New York City’s musicians’ union has begun leafleting outside a major jazz club, the first salvo in what union leaders say is a campaign to gain pension benefits and a minimum wage for jazz artists.
The campaign began quietly last Thursday night, when four members of Local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians stood in the cold outside the Blue Note in Greenwich Village and handed out leaflets with the headline “Justice for Jazz Artists!” Musicians continued passing out information outside the Blue Note over the weekend and said they would do so again starting on Thursday.
“It’s just a sin that we have no pension,” said Keisha St. Joan, 72, a jazz vocalist who was distributing leaflets. “I will not have a pension before I die.”
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