The band EPK: one link with everything a venue asks a band for.

01 What goes in it

What goes in a band EPK: eight things, in the order a venue looks for them.

1. Your name, what you play, where you are from, and how many of you there are, on the first screen. “Five-piece wedding and party band from Charlotte.” A venue sizes the stage and the fee from that one line.
2. A short bio, around 60 words. The sound, the rooms you play, one piece of proof, how long a set runs. Written in the third person, so a venue can paste it into a listing. Three to copy the shape of are further down.
3. Two or three tracks, your best first. For a band, the recording is the audition for the room; the video is the audition for the crowd.
4. A video of the band playing to people. A phone clip of a full room beats a studio video with no audience. Thirty seconds answers the question every booker is really asking: can they hold a room?
5. Photos a venue can use. One wide band photo for the listing, one live shot, both credited. Hi-res downloads so nobody has to ask.
6. A stage plot and tech rider. The band-only item. How many inputs, how many monitor mixes, what you bring and what you need from the house. An engineer reads it the afternoon of the show; a venue that sees one in the kit knows you have played real rooms.
7. Dates and the rooms you have played. Upcoming shows with ticket links, and three or four past rooms or festivals a booker will recognize.
8. A booking contact and your formats. A real email and a phone number, and whether you play as a full band, a trio or acoustic, with set lengths. A wedding band adds fees and availability on a booking page.

02 A real example

Band EPK example: open one and scroll it like a venue would.

Espira is a Latin alternative rock band from San Antonio, together since 1998, on MidWav Records. Their kit has a Spanish home page and an English page. It shows the parts that get a band booked: the latest release with its cover and a player, three music videos and a live clip, and two press quotes. Below those sit the upcoming dates with ticket status and a one-page stage plot in the downloads, where the engineer looks for it.

A band that plays weddings and private events needs a second kind of page. The Saturday Linens, a sample five-piece wedding band we made up, shows it on the Marquee template. A 300-song setlist, three formats with set lengths, the venues they have played, testimonials, and a month-by-month availability grid. More finished band kits, with notes on why each works: EPK examples.

All three are sample acts we made up, labeled that way on their kits.

03 Band bio examples

Band bio examples: three short ones you can copy the shape of.

Each one says what the band sounds like, where it plays, one piece of proof and how long it can play, in the third person. All three bands are made up.

Ten more, one per genre, with notes on what each gets right: musician bio examples.

04 The stage plot and tech rider

The band stage plot and tech rider: the part a solo act can skip.

A band is the act that needs the paperwork. The engineer wants to know how many channels to patch, how many wedges to drag out, whether there is a drum riser, and what you bring. A one-page stage plot with an input list and a one-page rider answers that before load-in, and a venue that sees them in the kit knows the band has done this before.

• The stage plot shows who stands where, each input numbered, and the monitor mixes. The stage plot maker draws it from a preset for a trio, a four-piece or a seven-piece with horns.
• The tech rider says what you bring, what you need from the house, the set length and sound check time, in a page. The tech rider template fills it in from the same plot.
• Both go in the kit’s downloads as one two-page PDF, next to the hi-res photos, so the engineer and the booker find them in the same place.

05 How to build it

How to make a band EPK: five steps, about twenty minutes.

1. Sign up and pick a template. The Stage for a loud band, The Studio for a quieter one. You can switch later without losing anything.
2. Type the name line and the short bio. Genre, city, how many of you. Then the 60-word bio from the examples above.
3. Paste your links. Two or three tracks from Spotify or Bandcamp, one live video from YouTube. They play on the page.
4. Add photos, dates and a booking email. One wide band photo, one live shot, your next shows, a real email.
5. Make the stage plot and rider, then publish. Ten minutes in the free tools; the PDF lands in your downloads. Publish, and put the link in your next booking email.

The longer walkthrough, section by section: how to make an EPK.

06 Solo acts

Artist EPK vs band EPK: what changes for a solo act.

An artist EPK holds the same eight things with two differences. The name line says how you play live, alone, with tracks or with a band, because that changes the room and the fee more than anything else about you. And the stage plot shrinks to a line in the downloads: one vocal mic, one DI, one wedge. The Studio template suits a songwriter; The Spotlight suits a louder act. A solo act that fronts a hired band for bigger rooms lists both formats, the way a wedding band lists a trio and a full band.

07 Template or link?

Band EPK template: a file to fill in, or a page that updates itself.

If a festival or a grant asks for a document, the EPK template is a free two-page Word and PDF download with a box for everything above, and a filled-in example. For everyone else, send the link. A PDF shows the dates and the lineup from the day you saved it; the kit shows this month’s. The music press kit template walks through each section with example copy if you want to write it before you build it.

08 What it costs

Free to publish. Five dollars to put it at your band’s name.

The editor, three templates, the stage plot and rider tools and publishing at a generated link cost nothing. A free kit carries a small LiveEPK badge. The $5 plan ($50 a year) puts the kit at yourband.liveepk.com with no badge. It adds the booking page, the Marquee template, an email composer that drafts the pitch with your music and dates in it, and a switch that lets Google list the kit. Everything the free plan includes, in plain terms: the free EPK builder.