Higher Education and Live Music in Wales: Future Developments

Well, I am coming toward the end of the research into the relationships between live music and higher education in Wales. With the report due at the end of this month, I thought I would provide some comments below. Very happy to receive any comments, preferably before the end of the month – I could include them in the report then!

From a music industry perspective, the recent acquisition by Live Nation, of data entertainment firm Big Champagne,[1] could be considered indicative of how the global live music industry is changing, and the financial emphasis that is being placed upon it. According to Hypebot.Com’s Bruce Houghton, the takeover represents the essential next step to drive a transformation of live music based on data rather than the antiquated assumptions of the old guard music industry (Houghton, 2012b). However, if we regard this purchase more cynically, it clearly follows the paradigm that is pervasive throughout the history of recorded music: the purchase the smaller innovative companies by a dominant wealthy few (ironically, what Houghton describes as the antiquated “old guard”) – an oligopoly that facilitates the capitalist society both Higher Education and the Music Industry operate in.

Equally so, the Higher Education sector is going through a period of great change, with “New Universities” in particular having to face up to issues such as employability, the influx of private providers, and validation powers in Further Education Colleges, not to mention the unknown impact that increased student fees may have on the entire sector. In Wales of course there is also the question of impeding university mergers, and although the exact details are not known yet, the Welsh Higher Education sector of the future will look very different to what it does today.

The question for Welsh Higher Education music departments engaged in live music, is how to negotiate these two independent, powerful forces. How do we engage with both the national and international live music scenes from a pedagogical and research perspective, ensuring our students gain an industrially relevant and academically challenging experience, while undergoing the changes to Higher Education and the live sector as outlined above?

It is apparent from the report for the Higher Education Academy, in addition to previous investigations undertaken, that the Welsh music industry requires far more research into its various infrastructures. Although not an exhaustive list, issues such as why bands bypass Wales when touring; transport issues to and from venues; publicity infrastructures in the capital and throughout Wales (Do audiences feel informed? What community and local Council activities are already taking place?); working relationships between venues and local councils, and venues and national promoters; and the relationships between live music and cultural tourism – from both an import and export perspective, are indicative of factors that not only require on-going research, but also should be included into taught music industry modules, that from experience tend to focus on global rather than local paradigms.  Although some parties within the Welsh music industry would question its relevance – arguing that academic exercises such as this represent the pinnacle of “knowledge resistance”,  in congruence with the numerous other nations, it is suggested that a comprehensive mapping document of Wales is required, documented independently, and including a critical investigation of what could be learned from nations such as Scotland, New Zealand and Finland – the latter who seem particularly successful in fostering government support for performing live music abroad.

Regarding pedagogical initiatives, in congruence to the University of Bolton’s relationship with the Backstage Academy, and the University of Plymouth’s work with Deep Blue Sound, it seems prudent for Welsh Higher Education to continue to investigate what industrial and governmental bodies it can work with in order to address the specific skill gaps referred to by Creative and Cultural Skills, and most importantly how they impact the Welsh live music industry. As stated earlier, keeping intellectual property and income streams within Wales is an essential factor if the Welsh live music industry is to build upon its current £60 turnover, an increase which is essential if the Welsh industry is to become truly independent.

Considering that part of this skill gap needs to be targeted at practitioners already working in the Welsh Music Industry, it is also logical to suggest that Higher Education needs to investigate part-time, distance learning and particularly “accelerated” provision – in order to open up these markets, so Higher Education institutions can facilitate practitioner engagement within and between their working lives. As stated in the stakeholder interviews section in the report, a number of industrial and government bodies are open to the idea of strategic work placements, and in congruence with the likes of Buckingham New University, the instigation of “production companies” within the Welsh university sector would potentially facilitate outward facing, industry focused “centres”, that would encourage music departments to engage with mechanisms such as Accreditation for Prior Experiential Learning, accreditation for current work based learning, in addition to ensuring “traditional” undergraduate students get the opportunity to engage in meaningful accredited work with the live music industry.

The importance of skills, and the relative lack of interest in accreditation in both the questionnaire and some stakeholder interviews reflects larger scale studies carried out by Creative and Cultural Skills (Wenham and Felton, 2011) and a Creative and Cultural Industries Workforce Survey  – both of which suggest that Higher Education is not serving industry with the skills it needs. It is suggested, in the music industry, the grey area between skills and qualifications can only be alleviated if:

1) Employers understand what skills students will have once they have obtained specific qualifications

2) Students themselves have a clear understanding of the relationship between skills and qualifications

3) Both parties are convinced that course content is relevant to the sub-sectors of live music they are working in

It is understood that mutual trust between the live music sector and Higher Education will not develop overnight, and initiatives such as The Live Music Exchange is for the first time beginning to facilitate how both parties can constructively work together. Based on some of the work undertaken as part of this report, the next Live Music Exchange event is planned to be in Cardiff, as part of the 2012 Sŵn Festival in October 2012, and it is envisaged this will provide a strategic opportunity to explore how Higher Education can facilitate the economic and cultural development of live music in Wales.

 

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[1] See (http://bcdash.bigchampagne.com/what)

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Everybody is, Everybody is: SWN festival session 3

This 3rd session from the SWN conference at the ATRiuM in Cardiff  is hosted by Huw Williams and features Andrew Dubber (New Musical Strategies), Colin Rice (We 7), Tejas Mistry (Indistore) and Ewan Grant (Xtaster/Death of Glory Music) as panellists. The focus is very much focused on the opportunities available to artists via the ‘do it yourself’ business model. After each panellist describes their experience to date, the discussion focuses upon future business models (360 model etc), rights protection, etc. Enjoy

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SWN Festival Seminar 2: How to Have A Number One Album with Scouting For Girls

This post features a pod-cast of Roy, Greg and Pete from ‘Scouting For Girls‘ being interviewed by Radio One’s Huw Stephens. The session was one of a number of conference themes that I implemented as part of the 2008 SWN Festival at the ATRiuM in Cardiff in conjunction with The Welsh Music Foundation, The Centre for Small Nations, and The Music Academy. The refreshing thing about the session aside from the modesty and humility of the band was that their initial aim was to develop themselves slowly by not attempting to get a record deal at the start. Unlike many current artists who are interested in quick success, the band decided to focus on developing their compositional, industrial, personal and performance skills to ‘professional quality’ prior to considering a record contract. This is reminiscent of how bands like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones started, and begs the question if this process leads to a longer career, and equally as important a better recording contract (there is a research paper in that somewhere!!).

It was interesting to note how the ‘Cottage Industry’ the band developed prior to securing a major contract seemed to be such an important aspect of the bands success  – not only enabling them to learn about the various aspects of the industry, but actually earn more money from CD’s and merchandising when sales were low (They discussed how they currently get a small fraction of CD sales as opposed to the 80% of retail price via the DIY method). These cottage industry activities also involved pressing CD’s themselves, organising ‘personal’ mailing lists, but more importantly seemed to give them the attributes to move through the system very fast once they were signed. They found that once their success was beginning to be noticeable via factors such as My Space hits, comments and gig attendances, the age old procedure of the ‘industry coming to them’ occurred. Indeed their manager signed them on the basis of viewing a rehearsal, as did Sony BMG six weeks later (The Epic subsidiary). The album (which they started recording 4-5 days after signing) took six weeks to record, two weeks to master, leading their manager to describe them as a “managers dream” (mainly due to the lack of development time required to perfect their art). It is also interesting to note that the band had no complaints regarding artistic autonomy with their contract – is this because what they have developed ‘works’, or because they are probably one of the last bands to escape the dreaded 360 degree deal?

I generally got the impression that this was a band that had ‘served their time’ and their main priority was and is THE MUSIC – not money, lifestyle etc. Their local fan following was built personally, gradually, and was still an important factor of their professional lives, despite their success. Related to this, they also believed that it was important to try and get A&R depts to see bands on their local territory, with local audiences, rather than attempting the ‘empty London venue’ experience.

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Why don’t more bands come to Wales: Promoting Live Music In Wales

On Friday November 14th, the ATRiuM’s Music Academy, Centre For Small Nations and the Welsh Music Foundation hosted a day of music industry seminars as part of the Cardiff based SWN festival. Over the next several weeks I will upload downloadable links to podcasts of each of the four seminars, and discuss the seminar content via this blog. The first seminar featured promoters Dave Driscoll (Push 4), Guto Brychan (Maes B), Steve Tilly (Kilimangero) and moderator John Rostron (SWN co-organiser). For more details about the presenters please click here.
The initial discussion centred around the reasons why many artists don’t come to Wales, or indeed Cardiff in particular during their ‘national’ tours. This was something I had noted during my days as a professional musician, with very few James Taylor Quartet tours of the late 1980’s/early 1990’s taking in Wales. In fact Cardiff was the only venue we played back then. This pattern seems to have continued, with Fleet Foxes being an indicative example of an up and coming ‘buzz’ band not playing a single gig in Wales. The seminar also raised a number of questions that I would welcome responses to:

• Why is it that some agents don’t feel compelled to send their artists to Wales?

• Is there a misconception that there are not enough venues in Wales?

• Is there a lack of mid sized venues in Wales? Once bands get to a certain size, can they continue to play in Wales?

• Are the transport systems good enough to get people to and from Cardiff and some of the more remote venues (should some ticket sales include transport and/or gigs be flexible to comply with trains buses etc)?

• Is the perception that Cardiff people can simply go to Bristol to see a gig?

• What is the infrastructure in Cardiff in terms of generating media coverage for bands.

• Regarding the last point, do potential audiences feel informed in terms of what is happening in the Capital of Wales? The Joy Collective was noted as a good example of a web site that included South Wales and Bristol.

• Should promoters always continue to promote gigs after the venue has sold out?

• Are bands in too much of a hurry to play bigger venues before they are ready?

• How could the Welsh Assembly Government help with some of these issues?

I think the discussion reminded everyone of the central role that promoters play in the UK music industry, and the financial risk they take when acting as middlemen between agents, venues and the general public is considerable. When one considers that a local promoter like Push 4 can be working with around 25 artists and associate venues at any one time, it provides a lucid snapshot of the skills involved. Dave Driscoll did note that the slow speed of ticket sales in Wales generally provide a series of challenges to up and coming promoters that may not be apparent in other areas. It means that Welsh promoters in particular need to have a ‘hook’ when promoting many gigs, and Push 4’s work with Donny Osmond and The Lost Prophets were used as indicative examples. The seminar did illustrate that ticket sales in Cardiff have an idiosyncratic trait of selling very slowly, so there needs to be mutual trust between agents and promoters that can only develop over time.

The fact is that there are more venues in Cardiff now than there was 10 years ago, and it would be interesting to discuss if the city is now saturated. This however does not seem to be the case in mid/north Wales, there been very few venues north of the m4 corridor.

I am very interested in anyone’s thoughts on any of this. An RSS feed to this and other podcasts can be downloaded here. If required you can add to I Tunes and simply update when future posts are documented. Alternatively you can access the podcast directly below:

Please note that the start of this podcast is very quiet.

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