Please note: the following posts are from a personal blog and therefore do not represent the views of my employer, or the performing arts and governmental agencies linked from this site.

They are included as anecdotes and examples of my experiences with presenting artists from abroad.

World Music: Part 5 of 4 – I’m Moving to Canada


As I indicated in my previous post, we had an artist stranded in Montreal, because the U.S. Embassy in London lost his passport and visa during processing. I spent SEVERAL hours contacting the embassies in London and Montreal, personnel at the Vermont Border crossing, personnel at USCIS, CBP and the State Department, all of Vermont’s representatives in Washington, heck – even an immigration lawyer who is a family friend, trying to find a solution.

We explored the possibility of the Visa Waiver Program:

Nationals from 27 countries (primarily Europe, plus Australia, Brunei, Japan, New Zealand, and Singapore) may enter the U.S. without a visa for up to 90 days. The general requirements for participation include no prior overstays in the U.S., a machine readable passport, a processing fee (in U.S. funds only) and a prepaid round-trip ticket to a non-contiguous country within 90 days of arrival. Here was the rub for us, however: Aliens entering under the Visa Waiver Program (VWP) are subject to the same rules as those admitted in B-1 or B-2 status – meaning they cannot work!However, before using the VWP, you should carefully consider your options. If you are admitted to the U.S. under the VWP, you may not change or extend your non-immigrant status. If your admission is denied, you have no right to administrative or judicial review. Likewise, if you are found to have violated the terms of your admission, you also forfeit the right to contest a removal order.

After leaving voice messages, faxes, and e-mails scattered throughout the globe, I was able to speak with an extremely helpful border agent at our very own Vermont border crossing in Highgate. He confirmed many of the above stipulations of the VWP, and suggested that the consulate in Montreal might be able to reissue our artist’s visa on an expedited basis. A staffer at Senator Leahy’s Burlington office also called the Embassy in London trying to help as well.

After a few attempts, I actually heard back, via e-mail, from the U.S. Consulate in Montreal. It was an unsigned e-mail, from a general e-mail box, with no contact information whatsoever, but offering the following advice:

We will be able to accept [your pianist’s] application for a visa today before 11:00 am. Please contact him immediately so that he can complete the DS-156 form online at evisaforms.state.gov. He has to complete all the questions on that form online and then print out all three pages, including the third page with the barcode. If he is under 45 years of age, he must also complete the DS-157 form. He needs to bring his passport, one recent, passport-sized photo and 100$ in US cash only. If he shows up without any of the above, he will be turned away and will not be processed. He MUST be here before 11:00 am to get processed because we will closed tomorrow. Otherwise, he will not be able to travel to the U.S. on the Visa Waiver Program if he is getting paid for the performance.

Please confirm if he will be here before 11:00 am.
Best Regards.

I received this e-mail at 9:57 am. I broke my phone upon reading it.

The pianist was staying at a hotel at the airport – almost 30 minutes by taxi from the consulate. I know he probably didn’t have a spare passport photo on him, or $100 U.S. for that matter, so while it was an impossible task for us, I did try to appreciate that fact that they actually responded and we now know the option exists if similar problems arise in the future.

I must say our pianist, for all he went through, was gracious and performed spectacularly. He used the time in Montreal to rest, get his hair cut (he claims to have looked like Chewbacca before the trim,) eat great food, and watch some bad cable movies. We asked if he practiced his all Beethoven program on the piano in the hotel bar, to which he replied, “Yeah, until some drunk demanded I switch to Bach.”

Even with a shiny new democratic house and senate, I fear Bush with his 6 years of Homeland Security, the Patriot Act, increased ridiculous bureaucracy, refusal to sign Kyoto, IRAQ, and the incredible damage he has done to our global relations, I’m about ready to throw in the towel and move to Canada. At least I already know their national anthem.

Montreal HDR Photo courtesy of Alistair Howard
Updated 1/28/07 for typos and links.

World Music: Part 4 of 4 – When in Rome,…NY

Considering I currently have a brilliant British pianist stranded in Montreal and incapable of traveling over the Vermont/Quebec border to perform for us Friday since the U.S. Consulate in London LOST HIS PASSPORT AND US VISA they were processing, it seemed appropriate (and more constructive than the rant I’d like to post) to finish this series now.

To review the previous installments, visit…

World Music: Part 1 of 4 – Introduction
World Music – Part 2 of 4 – Visa. It’s everywhere you want to be! ™
World Music – Part 3 of 4. Taxation without Representation

OK, so you, your performer, and their agent have worked diligently for almost 6 months. We’ve competed a USCIS visa petition, received a I-797 approval notice, the artist has visited a U.S. consulate for an interview, photo and biometric fingerprinting, and finally has their shiny new visa affixed to their passport. Now our wonderful performer travels to the States.

Each time a foreign artist seeks entry, they must undergo inspection by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). Often, CBP inspectors ask nothing at all, but they have enormous power and discretion to determine whom they will admit. If a CBP inspector decides that an alien is seeking entry in the wrong status, the inspector may detain the alien, deny him/her access to a phone, and put him/her on the next plane back. Worse yet, if the inspector suspects that the alien has committed a fraud or misrepresentation, the inspector has full, unreviewable discretion summarily to exclude that alien from the U.S. for five years. Moreover, aliens who enter the U.S. with visas and then overstay may, in certain circumstances, be relegated to forever obtaining their visas only from their home country consulate.

Applicants should have with them a copy of the underlying USELESS USCIS (sorry, did I say that out loud?) petition as well as the original, or at least a copy, of the I-797 approval notice, whether they have a visa or not. Assuming CBP chooses to admit the alien, it will issue the alien one portion of the white I-94 containing a stamp showing the alien’s date of entry, a notation of the classification in which the alien is admitted, and the date until which the alien is admitted.

As crazy as it sounds, once in the U.S., this little white card trumps everything else – including that visa you spent hundreds of dollars and 6 months to obtain. The departure date HAND-WRITTEN (can you believe it) by the CBP on the I-94 is all-important. The artist/alien should be CERTAIN they can read a correct, designated departure date and that they have in fact been admitted in the proper classification before crossing into the U.S.! Once in the states, you must abide by the departure date on the I-94, even if the border agent accidentally transposed numbers in the date, or it otherwise doesn’t align with your visa. Do not count on there being exceptions of any kind to this rule, even if it is CBP’s fault. Indeed, an overstay of even one day can render the artist subject to another rule, 222g, under which the alien must return to his or her home country consulate to obtain ALL future U.S. visas. For frequent travelers, this can be devastating.


It is also important not to lose the I-94/I-94W (which is usually stapled into the passport, just above a perforation which can separate easily!), not only because it represents an immigration “registration” document that the holder by law must carry at all times, but because it represents the potential proof that the alien departed the U.S. on time. The carriers collect I-94s from departing aliens and send them to USCIS, which then inputs the data into its computer system. If timely departure data for a given alien is missing, the system will show that alien as a possible overstay. If so, CBP inspectors will at some point in the future, often years later, discover that that the arriving alien has a past overstay. In these cases, CBP has been known not just to put the alien into “secondary” inspection, which can cause hours of delay (and great stress), but to handcuff and ship them back immediately, if they cannot prove they did not overstay.

These 4 posts and guidelines hopefully don’t scare you away from presenting an international artist…but just offer some advice from the trenches to help recognize and avoid the potential hurdles and make your artist(s) visit a successful one. Again, I refer you to the following resources:

World Music – Part 3 of 4. Taxation without Representation

Once you’ve got the bulk of the artist’s visa work completed – then there are the tax implications to worry about.

Beneficial Ownership
First, and foremost, is determining to whom you will pay the artistic fee AND who is actually considered the “beneficial owner” of this payment. The beneficial owner is the person who ultimately gets to keep the money. Thus, a person receiving the funds (agent) strictly to pass this payment on to another person (artist) is not the beneficial owner. As the tax code changes so frequently, getting your organization and the artist’s manager on the same page regarding taxation and beneficial ownership is a frequent challenge.

Most types of U.S. income, received by a foreign person, are subject to a U.S. tax rate of 30 percent. A reduced rate or exemption may apply if there is a tax treaty (see below) between the foreign person’s country of residence and the United States.

Whether payment is made through a foreign or U.S. management agent, the foreign artist must complete a Form 8233, “Exemption From Withholding on Compensation for Independent Personal Services of a Nonresident Alien Individual.” A lovely form, which requires the performer to list all the visa details from their passport for the last several years. If the artist tours extensively – this can take forever.

Tax Treaties
The United States has entered into income tax treaties with a large number of foreign countries. Under many treaties, residents of foreign countries are exempt from U.S. income taxes with varying limitations and/or income thresholds. If a treaty exemption applies to a particular foreign artist you must indicate said exemption on Form 8233. However…

Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers
A U.S.-issued Individual Tax Identification Numbers (ITIN) must be furnished on all returns, statements, and other tax-related documents (including the 8233!) ITINs may be acquired from the IRS by filing a Form W-7 with appropriate documents indicating identity and foreign status. A foreign artist must have a tax identification number to file an income tax return or to claim tax treaty benefits, including exemptions from foreign withholding. In other words, even if you have proved that the artist will NOT be required to pay taxes, they STILL need to get a taxpayer ID number to claim this.

Individual Tax Returns
A foreign artist paid by a U.S arts organization is considered to be “engaged in a trade or business” in the United States. Crazy as it seems, the foreign artist MUST file a Form 1040NR tax return, even if no income tax was required to be withheld.

And remember – ALL of this is simply to ensure the artist can legally perform in the U.S. There remains all of the other planning considerations required as with any artistic performance.

  • Contract negotiation
  • Technical rider review, negotiation, and adherence
  • Grant work
  • Arranging for or renting required technical gear
  • Planning associated outreach or residency events
  • Marketing and promotion
  • Travel logistics to nearest airport and local transport service
  • Lodgings and meals
  • Reserving rehearsal time in your venue
  • Hiring page turners, piano technician, IATSE workers, etc.
  • Program design including program order, titling, program notes, biographies, texts, translations, and required grant or sponsorship language, etc.

Tune in later this week for the final installment: When in Rome…NY.

Again – please refer to the Artists from Abroad website. Artists from Abroad is made possible by the Association of Performing Arts Presenters, the American Symphony Orchestra League, and through a grant from the National Endowment from the Arts. Please also refer to the USCIS and IRS websites for more information.

World Music – Part 2 of 4 – Visa. It’s everywhere you want to be! ™

In part one, I gave a brief introduction to some of the work I do presenting artists from abroad. Here is where the fun begins: planning and paperwork!

About 6 months before (Update May 2007: You now can apply a YEAR in advance!) the artist is scheduled to perform in your community, you need to ensure that the visa petition is in process. If you are lucky enough to have a performer with an American manager/agent, they are likely handling this for the artist’s entire U.S. tour.

If the artist’s management agency is located abroad and/or you are the only American organization presenting said performer/ensemble, you will need to submit the visa petition(s) to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) for work-related O or P classification visas. The classes are as follows:

  • O-1: Persons of extraordinary ability in the arts, athletics, business, education or science
  • O-2: Essential support personnel of O-1 visa holders (accompanists, coaches, tour manager, lighting designer, etc.)
  • P-1: Athletes, entertainment groups/ensembles and their support personnel
  • P-3: Artists or Entertainers in a culturally unique program

Filing a petition takes planning. Just take a look at the USCIS’s checklist - down to exactly how you must hole-punch the paper. The I-129 petition requires documentation of the artists’ “extraordinary ability”, copies of contracts from other U.S. presenters, all of the performer’s passport biographical information, tour itineraries, selections from a press kit or documentation of an award of international merit, and lastly, a union consultation. It can take weeks to assemble all of the proper documents, but remember it also takes weeks or months for the petition to actually be processed and hopefully approved.

Let’s say we actually get the petition and all documentation in order in a fairly timely fashion. We then send the petition(s) off to the Vermont Service Center. This is a fairly recent development. You used to send the I-129 to your region’s processing center, but due to extreme backloads in certain centers (CA had a 180 day backlog – and remember, you cannot apply more than 180 days in advance!!) , all O & P’s are now sent just to Vermont, since this center notoriously had the best processing times and customer service. However – this now means YOUR petition is competing for processing with every other O & P in the nation (over 44,000 last year!) – including those that have paid for “premium processing.” So you can imaging that things have slowed a little.

Now, did I mention that…

  1. An “ensemble” or “culturally-significant” performance can be filed under a single P visa petition – BUT if you have, say, a vocalist (O-1B visa) who travels with her accompanist (O-2) and a vocal coach or tour manager (O-2) you actually need to complete three separate petitions
  2. Oh – and the cost. The I-129 carries a $190 (Update July 2007: $320!) processing fee PER petition, AND you also have to pay usually $200 for each labor consultation. If you don’t complete the petition yourself, then you’re also looking at paying an immigration firm as well.
  3. AND – if you have not done adequate planning, book the event in a short-time frame, or hit a filing snag – you’ll likely have to upgrade your petition to Premium Processing – which guarantees processing in 15 days or less, for the minor cost of $1,000 per petition.
  4. And lastly, if any of the artists are male applicants between 16-45 years old and/OR nationals of the 7 designated “state sponsors of terrorism” (Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Sudan and Syria) they must also complete a DS-157 form and possibly be subject to additional scrutiny.

If all goes well, you should receive a I-797 Approval Notice to forward to the performer. THEN the artist him/herself must complete a DS-156 form, and schedule a visit (around their busy world-wide touring schedule!) at an appropriate U.S. Consulate abroad for an interview, fingerprinting and the actual processing of the new machine-readable visa (pic. above) itself. The artist also has to pay a $100 application fee at this time.

If everything up until this point goes well – don’t worry – there are still a few stops along the way where it can all derail in an instant! But I’ll cover PFIs, POEs, I-94s and border posts in Part 4 – When in Rome, NY. Until then – enjoy the next installment : Part 3 – Taxation without Representation.

For more information, please visit Artists from Abroad.

Lady Liberty image Copyright © 2005/2006 American Symphony Orchestra League/Association of Performing Arts Presenters

World Music: Part 1 of 4 – Introduction

For the college where I work, I manage a visiting artist series. The series presents up to 20 performances during the academic year, one each in touring theatre and dance, and the remainder in music. Our concert venue was specifically designed for chamber music, which works out perfectly, since the director of the series is particularly fond of classical string quartet and solo piano repertoire. We also try to present jazz and world music events, but the acoustics in our hall do not always compliment the amplification that generally accompanies such performances.

Even if not a “world music” concert, we are often hosting artists from abroad. While this goes a long way to serving the global outlook at our college, it does present some real logistical challenges. I’ll look at these bureaucratic idiocyncracies in 4 separate posts over the next 2 weeks:

  1. This introduction
  2. Visa: “It’s everywhere you want to be”
  3. Taxation Without Representation
  4. When in Rome…

Let me preface this series by stating I am NO expert on this subject by ANY means. I am neither an immigration attorney, or a qualified tax manager. I simply posess some real world experience in these issues. If you are looking for help with visas, tax treaties or immigration-related issues, I recommend the following resources: