The Impact of the Digital Age on Professional Musicians By Eric Nielsen

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The Impact of the Digital Age on
Professional Musicians
By Eric Nielsen
T-611-NYTI New Technology
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Table of Contents
Introduction ............................................................................................... pg. 3
The History of Music Technology's Impact on Professional Musicians
The Impact Of the Phonograph ........................................................... Pgs. 3 – 4
The Impact of Radio .................................................................................... Pg. 4
World War II and the Music Industry ........................................................... Pg. 5
The Impact of Television and the LP ..................................................... Pgs. 5 – 6
The Impact of the Cassette Tape and Multi-track Recording ................. Pgs. 6 – 8
The Impact of the Compact Disc ............................................................. Pgs. 8 – 9
The Impact of the MP3 and Digital Music Technology ......................... Pgs. 9 – 11
The State of the Professional Musician in the Digital Age
The State of Famous Musicians ............................................................ Pgs. 11 – 12
The State of Musicians in the Smaller Sector of the Music Industry ..... Pgs. 12 – 14
The State of Classical and Jazz Musicians ............................................ Pgs. 14 – 16
Has the Digital Age Created a More Lucrative Environment for Professional
Musicians? ............................................................................................. Pgs 16 – 17
Bibliography ......................................................................................... Pgs. 18 - 21
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Introduction
In the 1920's radio was just starting to catch on with the general populace. Recorded sound
had been around since 1877 when Thomas Edison had invented the phonograph, a device that was
able to imprint sounds on a piece of wax paper and subsequently reproduce those sounds [1]. The
phonograph opened up a new world of monetization for professional musicians of the time,
allowing them to reach wider audiences by distributing albums that could be listened to at the
consumers leisure. Radio opened up an even bigger market than the phonograph because of its
cheaper price and more high quality sound (thanks to microphones) [2]. This gave musicians even
more options for monetization and created the explosion of swing music. Throughout the 1920s
America's dance halls and swing concerts were packed, which in turn packed the musician's wallets.
Since then America has seen a similarly large musical revolution with the invention and widespread
adoption of the internet. The home computer, the internet, the advent of home recording technology
and a slew of other technological advances together have brought us into a world where it is
possible to release 75,000 albums in one year [3]. Whereas technology brought a new musical
revolution in the 20's that filled musicians pockets, one must ask whether technology has done the
same for career musicians in the digital age.
Before continuing it is important to define the term professional musician as used in the
context of this essay. A professional musician is an individual whose majority of income is derived
from live performance, album sales, studio work or the licensing of compositions. This definition is
not to discredit musicians in the educational field, as there are many musicians that have the talent
of a professional musician but make most of their money teaching. Instead, the definition of a
professional musician is used as a way to keep a solid focus on a major sector of musicians that are
feeling a different impact from digital technology than music educators. It should also be noted that
the field of music has always been challenging and competitive. There has never been an easy
decade for musicians, but some decades have rewarded a greater percentage of professional
musicians than others.
The History of Music Technology's Impact On Professional Musicians
The Impact of the Phonograph
In order to be able to answer the question of whether the digital age is one of the hardest
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ages to make a career as a professional musician, it is important to know briefly how technology has
impacted musicians of the 20 th century leading up to the digital age to have a baseline for
comparison. As was mentioned earlier, 1877 – 1920 saw two major inventions that affected the
music world, the phonograph and the radio. Although it would seem obvious now that the
phonograph could be used for music, when it was first conceived in 1877 Thomas Edison stated in
an article that “The main utility of the phonograph [is] for the purpose of letter writing and other
forms of dictation” [4]. Known as the “talking machine”, the phonograph did not see musical
recordings produced commercially for it until 17 years after it's inception, in 1889. As a result of
these musical recordings, “Total phonograph sales increased tenfold between 1890 and 1900...” [1].
In 1901 flat discs were introduced to the market, allowing a longer recording time of 5 minutes
(instead of 2). As a result of this, gramophones (the name for disc based phonographs) started
making their way to homes rather than arcades, and from 1910 to 1930 a full on dance craze began.
A dance craze meant more demand for swing music and a demand for swing music meant more jobs
for musicians. The personal music fad soon led another device not originally meant for music to
step into the music world and contend for the money of music aficionados.
The Impact of Radio
Radio was developed to solve the same problem as the telegraph and the telephone:
communication. Just as the phonograph was conceived first and foremost to dictate to, radio was
first used to send wireless telegraphs. The first radio signal to be sent and received was in 1895,
and it wasn't until November 2, 1920 that the first radio station, KDKA, began a daily schedule of
programs including music played from gramophones [5]. Within a few years there were hundreds
of stations broadcasting, and radio was becoming a formidable adversary to the gramophone. Not
only did the radio give the gramophone a run for its money, but it also forced gramophone makers
to shift the way they recorded. As Greg Milner points out in his book, Perfecting Sound Forever,
“Because radio required a microphone, the sound of music on the radio accentuated the role of
electric amplification, and phonograph listeners began to want their records to have a louder, fuller
sound” [1]. Because of this, in 1924 a method for electronic recording was invented for
gramophones, placating consumers craving for the radio sound in their records. However, the
change to electronic recording left Thomas Edison's company in the dust, as he was adamant that
acoustic recording had the best sound quality. Radio and gramophone continued to be prosperous
for both labels and musicians, but in late 1930 an ugly beast reared its head.
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World War II and the Music Industry
That ugly beast was World War II, which began in 1939 and subsequently made many
peoples careers screech to a halt. Among those careers most hurt by the war was that of the
professional musician. Most of the musicians were shipped off to war and the few left in America
had tight restrictions forced on them by the musician's union which banned recordings altogether.
The reason for the ban was not because of the war, but because professional musicians began
demanding higher pay as they were starting to realize just how big music was becoming. On top of
the recording ban travel restrictions were enforced because of the war, making it so musicians could
not earn enough money through live performance alone. To make matters worse, when the
recording ban was released the focus was mainly on singers and small back up bands. The reason
for this was that music labels found a loophole in the music ban that allowed singers to continue
making records, so the likes of Frank Sinatra and Dick Haymes were kept in the public eye while
the big swing bands were diminished [6]. After the war people were more preoccupied with
creating families, going to school and furthering their lives rather than going to dances on the
weekends. Big bands were quickly falling apart as “pop” and smaller jazz and blues bands came to
prominence. The 40's may have been the worst time professional musicians have ever seen, but the
music scene was growing fast again by the beginning of the 50s.
The Impact of Television and the LP
Swing and big bands may have been falling out of popularity, but another technology was
gaining traction and creating another niche for musicians to fit into in the 50's. This new
technology was television, a series of moving images beamed to little boxes in homes all over the
world [2]. Television was such a big deal that by 1955 half of all U.S. homes owned a television set
[7]. When musical acts were featured on television it was best if they stayed small so that they
could all fit on screen. It was also best if the musical act had a leading man who could be the face
of the band. The need for leading men created the first “pop stars” such as Elvis Presley. Although
the focus was on leading men, and swing bands were dying out, the 50's were a profitable time for
musicians. A new kind of record, the LP (or long-playing record), had been invented in 1948 by
Columbia Record and was now the most popular form of record [8]. The LP allowed a record to
hold 25 – 30 minutes of music per side compared to the previous length of 12 minutes. The long
form of the record, the hyping of musicians on TV and the lifting of a depressing mood that was left
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over from the war era contributed to the creation of many bands of 4-8 people playing many new
types of genres like Rock 'N Roll. During the 50's there was no way to record without the backing
of a studio, but there were many studios willing to back musicians and less bands to compete with
for money. Because of the various types of in home entertainment, the 50's also saw less live
performances. Although television was such a big thing it did not detract from the sales of LP's, but
rather boosted sales because of the showcasing of musical talents on television. The sale of records
had gone largely uncontested by other formats from 1901 up through the 50's, but a new format was
looming on the horizon of the 60's.
The Impact of the Cassette Tape and Multi-track Recording
The Compact Cassette, a case containing 3.81 mm of magnetic tape spooled between two
reels, was first released by Phillips in 1962 [9]. It was released with little fanfare, selling only 9,000
units[10]. After a few years the audio quality of cassettes were improved which led Phillips, the
makers of the cassette, to believe that cassettes could be a viable alternative to vinyl records.
Phillips was correct and by 1968, 6 years after its release, the cassette tape business was worth $150
million [10]. As far as professional musicians were concerned, career options were becoming more
plentiful. There weren't only opportunities in releasing records, but the graduates of music
universities had many career options as well. In a television interview done in 1963 on Swedish
television, Duke Ellington, a big star from the swing era, had this to say about post university music
careers, “We have musicians who are coming out with their degrees today. For instance I would say
one fourth of them go into the symphony, one fourth go into teaching, one fourth I would say go
into television and the radio stations and the other fourth would go into what is known as jazz
music” [11]. According to Duke Ellington, in the 60's three fourths of the music careers in the
world were reserved for professional musicians, while one fourth was for music educators. On top
of that, rock was seeing an expansion into many different sub-genres such as surf rock, garage rock,
blues-rock and many others. Folk music was also burgeoning, culminating in one of the biggest
music festivals ever: Woodstock. Not only was the cassette released, but big strides were being
made in the realm of recording during the 60's as well.
Up until the 60's, with the exception of a few experiments by the guitarist Les Paul, music
was mainly recorded in mono on one track only [12]. Recording on one track meant that bands
could only record as a whole, it was impossible to record one instrument at a time. This also meant
that if the band messed up once during the recording, they were forced to start over from the
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beginning again. In the early 60's two track recording was making its way to the major studios,
allowing a band to record the music on one track and the vocals on a separate track. By the early to
mid 60's studios started getting four tracks, and stereo sound was becoming more prominent. By
the late 60's studios were upgrading to four and eight tracks [1]. Studio upgrades meant a spike in
pro recording studio prices per hour. As Wayne Wadham says in his book Sound Advice: a
Musician's Guide to the Recording Studio, “In the mid-l960s $6,000 was a huge studio budget for a
rock album. Just four years later, when 8-track became the pro format for rock, and when
independent studios began springing up in every loft or converted office space, rentals rose to an
unheard-of $60 per hour” [12]. The only bands that were able to experiment and push the
boundaries of recording at the time were those with a significant budget, such as The Beatles. The
development of multi-track recording was an important step towards our digital world today. It
marked the beginning of an era where recorded music wasn't as much about capturing the spirit of
the natural performance, but rather creating a whole new experience. Although it would seem like
the higher price of studios would mean that the amount of albums produced later in the 60's would
be less than the amount of albums produced in the beginning of the 60's, this was not true at all.
Wikipedia lists 270 albums being released in 1960, while 1969 had 522 albums [13]. While
Wikipedia may not be exactly accurate, it is still possible to see that there was a large rise in the
amount of albums produced per year throughout the 60's. Not only was popular music doing well
in the 60's, but orchestral music was as well. This can be seen by the fact that one of the biggest
free orchestra concerts in America, the Naumburg Orchestral Concerts in New York, was drawing
crowds of 10,000 people in 1960 and 8,000 people in 1966 [14].
The 1970's saw an increase in albums produced per year as well as albums sold. Thanks to
the adoption of using cassettes for music as well as vinyl records, many albums were being rereleased on cassettes while new albums were being released on both formats. Studios continued to
become more and more sophisticated as the number of tracks used to record multiplied to 24 by the
end of the decade [12]. By 1977 the average American household contained two to three types of
music players. Cassette sales began to rival the sale of LP's by the end of the decade with 878
million units of LP's being sold and 470 million cassettes in 1979 [15]. It can also be argued that
the popularity of cassettes and the ease of recording music playing from speakers with cassette
recorders planted the first seeds of music swapping that was to become so prevalent in the digital
age. The 70's also saw a larger segmentation of musical tastes and artists thanks to indie labels,
with punk, disco, hip hop and rap and many other forms coming to the market. As Peter Tschmuck
says in his article, the recession in the music industry – a cause analysis, “The market segments
became smaller and smaller, and with them the profit margins shrank. What was originally
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conceived as a profit-maximizing instrument for the [major labels] now worked against the
inventor” [15]. How were classical musicians faring in the 70's? In an interview with the author,
Kendell Nielsen, a classical musician whose most active performing years in America were during
the 70's and 80's, had this to say about the availability of classical performance jobs then compared
to now, “I think there were busier musicians, people who could get more gigs... I think there are
fewer [professional classical musicians] now than then” [16]. Although classical music was on the
decline, orchestras were still employing a decent amount of musicians compared to now.
At the beginning of the 80's the major labels had to shift their business strategy because of
the segmentation of the market. Major labels cut down their artist roster and focused on a
“superstar principle”, leaving indie labels to fight over multiple genres. Because of the superstar
principle, the 80's saw the likes of such superstars as Michael Jackson, Prince, Madonna, Elton
John, Bruce Springsteen, and many more big names that appealed to a larger customer base. In
1981, LP's saw their peak year, selling 1.140 billion units while cassettes sold 510 million. This
large difference between sales of the two different formats soon evened out in 1984, when both LP's
and cassettes sold 800 million units each [15]. From 1984 until the 90's the cassette dominated as
LP sales shrank. Another contender, however, entered the format wars in 1983, ushering in the
digital age of music, revolutionizing the music world more than any other format and bringing
music into the digital age.
The Impact of the Compact Disc
The compact disc, or CD as it is known, is a small circular disc made of polycarbonate
plastic, weighing 15 – 20 grams and small enough to fit into one's palms. The grooves in the disc
are etched by lasers which allows each groove to be smaller and more precise, allowing for 80
minutes worth of music or 700 megabytes worth of data, more data than hard drives on home
computers could hold at the time of its release. When listened to, the music emanating from the
speakers is digitally recreated as 44,100 strings of 16-bit binary numbers per second are converted
into wave forms that sound almost exactly like its real world counterpart. The sound, according to
scientists, was as perfect as sound could get.
The CD brought many mixed emotions when it was first released in the mass market in
1983. The prospect of digital sound made many musicians uncomfortable, as they believed the soul
of their music was being ripped out of their songs. Possibly the most prominent musical figure
against CD's was Neil Young, who had this to say about the CD: “Listening to a CD is like looking
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at the world through a screen window... if you get right up next to a screen window, you can see all
kinds of colors through each hole. Well, imagine if all that color had to be reduced to one color per
hole. That is what digital recording does to sound. All that gets recorded is what's dominant at the
moment... It's an insult to the brain and heart and feelings to have to listen to this and think it's
music” [1]. The consumers, however, did not agree. By 1989 the CD sold 600 million units that
year while the LP sold 450 million. This was the first year that LP's were outsold by CD's.
Fittingly, this was also the peak year for cassettes as they sold 1.540 billion units, 400 million more
units than the LP sold during its peak year [15].
The popularity of the CD and the length of time that was allowed per CD helped the industry
create a long-format music strategy. This meant that even if a consumer wanted only a few songs
from an album they still had to pay the full price for the album. By 1990 CD's were making almost
as much profit as cassettes, but cassettes were still selling more units. It didn't take too long for CD
to overtake cassettes in units sold either. In 1993 there were 1.419 billion CD's sold and only 1.382
billion cassettes. CD's continued to have a momentous growth until its peak in the year 2000, when
there were 2.454 billion CD's sold, 914 million more units than the cassettes peak year [15]. This
boom in CD sales is one of the reasons message boards pop up all over the internet about why the
90's is the best era of music ever. The amount of CD's being released meant that more musicians
were being hired in the studio to play on all these CD's, but the sheer volume also meant that the
revenue from these albums was shared amongst a bigger pool of musicians. The emphasis on more
popular genres of music also meant that work for orchestral and jazz musicians began to wane even
more than they already were.
The Impact of the MP3 and Digital Music Technology
The release of the MP3 digital format in 1994 and the rise of the internet in the late 90's
together began two of the three biggest challenges facing professional musicians in the digital age.
The first problem, brought about by the release of a software called Napster, was the problem of
mass music sharing and piracy. The MP3 was small enough to be downloaded from the internet and
Napster was the first music sharing software that was easy enough for the general population to use.
Released in 1999, Napster allowed millions of people completely free access to any music they
could dream of. The lure of free music brought 20 million subscribers to its service by the year
2000 [19]. For the first time in history, new music could be acquired from home. Not only that, but
it was free! The seed of the idea had been planted, and there was no going back. The change
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happened so fast that record executives hardly had time to act. In 2001, for the first time in 18
years, CD sales dipped [15]. This caught the record executives attention enough to try and take
action against Napster. A story told by Tom Lamont in his article Napster: the day the music was
set free perfectly sums up how record executives reacted to Napster, “...the heads of the major
record labels had gathered for a summit. In the Washington offices of the Record Industry
Association of America (RIAA), execs were encouraged to play a game that was informally called
Stump the Napster – in other words, try to find at least one of their new singles that wasn't being
shared online. All were appropriately horrified and an action was launched against Napster for
breach of copyright” [19]. In February of 2001, the RIAA had won their court case against Napster,
in which Napster had been ordered to start charging for content or close completely. In the 48 hours
before Napster shut down there was a mad rush by all of its users to download whatever songs they
had not already downloaded [19]. The shutting down of Napster temporarily halted the problem of
piracy, but it was already too late to turn its effects around.
The second biggest challenge of the digital age for professional musicians came about
because of the mindset that was established by Napster. Now that the general population was used
to the idea of easy access to music, musicians and companies needed to find a way to monetize it.
In 2001 Apple released their iPod, a handheld MP3 player. The iPod was the first MP3 player to be
adopted by the mass market. Apple then followed the iPod up with a platform for legally buying
MP3s in 2003 in the form of iTunes. The age of consumers being forced to buy whole albums to
get a few songs was officially over as iTunes allowed single songs to be bought for $0.99. Sales of
single songs shot up after the release of iTunes, going from selling 354 million singles in 2004 to
1.494 singles sold in 2008. During the same period that the digital single market was booming, CD
sales dropped 35% [15]. While pop musicians were once again making money from their music, it
was only a fraction of what they were making before because they were only making $0.99 at a
time.
The third and final biggest challenge facing professional musicians in the digital age stems
from the low cost and increased capabilities of recording software and equipment. The leading
company in recording software, Digidesign, started focusing more on the normal consumer base
rather than professionals in 1999 releasing a version of their Pro Tools software that was scaled
back for consumers. By 2002, two other companies had entered the digital audio workstation
(DAW) market, Apple's DAW was named Logic and Steinberg's was named Cubase [20]. All these
DAWs for such a low cost made recording in ones basement more feasible than ever and hurt both
studios and professional studio musicians. As more music making programs came out and became
more sophisticated, real musicians were needed less and less as what they offered could be
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recreated by these DAWs. The rise in electronic music throughout the digital age has also made less
demand for musicians as more consumers ears want a more electronic sound to their music. The
internet mixed with the low cost of recording brought a flood of amateurs to the market. It also
brought a flood of talented individuals that would never have been able to release their music as
well, but the sheer volume of albums released per year made it hard to get ones albums noticed
above the rest. In an interview with the author, Clark Sommers, a professional jazz bassist who is
best known for playing with the globally renowned singer Kurt Elling, explains this sentiment:
“There may be more talented people but there are is also a disproportionate amount [of] mediocrity.
It's a numbers game. There's just more of everything” [21]. As mentioned earlier, 75,000 albums
were released in 2010 alone [3]. If a human being were to spend 24 hours a day , 365 days a year
listening to music, it would take 8.5 years to listen to all of the music released in 2010. This sheer
amount of volume is presenting many challenges to those that make their living off of being a
professional musician.
The State of the Professional Musician in the Digital Age
The State of Famous Musicians
Having discussed the major challenges facing professional musicians in the digital age, we
should now turn to the the question of how professional musicians are faring financially in the
digital age. We will look at 3 categories of professional musicians to see how they are faring in the
digital age: pop stars and established bands, lesser known musicians in popular music, and jazz and
classical musicians. To understand how pop and superstars are faring today compared to the past
we can look at the net worth of pop stars from the 80's compared to pop stars now. The single
highest paid musician of 2012 according to Forbes magazine was Dr. Dre, the rap/hip-hop producer
and giant, making $110 million in pretax earnings for the year [22]. Dr. Dre's total net worth (his
total assets minus total outside liabilities) is $260 million, a big chunk ($175 millions worth) of
which has come from his headphone line, Dr. Dre Beats [23]. In comparison, Michael Jackson's net
worth is $600 million, making a big chunk of that from his music, videos and concerts. Michael
Jackson did have many endorsements and even bought ownership of some of the Beatles' most
famous songs. Still, it is known that he got at least half of his money from his own music endeavors
[24]. The biggest difference between these two superstars is, first, that there is a big gap between
the net worth of the two. Dr. Dre has been around since the early eighties, and has had more than
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enough time to catch up to the likes of Michael Jackson, and yet half of Dr. Dre's money comes
from his headphone line. As CD sales have declined, even for the pop stars, it has forced them to
have to diversify their income stream even more in order to make money even close to the
superstars of the 80's. The digital age has also brought pop stars back to 1970's in a sense, where
touring is the most lucrative part of what they do. From Beyonce to Justin Bieber to Taylor Swift, a
big majority of these pop stars income is derived heavily from touring [22].
Another trend that can be seen is that pop stars today are still making a lot of money, but less
across the board. Justin Bieber's net worth is $110 million [25], Taylor Swifts is $80 million [26],
and Justin Timberlake, a pop star that has been around since the 90's, giving his music time to make
more royalties for him, is only worth $100 million [27]. In comparison, Madonna, a pop star from
the 80's is worth $650 million [28] while Prince, another big star from the 80's is worth $250
million [29]. However, there are some big artists that have been able to make the freedom of the
internet work for themselves such as Prince, Wilco, Nine Inch Nails, Jack Johnson, and the Grateful
dead, who have released some of their CD's and videos on their own without going through a record
label, netting them more profit in the end. Perhaps the band to most famously use the internet to
their advantage is Radiohead, whose 2000 album, Kid A, was able to reach number 1 in the
billboard charts without any radio play, music videos, interviews or touring. Radiohead also
allowed Kid A to be downloaded through Napster. This was not the only time Radiohead was able
to make profit off of quirky sales techniques. In 2007, Radiohead allowed their fans to decide
themselves what to pay for their latest album, In Rainbows. This tactic bypassed any record labels
and allowed Radiohead to make a good profit from the sale of their album [30].
The State of Musicians in the Smaller Sector of the Music Industry
With pop stars earning less money individually than before, how has this scattering of
revenue affected the smaller bands in all the different genres? The answer to this question can be
found in a survey studying musical income of professional musicians that was conducted in 2011 by
Peter Dicola at the Northwestern University School of Law. 5,013 respondents finished the whole
survey, and from this sample 42.1% of respondents earned 100 percent of their income solely from
music. Of the 5,013 respondents, 2,407, or 48%, of respondents identified their music as a genre
other than classical and jazz. Of these 2,407, 55% reported the amount of musical income that they
made as being between $0 and $17,500, effectively putting them below the poverty line in the
United States if they were relying on their musical income. Looking at Figure 1, it can be seen that
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professional musicians in the smaller sector of popular music make, on average, less than
professional musicians in Jazz and Classical.
Musical Income Amongst Respondents by Genre
% of Jazz
Lower Class
Middle Class
Upper Class
($0 - $17,500)
($18,000 - $85,000)
($85,500 - $330,000)
48%
44%
8%
36%
51%
13%
55%
28%
17%
43%
35%
22%
Musicians
% of Classical
Musicians
% of Rock, Pop,
Etc. Musicians
% of Composers
Figure 1 [31]
On the flip side, however, professional musicians in the smaller sector of popular music have the
second biggest percentage of people that are considered upper class [31]. This, however, has
always been the attitude in music industry, where you either make it or break it.
The digital age has created a completely new genre that was only possible with digital
technology, a genre that is becoming more and more lucrative every year. This genre is electronic
music. As music technology has become more sophisticated electronic music has seen a huge rise
in interest, specifically within the sub-genre of electronic dance music. This sub-genre has created a
whole new breed of upcoming superstars called DJs whose performances consist of using turntables
and digital equipment to mesh well known songs together on the fly while adding some elements of
their own. The DJ has become a staple of the club and party scene and more people are beginning
to prefer DJs over live bands. DJs are so popular, in fact, that in 2012 Forbes magazine began
publishing a list of the worlds highest paid DJs for the first time. The DJ at the top of the list was
DJ Tiesto, grossing $22 million over the year [32]. The downside of the popularity of DJs for other
musicians in the smaller music sector is that DJs are taking the kind of gigs that other genres of
music that required more musicians may have dominated before now. However, every generation
has seen the waning of one genre and the escalating of another.
Since we now have a general idea of the kinds of money made in the smaller popular music
sector it is now prudent to explore the options that have popped up because of the digital age to
these groups and musicians. First and foremost, the smaller popular music sector gets most of its
income from live shows. In the same survey by Peter Dicola referred to earlier, as can be seen in
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Figure 2, the non-classical and jazz respondents said that 41% of their musical income is from live
performances while 18% is only from recording and composing commissions on albums sales [31].
Percentage of Musical Income Amongst Respondents by Type
Composing
Recording
Studio
Live
Merch. Salary Teaching Other
commissions commissions Work Perform.
Classical
2%
2%
11%
11%
1%
33%
35%
5%
Jazz
3%
4%
11%
37%
1%
13%
27%
4%
Rock,
8%
10%
8%
41%
3%
8%
14%
8%
39%
5%
7%
10%
1%
6%
23%
9%
Pop, etc.
Composer
Figure 2 [31]
Obviously the digital age has made a new interest in live performances, as that seems to be the best
way to get guaranteed money. The digital age has seen a few new business models pop up to try
and get artists more money for their songs, such as Spotify and Pandora. These services, however,
are not in a state where much money can be made from them by the artist. For every listen an artist
gets on Spotify, they earn just under 1/3 of a cent. An artist must pay $50 to TuneCore to be able to
be put on services such as Spotify, which means that an artist would have to get 5,127 plays alone
on Spotify just to break even on distribution [33]. In a world where only 2,000 out of 75,000
albums in 2010 sold more than 5,000 copies, and only 1,000 of that 2,000 albums sold more than
10,000 copies, it is safe to assume that those kind of numbers can be applied to streams as well [3].
The State of Classical and Jazz Musicians
Seeing how smaller bands in popular music are struggling, how are the already dying sectors
of classical and jazz doing? First of all, there are less classical and jazz musicians. According to
the US Department of Labor, there were 41 percent fewer paid musicians in 2011 than there were in
1999 [34]. Although there has been a huge drop in the number of paid musicians, those in the
classical world are faring better than to be expected. Referring back to the survey conducted by
Peter Dicola, out of the 5,013 respondents, 1777 were classical musicians (not including the
composer group). Referring back to Figure 1, out of these 1777 musicians, 36% were in the lower
class income range and 51% made enough money to be considered middle class. This makes the
Nielsen 15
classical genre have the least amount of participants who were considered lower class and the
highest amount of participants who were considered middle class in the context of this survey. It
can be seen in Figure 2 that 41% of classical respondents salary comes from live performance
(combining the live performance category and the salary from orchestras) while 35% of their
income is derived from teaching [31]. It seems then that there is a decent demand for live
performances as of 2011. This can be proven by the fact that in 2006, worldwide concert ticket
revenues were $8.2 billion but grew to $12.1 billion in 2011 [35]. The demand for live classical
concerts shrank from the 1950's to 2000 as the record industry grew and grew, but the commodity of
music in the 2000's thanks to file sharing could be an explanation for why concerts are becoming
important again.
Continuing with Peter Dicola's research into professional musician income we will now look
into the jazz world. Of the 5,013 respondents, 872 self-identified as jazz musicians (roughly 17%),
making jazz the least represented of all the genres. Of these 872 respondents, 48% reported a
musical income that would land them in the lower class bracket, while 44% were making enough
musical income to put them in the middle class bracket and only 8% making enough to enter the
higher class bracket (figure 1). Findings from a different study focused solely on jazz musicians
conducted by the Research Center for Arts and Culture in San Francisco show a slightly different
picture of jazz musicians musical income, with the majority of their respondents making between
$20,000 - $60,000, meaning there were more jazz musicians making middle class income compared
to lower class income [36]. Although the findings between the two reports were slightly different it
can still be inferred from these results that jazz musicians have the least amount of musicians
getting larger sums of money for their music. The majority of jazz musicians' income is derived
from live performance at 37% while the second biggest source of income is teaching at 27% (figure
2). This is not really different from the past as jazz musicians have always made more from live
performances over albums sales since the swing era.
The question that needs answering is whether there are less successful jazz musicians now
than there have been in the past. In an interview with the author, Clark Sommers, mentioned earlier
as the bassist for the famous jazz singer Kurt Elling, sheds some light on this question saying, “I
would say that the same amount of [jazz musicians] acquire actual success” [21]. It is interesting to
note that although he says the same amount of jazz musicians are successful, he also believes that
the digital age has created an influx of more amateur players trying to enter the professional jazz
scene, saying, “The primary change that I've witnessed [in the jazz world] is a higher influx of
younger musicians coming out of college and attempting to make a living as professional
musicians” [21]. Although there is no hard evidence to go by to know whether there are more
Nielsen 16
successful jazz musicians now than in the past, Clark Sommer's assertion that the number of
financially successful jazz musicians is no different in the digital age has one argument that may
back it up. Success in the jazz world, more than any other genre, has always been measured less by
financial stability and more by one's ability to express oneself more artistically. In the study
conducted by the Research Center for Arts and Culture in San Francisco mentioned earlier, they
found that out of the jazz musicians that were polled that the most sought after goal of jazz
musicians was “achieving a higher level of artistic expression” [36]. This mindset shows that it is
very plausible that the amount of successful jazz musicians hasn't fluctuated much throughout the
years in that jazz musicians hardly ever begin playing jazz music hoping for stardom.
Has the Digital Age Created a More Lucrative Environment for Professional
Musicians?
Having examined the financial state of musicians in the digital age it is important to ask the
most important question of all. Has the second biggest music technology revolution, like the music
revolution of the early 20th century before it, opened up even more cash flow and opportunities for
professional musicians? It can be concluded from the data presented that the first half of the digital
age during the 90's did indeed create more monetary opportunities for a wider range of musicians
than other decades before it. As digital technology progressed into the 2000s, however, the digital
age turned into arguably the worst time financially since World War II to be a professional career
musician. From the 41 percent drop in musician employment since 1999 to the shift to a single
song oriented mind set amongst consumers to the flood of new and amateur musicians, the latter
half of the digital age has seen a huge drop off in income for a wide amount of professional
musicians. However, although the digital age has seen the worst musical recession since the 1940's,
it may be the most fulfilling time ever to be a musician.
How can the hardest time to have a musical career also be the most fulfilling? Quite simply
because of the huge range of opportunities to hear and be heard, to share with people that are more
like minded, and the ability for one to find more influences than ever before that allows one to grow
artistically. In an anonymous survey conducted by the author about the digital ages effect on
musicians amongst 42 participants, with 19 of those participants (45.24%) self-identifying as
professional musicians and 13 (30.95%) participants identifying as music enthusiasts who had
seriously considered a career in music at one point, there were only very few participants that
seemed bitter or jaded by the state of the current music industry. Only 16.67% of respondents
Nielsen 17
thought that the internet had made it harder to be a professional musician while only 9.52% thought
that home recording technology adversely affected being a professional musician. How could so
many musicians believe that two of the biggest technologies that have hurt professional musicians
financially have actually helped professional musicians? This answer can be gleaned from the final
comments of a few of the respondents. Respondent #31 said, “...the ability to build my own
website, connect with others through social media, raise recording funds through Kickstarter, and
sell my music online has made it possible to develop a career independently without having to
compromise artistically to fit whatever major labels feel are the current or future trends”.
Respondent #30 said, “Social media has made it easier to 'find your tribe' and connect to fans and
contemporaries directly”. Respondent #14 commented, “I was able to take lessons over the Internet
with teachers at Juilliard, manhattan school of music, ucla, and USC without going there in person
which was invaluable to me”. Finally, respondent #11 said, “The internet has made it easier to
access new music, as well as share musical ideas with others”. These were not the only respondents
to make comments similar to these.
The concepts that these respondents comments encapsulates is that the digital age has
brought more connection, less artistic compromising, more musical freedom, more musical learning
opportunities and more access to new musical ideas. It seems that these concepts overshadowed the
fact that professional musicians were actually being hurt more financially. Although there were
some respondents that acknowledged the hardships of being a musician today, it seemed that most
were happier musicians because of the musical world that was opened up to them. Clark Sommers
sums up this sentiment best when he says, “Technology has allowed someone in Peoria, Illinois to
hear music from Java, Indonesia. The idea that almost every music from everywhere in the world is
easily accessible has changed music greatly... it has become easier to be inspired by musical
information from virtually every corner of the world. That's what keeps music moving forward...
The smallness of the world, as a result of the Internet provides an overwhelming amount of musical
information to deal with. I thinks most artists welcome that notion” [21].
Nielsen 18
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Nielsen 21
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