9 HEADLINER
“ALONG WITH THE RISE OF CELEBRITY DJS, THERE’S A SORT OF FEELING OVER THE INTERNET THAT WE MIGHT BE NOTICING A CHANGE OF STATE IN INSTRUMENTALISM AND LIVE PERFORMANCES...”
we might be noticing a change of state in instrumentalism and live performances. This uneasy sentiment felt by the music trade industry is legitimate: Guitar Center, America’s largest chain of instrument stores, has revealed difficulty maintaining a positive margin this year. Maybe that’s why they opened a Serato Digital Music Experience wing in one of their bigger stores in Brooklyn, New York, to focus more on electronic music gear than actual instruments? In general, the evidence is here to justify their worries, but all is definitely not lost. Sure, one can venture out, expressing radical statements like, ‘rock and roll is dead’, ‘hip hop is passé’, or ‘dance music is losing its legitimacy to EDM’, but evidence shows that this backward thinking is ludicrous. Last year, rock bands like 30 Seconds To Mars enjoyed a string of sold-out tours worldwide. Adele only officially released two albums and they both went multi-platinum, with 21 even reaching diamond sales figures! Jack White got a Grammy in 2013, and Imagine Dragons received one this year as well. According to Forbes wealth magazine, the highest paid musicians of 2013 were: Madonna ($125m), Lady Gaga ($80m), Bon Jovi ($79m), Toby Keith ($65m), Coldplay ($64m), and Bruce Springsteen ($62m). These amazing artists are singers, pianists, guitarists, drummers, and most importantly, performers - and they’re all doing just fine. Furthermore, to widen the scope of comparison, performing indie artists are also getting financially rewarded, and handsomely too: TuneCore’s Dave Days collects six figures each year; Christian hip hop artist, Lecrae, made half-a-million
dollars from selling 53,052 albums, 315,583 tracks; and comedian songwriter, Liam Sullivan, earned $558,195 just through digital sales. This exludes royalty revenues coming from streaming services as well as other monetary sources like sponsorship, endorsements, live performances, or merchandise sales - which also have become critical components of the business. ReverbNation, which is a digital music management and networking website, is now housing over 3.54 million musicians, venues and industry professionals. Last year, 2.5 million guitar units were sold in the US, and China remains the number one importer of pianos in the world (having bought 3.6 billion dollars worth of pianos in the last year as well). So have no fear, by the time some DJs find out where the middle C is on their keyboard, the art of musicianship will have time to come back and dominate modern music culture once again! All in all, in order to close the curtains on this topic with an inspiring note, this year, the publisher of Music Trade Magazine, Paul Majeski, said the following: “I know people are wondering about whether guitars will find a place in an increasingly digital world. I would say, fear not. The guitar will remain at the centre of our musical culture. Silicon chips and software can provide texture and background, and they alter how we capture and share music, but there is still nothing that compares to a human finger controlling a vibrating string.” www.sonicvistastudios.com
DEFINITIONS MUSICIAN: A person who is talented in making music or performing music creatively, or one who composes, conducts, or performs music. Musicians specialise in any style, and some musicians play in a variety of different styles. Examples of a musician’s possible skills include performing, orchestrating, arranging, composing, and singing. MUSICIANSHIP: Artistry in performing music. INSTRUMENTALIST: A player of a musical instrument. MILLENIALS: Population born between 1980 and 2000. Sometimes referred to in the media as ‘Generation Y’; millennials are the children of the post-WWII baby boomer generation.