I started cntd because I watched talent give up.

It began with my wife and a few friends from school. Then I met the people who book them, and found they were stuck too.

I'm Dominic Soh. I look after the business side of cntd, and Sean builds the product.

My wife wanted a full‑time career in dance.

10+ years of ballet
Dance diploma
Full-time dancer
Stage management
Public sector

She wanted to pursue dance full time, as a dancer. In Singapore, the prospects for that are quite low, so she looked into freelance stage management.

It was just as hard to find gigs and jobs. Worse, there was no platform for it: everything came through word of mouth or an introduction. She ended up working at a government body in the public sector.

30.6%

of performing arts diploma graduates had a full-time permanent job six months out. Yet more of them, 32.7%, were freelancing, with no salary to count on.

NAFA Graduate Employment Survey2025 survey

1 in 3

arts workers here are freelance or self-employed. So when a gig is cancelled or paid late, there is no salary to fall back on.

Singapore Government, 2024

Such a waste of talent.

Some friends from school could really sing. They posted on Spotify and hunted for gigs. Then came NS, then uni, and they drifted away from it.

One of them played guitar, sang and produced all through poly: open houses, external gigs, busking. After graduating, the bookings dried up and the network just wasn't there. A stable job won.

Their reason: it's not financially sound.

S$150

a night is what gig musicians here have earned since the 1970s, says jazz pianist Jeremy Monteiro. Had it kept up with prices, it would be about S$630.

Vulcan Post, 20242023 dollars

S$4,313

a month is what the typical full-time arts worker earns. Yet the typical full-time worker earns S$5,500, so arts pay is about a fifth lower.

MCCY, 2025, MOM, 20252024 figures, gap is our arithmetic

48%

of freelancers here with local clients get work through word of mouth. So if you don't know the right people, that work doesn't find you.

PayPal survey, 2018all freelancers, not only arts

Even when the gig comes, the pay can be late.

77%

of freelance arts workers were paid on time, against 95% of full-time staff. So roughly 1 in 4 freelancers waited on money they had already earned.

NAC, 20172016 fieldwork

58%

of freelance arts workers had a signed contract with their client, against 86% of staff. The other 42% had nothing in writing to point to.

NAC, 20172016 fieldwork

Then I talked to the people who book us.

Two DJs involved in running collectives, and a manager at a live-music venue, told me how booking works from their side. Two artists at a live bar told me what they would rather have.

These are conversations, not statistics. I couldn't find anyone who publishes numbers on how organisers book artists.

Getting paid is a real, recurring problem. Most deals are verbal, and nothing enforces them. They haven't been paid for a gig since last year, and they don't expect to get it back.
A DJ who runs a collective
They once booked a DJ friend they knew was good, but the genres were wrong for the room. Now a link to a mix is the least they want before saying yes.
A DJ who runs a collective
For their collective, the hardest part wasn't finding artists. It was finding somewhere to rent.
Another DJ
The owner picks the line-up. Artists come in to audition for a slot, and the ones who get one sign contracts that stop them playing anywhere else.
A manager at a live-music venue, August 2026
Being tied to one venue is not what they want. Given the choice, and if freelancing had more gigs, they would rather freelance than be contracted. They also said that if their payment were secure, they would be more open to trying a platform.
Two artists at a live bar, August 2026

The rooms are going too. Spectrum held its last gig in November 2025, citing high costs (Bandwagon), and Headquarters closed in May 2026 after ten years (Bandwagon).

120

or so people need to walk in before one independent venue breaks even on a show. So booking an act you haven't seen play is a gamble.

Esplanade Offstage, 2025

S$284.7m

came into pubs, clubs and karaoke lounges in 2022, under half the S$674.7m of 2015. So the rooms that book artists have much less to spend.

Dept of Statistics via CNA, 20252022 figures, includes the pandemic

What if it had existed back then?

I wanted to build something she, her friends and mine would have found genuinely useful. Maybe, just maybe, they'd have gone for it with a little less fear.

What cntd does about it.

Work comes by word of mouth.
Organisers, venues and collectives post gigs with the date and the fee. Artists build a profile with their work, browse the board and apply. You meet people you didn't already know.
Deals are verbal.
When an organiser picks someone, cntd writes the contract from the gig's details. You both sign before any money moves.
Nothing makes anyone pay, or show up.
You both put down a deposit, held by cntd until the gig is done, so neither side pulls out lightly. The organiser pays the rest through cntd afterwards, and the artist is paid out. If an artist doesn't turn up, the organiser gets their deposit back, and the artist's as money off their next booking.
Booking someone you haven't seen play.
Profiles show the work, the gigs played on cntd and the ratings. Ratings come only from the two sides of a finished gig.
Rooms are closing, and renting one is hard.
cntd can't change rent. It does connect artists to the organisers and venues that post gigs, and organisers to the artists who apply.

Thanks for reading.

Dominic

Whichever side of the night you're on.

Join cntd Post a gig

Where these numbers come from11 sources

Where a card says "our arithmetic", we worked it out from the published figures. The conversations with DJs, artists and a venue manager are paraphrased and kept anonymous.