New Music
New Music Models – Digital Record Labels
First, Napter emerged and would forever change the way people got their music. Although Napster was forced to shut down, several copycats resurfaced. Since then, iTunes, MySpace, ringtones, and peer-2-peer networks would forever change the music industry as we know it. Record stores became less relevant to the point that they barely exist today and digital downloading seems to be the only way to music profitability. No longer would consumers need to leave the comfort of their homes to buy music and could simply do so online. As a result, the traditional music business model became a thing of the past, and label executives today are scrambling to put their pulse on the beat and monetize in this digital music world. From MySpace and three of the major record labels unveiling MySpace Music to online streaming music sites like Imeem, the music industry as we know it has completely revamped their music models. This is good news for the artists who now have more control of their music in the way it is marketed and distributed, but it’s bad news for the record labels who now see dwindling profits and less control of artists and their music. With the old music models, record labels were practically the only way an artist could break big in the industry, the only way for an artist to get major radio play, and the only way to national retail distribution. Now what the digital music model has done is put control right in the hands of artists. With online channels, artists can get national distribution without the financial burdens once typical of retail distribution. Artists can also increase their promotional outlets using social media and video sites like YouTube and no longer need to solely rely on the record labels for marketing support. Read the rest of this entry »
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Will There Still Be a Demand For New Music in 2009?
As consumers tighten their budgets, the entertainment industry is left wondering what will become of music demand. The global economic recession has affected some of the strongest markets in the world, including the US and UK, and there has been little or no substantial increase in average wages over the past several decades. With the amount of disposable income available to people declining, new music would seem to be destined to occupy a position of very low priority in most people’s lives. However, there have been simultaneous advances in technology that have made music distribution much easier than it was in the past. Digital distribution, through legal means that do not infringe on copyrights, have become more popular throughout the first decade of the 21st Century, which leaves some hope that the demand for new music may not wane so much due to the grim economic outlook for 2009.
If there is one sector that has seen impressive growth in sales, it has been the sale of single tracks by digital music distribution sites. Over 1.7 billion single track downloads were purchased in 2007, accounting for a growth rate of 53% over previous years. This innovative means of distributing new music has several aspects which do not conflict with a widespread desire in the consumer sector to rein in spending. Read the rest of this entry »
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New Music Release in History
We always hear talk of new music and the new music release but, on closer examination, these terms are words that are loosely bandied about. They are words sent forward with dead certain intent and yet they have no certain criteria. They are like other words that we also use with serious intent that also have, at best, a subjective meaning; words such as ‘god,’ ‘soul,’ and ‘normal.’
First of all, when we use the words ‘new music,’ we make the arrogant assumption that we are talking about the new music of our own generation, as if preceding generations did not have and talk about new music. Let us go back to the early 1700s, at the end of J.S. Bach’s lifetime where we will find only one such circumstance of the advent of new music. J.S. Bach’s sons were among the proponents of this new music that we now call Classical.
The music of J.S. Bach’s day, the Baroque, was a more complex form of music, thus we see yet another instance of new music involving a de-evolution of sorts and part and parcel with a popular movement. As a student, I had a music history professor whose pet theory was that everything after J.S. Bach was just a recycling of material, as it were. If you look at music from the standpoint of the harmonies only, it is difficult to argue against what he said. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: New Music, Touche Maestro