Research portfolio – Arts Administrator

Before starting my studies at LCM during my gap years, I was fortunate to do some
freelance work for the Cumbria Music Hub (CMH), which introduced me to severalroles
within the music industry and one that I would like to pursue when I have finished my
degree, arts administration. To be able to work with the music hub I had to undergo an
enhanced DBS check which is the highest level of criminal record check and essential
for anyone working with children (Personnel Checks, 2026). As a freelancer I also had to
have public liability insurance, which is a type of business insurance that covers legal
fees and compensation if I were to be held responsible for an injury to a third party or
damage to property whilst working for CMH (Spalton, 2025). I was able to get PLI through
my ISM membership as it is a service they provide. As I had been involved with the music
hub whilst I was at school I was invited to apply for the job as the Hub was looking to give
students experience of working in this sector. I was interviewed and given a role as a
freelance admin assistant involved in the organisation of events that the Hub had
planned for summer 2024. As I was on a freelance contract, I had to invoice the hub with
the hours I had worked each month, and I was paid £13.33 p/h. I had to set myself up as
a company with the HMRC and keep a record of my incoming and outgoings that I then
sent to an accountant to work out how much tax I had to pay on my income.
Prospects, (2019) states that it is not essential for arts administrators to have a degree,
but most have some sort of higher-level education which may include degrees in Arts
Management, Music, Business Studies, Performing Arts and Visual Arts. It also describes
jobs in this industry as being very competitive so experience prior to applying is desirable.
This experience could include voluntary work or an internship. However, administrative
skills may not be enough and so experience of arts specific project such as promoting
events, reviewing concerts and productions and helping to organise events and concerts
is advantageous.

Prospects, (2019) describes Arts Administrator as a role that can involve developing new
projects and planning and marketing for events. This is to facilitate the work of arts
organisations, arts programmes and the artists themselves. Organisations that may
employ an Arts Administrator include arts festivals and centre, community organisations,
local authorities and Music Hubs. When working for an organisation as an arts
administrator responsibilities may include:

1. Securing funding for events
Interviewing the head of CMH (Hinds, M. 2025), I learnt that the Hub is funded with grants
from Arts Council England and that to continue receiving this funding they must submit
an annual report. They use this funding to commission projects from freelance Artists.
They also complete grant application forms for further funding from other organisations.

2. Planning logistics relating to performance venues including catering, ticket sales
and security.
One of my roles whilst working for CMH was to secure a venue for the rehearsals and
concert for the Club Classical project. This involved some creative thinking as we wanted
to hold the event in Carlisle and there aren’t many traditional concert spaces available
that met our needs. The one venue suitable for our concert already had a booking so
thinking outside the box I decided to contact local hotels with ballrooms, the local
Cathedral and spaces with Marquees set up. After costing these venues and conducting
site visits it was decided to go with the Fratry at the Cathedral.
I learnt that when booking a venue, it is important for an arts administrator to consider
the following.
• How much are the hiring costs – are you going to be able to cover the costs of the
project?
• Size of venue – is there enough space for the performers and an audience? Can
you get enough audience in to cover the cost of the project?
• Access to venue – is it easy to park by the venue to unload equipment and what is
the situation with stairs inside the venue for moving equipment and audience
accessibility?
• Parking – can the audience and performers park near the venue?
• How will you sell tickets for the event? – we used an online ticket provider
• Does the venue have catering facilities? – we provided teas and coffees ourselves
in this instance.
• Does the venue need security – depending on the type of event the Arts
Administrator may need to arrange security as part of the licence for the event.
This will only apply to bigger events.

3. Events marketing
Whilst working for CMH I was invloved in marketing several events. I used Canva to create
the poster and then sent it out via email to schools and gave printed copies to local music
centres to distribute straight to students. I used Canva to ensure the poster looked
professional and exciting. The poster also needed to include the logos of those involved
and Arts Council England who had provided funding for the project.(See posters 1-4 in appendix)

Arts administrators need to make sure the post is eye catching, will appeal to the relevant
audience and has all the information needed without looking cluttered. (See poster 5 in appendix)

Club Classical was another project I oversaw the marketing for. The project was initially
going to be called Hacienda Classical but after discussion with Tim Crooks it was
decided to change it to Club Classical as marketing it as a ‘Hacienda’ experience might
get us into trouble as the Hacienda brand can be particular about the use of the term.
This was an important learning experience and something I hadn’t considered before. In
the role of arts administrator, it is important to be aware of the legalities surrounding
brands and marketing. The trademark ‘Hacienda’ belongs to Factory Records as they
owned the famous nightclub with that name (Thevinylfactory.com, 2025). To use the title
Hacienda, we would have needed to approach factory records for their permission, so it
was easier just to change the title of the project.

4. Developing New Projects
The AmaSing project gave me the opportunity to have a larger role. AmaSing is a group of
freelance artists who take singing projects to communities, schools and music hubs and
in Summer 2024 they were commissioned by CMH and as a partner we organised ‘Can
you hear Cumbria Sing’
My first role in this project was to collate the contact details for all the schools in the
Cumberland and Westmorland council districts. Schools were sent a Microsoft form to
complete, and I used this information to create an excel spread sheet to collate this
information. This enabled me to see easily see the following information:
• School details and main contact person
• Preferred performance location
• Maximum number of performers

Once I had this information, I had to book venues for each of the 3 performances. One in
South Cumbria (Kendal Parish Church), West Cumbria (St Bees School) and North
Cumbria (Eden Golf Club Wedding Marquee). These venues needed to be a suitable size
for the number of performers, accessible to everyone, have toilet availability for both
children and adults, for safeguarding reasons and coach parking. Prior to the event I had
to keep school’s updated with the details of the event. After the event we contacted all
the schools again for feedback which was collated to support the organisation of events
in the future. The work between AmaSing and CMH went on to be Highly Commended at
the Diverse Cumbria Awards, and I am very proud to have been a part of this.

5. Write press releases to accompany events and activities, working in with press
liaison, public relations, arts-related law and those in charge of finance.
Communication is a key skill for anyone working in arts administration whether this be
communicating with the public as a potential audience or with other members of the
team to ensure everything is covered. When I was working for CHM, we had regular
meetings with key stakeholders to ensure that projects stayed on budget and were
advertised correctly in the press.

6. Health and Safety
On the days of the AmaSing performances, my first job was to check in with the venue
manager to see if there were any issues that had arisen since we last spoke. I then met
with the chaperones (all with enhanced DBS certificates) that the Music Hub had
employed for the event. My first job was to go over their roles and responsibilities, issue
them with their uniform, so they were easily recognisable to school staff and students, I
then went over the fire regulations for the venue, and the location of fire exits, and the
toilets designated for the children.

7. Provide administrative support
Another of my roles at CMH was admin support for the County Youth orchestra. This
involved organise the music for rehearsals and performance including printing off and
photocopying music for the performers. To do this I had to liaise with the project
managers, so I knew the numbers of performers and instruments involved. For the Club
Classical project all the rights to the music were owned by Tim Crooks, meaning we had
permission to print and photocopy the music, however if this hadn’t been the case it
could have been illegal to photocopy music for performance. The role also involved in
supplying the details of the pieces performed to the venue so they could complete their PRS return this is an important job to consider as an arts administrator as it ensures the
composer or arrange gets a payment when their music is performed.

Many musicians have portfolio careers where they work freelance for several different
employers. This includes my former music teacher who in an interview (Richardson,
2025)described the challenges of working in arts administration. Funding for the Arts can
be impacted by the financial climate meaning grants, funding donations and earned
income can be reduced. To ensure sustainability it is important to make the most of
available resources and stick to strict budgets. Working freelance can also lack security
especially in the current climate, where the arts are being impacted by the cost-of-living
crisis and advice is to try and secure a job with a permanent contract rather than working
freelance. I believe it is also important for arts administrations to advocate for artistic
integrity, and this can sometimes clash with commercial viability. Maintaining the core
values of the organisation is essentialwhen devising businessplans. Balancing audience
engagement with the importance of championing underrepresented artists is also key,
for example many orchestral series still don’t include female composers, in 2018 out of 1,445 classical concert only 76 included works by female composer (the Guardian, 2018), or performers
from a diverse range of backgrounds. I believe it is key for arts administrators to challenge
this cultural imbalance to ensure that more composers and performers from
underrepresented groups get a performance platform. This can be done through
audience research and developing inclusive community engagement programs.

As stated, earlier jobs within arts administration are very competitive and highly sought
after Prospects, (2019). Progression within this sector may mean promotion to general
manager, head of administration or to the chief executive of an arts organisation. An
alternative to this, once you have built up significant experience and contacts is to work
freelance as a consultant taking on feasibility studies and developing arts studies for a
range of organisations. There are also opportunities to work overseas through
involvement in partnership between British and international arts companies, however
this may be more difficult since Brexit. Experienced arts administrators can also make
the transition to public, private and voluntary sectorpostsor into the media industry with
roles like agent or promotor.

Bibliography
Amasing. (2025). Home – Amasing. [online] Available at: https://amasing.org.uk/
[Accessed 6 Jan. 2026].

Hinds, M. (2025). Arts Administration job role at Cumbria Music Hub. 27 Oct.

Personnel Checks. (n.d.). Enhanced DBS Checks. [online] Available at:
https://www.personnelchecks.co.uk/enhanced-dbs-checks.

Prospects (2019). Prospects.ac.uk. [online] Prospects.ac.uk. Available at:
http://www.prospects.ac.uk.

Richardson, A. (2025). Working as a freelance Arts Administrator. 28 Oct.

Spalton, R. (2025). Public liability insurance for musicians. [online] Independent Society
of Musicians. Available at: https://www.ism.org/advice/public-liability-insurance-for-
musicians/ [Accessed 6 Jan. 2026].

the Guardian. (2018). Female composers largely ignored by concert line-ups. [online] Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2018/jun/13/female-composers-largely-ignored-by-concert-line-ups.

‌Thevinylfactory.com. (2025). Cameron Bensimon. [online] Available at:
https://www.thevinylfactory.com/features/photos-hacienda-opening-party [Accessed
6 Jan. 2026].

Appendix