EPK Builder: Make a Musician Press Kit FreeThe seven things a booker checks, in the order they check them, and what to leave out
TL;DR: two minutes of live video, your dates, and your fee range
An EPK is an electronic press kit: one link that tells a booker who you are, what you sound like live, what you charge and when you are free. Seven elements matter, and live video matters most. You can build one free inside a GigXchange performer profile.
The mistake almost everyone makes is writing it for other musicians. A booker is deciding one thing: will this act hold my room on a Tuesday.
- 7 elementsthat a booker actually checks
- 30 secondsroughly how long your EPK gets on first open
- 2 minutesof live video is worth more than any biography
- £150-£500the fee range most pub bookers are working to
Platform counts in this post are live, read from the database as the page loads. Fee guidance from the GX Index.
I have been on both sides of this. As an act I have sent a lot of press kits, and now I watch what venue bookers open first. It is never the biography. It is the video, then the dates, then the fee, and if those three land the rest is a formality.
1. Live video: the one that decides it
Two minutes, one take, a real room
A phone on a stand at the back of a pub beats a studio edit. Bookers are checking whether people look up from their drinks, which a polished edit hides and a single take cannot. It is also the room bookers are protecting: the Music Venue Trust annual report shows how little margin a grassroots night runs on, which is why "can this act hold a Friday" is the only question that matters to them.
Do not send a studio recording as your only audio
Studio audio tells a booker nothing about whether you can hold a room. Send it as well, never instead.
Filming the two minutes, properly enough
You do not need a videographer. You need one song, shot from the back of a real room, with the audio not clipping.
- Phone on a small tripod at the back of the room, chest height.
- Landscape, locked off, do not zoom.
- Pick the song that usually gets the room going, not the new one.
- Record the whole song, then cut to the best two minutes.
- Check the audio on phone speakers before you use it.
Who is actually searching these profiles
The reason to fill this in properly is not tidiness. It is that the search is real and it runs every day.
Live on GigXchange right now
50 UK venues and 579 artists across 71 cities. A profile with live video, current dates and a stated fee range is what a venue filters for when they need a Friday filled.
2. Availability: the second thing they check
Publish your free dates, and keep them current
Most booking conversations die on "are you free on the 14th". A profile carrying live availability answers it before the message is sent. Set yours in your performer profile. You can put the same calendar on your own site too: see the availability widget.
A stale calendar is worse than none
Being offered a date you already booked costs you the next enquiry too.
3. Fee range: say it, do not make them ask
Give a range, with what changes it
"£200-£350 depending on set length and travel" filters out the wrong enquiries and speeds up the right ones. Anchor it to the GX Index so you are quoting the market, not a guess. Our pricing guide goes deeper. Set the bottom of the range against the Musicians Union national rate, £167.16 per musician for up to three hours, so a low offer has a number to argue with.
Hiding your price does not win negotiations
It mostly wins you enquiries from people who were never going to pay it. The ISM makes the same point about written terms generally: the awkward number is cheaper stated early than discovered late.
4. The basics bookers scan for
Format and set length, in the first line
"Acoustic duo, two 45 minute sets, own PA" tells a booker more than three paragraphs of description, because it answers the three questions that decide whether you fit their night: how many of you there are, how long you play, and whether they need to provide anything.
Put it in the first line, before the story. A booker deciding between six acts is scanning for a fit, and the ones who make it obvious get shortlisted by people who never read past the second sentence.
Genre in the language a landlord uses
"Covers, 60s to now" lands. "Alt-folk with shoegaze textures" does not, and not because it is pretentious: it is written for other musicians rather than for the person deciding whether their Friday crowd will stay.
Use the words a landlord would use to describe the night to a regular. You can keep the accurate description for press and playlists, where the audience actually knows what shoegaze is.
Where you are based and how far you travel
Travel radius is a filter bookers use constantly, and leaving it blank means being excluded from searches rather than being considered for everything. Give a distance and a base town.
It is worth being honest about it rather than optimistic. An act who claims the whole South East and then declines anything past the M25 gets asked once, and the venues who make a note of that talk to each other.
What you bring: PA, backline, how much space
A small room needs to know if you fit, physically and electrically: how much floor space you need, whether you bring a PA, how many sockets, and how long the load-in takes.
This is the detail that turns a maybe into a booking, because it is the thing the landlord would otherwise have to ask on a Tuesday afternoon and wait a day for. Say it before they ask.
| Order | What goes in | Why it is there |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Live video, 2 minutes | Proves you hold a room. The deciding factor. |
| 2 | Availability | Kills the "are you free on the 14th" round trip. |
| 3 | Fee range | Filters wrong enquiries, speeds up right ones. |
| 4 | Format and set length | Tells them if you fit the night. |
| 5 | Genre in plain words | Tells them if you fit the crowd. |
| 6 | Location and travel radius | A filter bookers apply constantly. |
| 7 | Tech needs and what you bring | Tells them if you fit the room. |
What goes in an EPK, in the order bookers check it
Your profile blurb, in one paste
This is the shape that works, on our profiles and on anyone else's. Fill the brackets and it answers every scanning question in four lines.
[Act name] — [format, e.g. acoustic duo / 4-piece covers band], [base town].
[2 x 45] minute sets, [own PA / need a PA], [backline needs]. We need about [space] and [n] x 13A sockets.
We play [genre in plain words, e.g. covers, 60s to now]. Fee from £[amount], depending on set length and travel.
Travel: up to [n] miles from [town].
Live video: [link]
Free dates: [link]
[phone] — [email]5. What to cut from your press kit
Three things take up most of the space on a typical musician page and do none of the work. Each one is written for the wrong reader, and cutting them makes the booking more likely rather than less.
The three things bookers skip past
Each one is written for the wrong reader. Cutting them makes the page shorter and the booking more likely.
6. Building one free
Your GigXchange profile is an EPK
A performer profile carries all seven elements in one link: video, availability, fee range, format, genre, location and tech. Create an account and fill it in, and you have an EPK without paying for a separate builder.
Twenty minutes a month keeps it working
Update the video when you get better footage, and the dates whenever you book something. Everything else can sit. The rest of the monthly admin, invoices and rates included, is in getting paid as a musician and the free tools list.
- Film two minutes of a live set on a phone, one take, at the back of the room.
- Write three sentences: format, set length, genre in plain words.
- Set your fee range against the GX Index.
- Publish your free dates and diarise updating them.
- List what you bring: PA, backline, space needed.
- Put it all in one performer profile link.
- Send that single link. Never an attachment.
The tools for each part
All free. The EPK builder assembles the lot into one link.
What to do with it once it exists
The profile is one part of being bookable. These are the rest.
Frequently Asked Questions
Annual refresh commitment
This guide was published on 21 March 2026 and is refreshed every March. what bookers expect from a press kit changes, so annual verification matters. We re-verify every reference, recommendation, and data point once a year. Next scheduled refresh: March 2027. If any claim is outdated before then, email support@gigxchange.app and we will update it within 24 hours.
