compilation of useful resources for both local musicians and music lovers, we will be adding to this list as new resources roll in...

UTR Covid info page for ticket sellers / promotors HERE.

An updated document of Covid Resources for NZ Music / Production Industry Pals including useful notes (and info below) can be found HERE.

The Arts and Culture Event Support Scheme is eligible for arts / cultural events with attendee capacity of 100 to 5000 ticketed or un-ticketed, or 5000+ un-ticketed (i.e. free) — for details and to apply head over HERE.

The Events Transition Support Payment scheme (ETSP) covers large-scale events of over 5000 in-person attendees — details HERE.

MusicHelps have provided COVID-19 Information and Support for Kiwi Music People HERE. They offer a 24/7 Wellbeing Service – an online, on the phone (tollfree 0508MUSICHELP) and in-person counselling service provided free of charge to those that make live or recorded music possible in Aotearoa. For more info head along HERE.

Healthline has a wealth of resources on symptoms, self-isolating, and mental wellbeing, as well as all the COVID-19 media releases in one place.

Be prepared for self isolation — make a plan using the checklist HERE.

Arrange your booster shot and vaccination bookings HERE.

Request your My Vaccine Pass if you haven't done so already HERE.

The COVID-19 Leave Support Scheme is available to employers, including self-employed people, to help pay their employees who have been advised to self-isolate because of COVID-19 and can’t work at home during that period — for more on how to apply head over HERE.

Likewise, the COVID-19 Short-Term Absence Payment is available for businesses, including self-employed people, to help pay their employees who cannot work from home while they wait for a COVID-19 test result — for details head over HERE.

You can support artists directly by purchasing music / merchandise via Bandcamp — for recent Aotearoa releases head over HERE.

As Aotearoa's longest-running independent ticketing and music news website, we've been significantly impacted by the Red restrictions. Revenue from ticketing live shows enables the UTR team to keep bringing you the best breaking music news, interviews, playlists and so much more. Please consider supporting us HERE.