Guides
Most advice about backyard live music is written for nowhere in particular, which makes it useless the moment a neighbour picks up a phone. Austin publishes the actual numbers, and they are more specific and more restrictive than people expect.
From the City of Austin’s own page on outdoor amplified sound: Austin City Code allows amplified sound on residential property from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. at a maximum of 75 decibels. Amplified sound may not be audible beyond the property line from 10 p.m. to 10 a.m.
And then the part that changes plans. The same page states that residential property does not require, and is not eligible for, an outdoor sound permit. Austin has an entire permitting apparatus for outdoor amplified sound, and a house cannot use it.
In Austin, amplified sound on residential property is allowed from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. at up to 75 decibels, and a residential address is not eligible for an outdoor sound permit, so that window is fixed rather than negotiable.
Amplified sound is permitted between 10 a.m. and 10 p.m. at a maximum of 75 decibels. Outside those hours it must not be audible past the property line. Noise and amplified sound are regulated under Title 9, Chapter 9-2 of the Austin Code of Ordinances. The city is the authority here, and its page is the thing to read before your event rather than this one.
Seventy-five decibels is quieter than people picture. More useful than the number, though, is how the rule is enforced in practice: the limit and the audibility test both reference the property line. So the practical question is not how loud the band plays, it is what direction the speakers face and what is between them and the neighbours.
Point the PA into the yard rather than across it. Put the loudest part of the night early rather than at nine forty-five. Tell the neighbours beforehand, and decide in advance who answers the door if somebody knocks. That last one sounds trivial and it is the difference between a conversation and a complaint.
A house is not a venue. Residential circuits are shared with everything else in the building, and a band running an evening is what the electrical code calls a continuous load. Schneider Electric, explaining the code, notes that a continuous load is one where the maximum current is expected to continue for 3 hours or more, and that a branch circuit breaker must handle noncontinuous load plus 125 percent of the continuous load.
Practically, that means the working budget on a standard 20 amp circuit is around 1,920 watts rather than the 2,400 the arithmetic suggests. And the question to ask is not how many outlets are in the yard, it is how many separate circuits reach them and what else is on those circuits. A caterer running warmers on the same one is a more common cause of a dark stage than the band ever is.
Where can a van stop, how far is it from there to the setup, and what is in between. Gravel, a gate, a step, a flight of stairs and a lawn all cost time. If the answer is a long carry across grass, say so when you book rather than when the band arrives.
Your house, your rules, no venue coordinator and no rental fee. You also inherit every problem a venue normally solves: parking, power, bathrooms, weather, and a hard stop at ten that nobody can extend.
Costs money and buys infrastructure. A panel that can carry a band, a load-in path somebody has thought about, parking, staff, and in some cases a later curfew because the property is permitted for it.
Everything above is the City of Austin. Round Rock, Georgetown, Cedar Park, Dripping Springs and unincorporated Travis or Hays County each have their own rules, and a Hill Country address twenty minutes outside the city is not covered by Austin’s ordinance. Check the jurisdiction your address actually sits in.
If the event is bigger than a backyard, Austin Fire’s special events permits cover tents, generators and public assembly, and generators have to sit twenty feet from any tent.
We play backyard parties the same way we play a ballroom, with our own PA and lights, so the setup scales down rather than changing. If you are still working out the rest of the evening, what to ask a band before you book them covers the contract side.
10 p.m. The city allows amplified sound on residential property from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. at a maximum of 75 decibels, and states that after 10 p.m. amplified sound may not be audible beyond the property line. Other cities and the unincorporated county set their own rules.
No, and you cannot get one. The city states that residential property does not require, and is not eligible for, an outdoor sound permit. That means the 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. window at 75 decibels is fixed rather than something you can apply to extend.
Yes, if the power and the access work. The usual limits are how many separate circuits reach the setup and what else is running on them, and how far the gear has to travel from wherever a van can park. Neither is usually a problem once somebody has checked.
Ask about the setlist, the show, or what we need from your venue. If you want a date looked at, I can send it straight to the band.