Thread by @tgpb85

So #musicleeds is finishing up. Was in Leeds yesterday, shame I couldn’t stay. Looks like a great day which, in the shadow of the ECoC withdrawal debacle, was a real achievement to make happen.

But with “Music Cities” again being discussed, I want to sound a note of caution. To make the case for some critical reflection. And perhaps to read some of the findings from the last two decades (plus!) of “Creative City” experiences.

So – I don’t normally do this – but here’s a #thread alert.

And hey, executive summary: more research needed. So maybe others can pitch in on that.

The standard document that undergirds much of this is The Mastering of a Music City: a collaboration between the Canadian music sector trade body and the IFPI (global recording industry lobbying body). musiccanada.com/resources/rese…

(If you are of a certain persuasion, this will already be ringing alarm bells. Much has changed since Dave Harker’s “classical Marxist critique” of IFPI “rhetoric” in 1997 – but it remains instructive. jstor.org/stable/853437)

The influence of this document appears to be massive. Another city seems to whip it out to justify setting up their own music board every couple of months.

The Mastering of a Music City is essentially a catalogue of justifications for a quite diverse set of urban planning proposals and policy levers. These can be assembled (a bit too neatly) into three packages.

1. Music as industrial strategy (the Michael Porter approach). Clustering, access to resources, land-use governance, LEPs/BIDs, improved licensing legislation = boost productivity/employment.

2. Music for the Creative Class (the Richard Florida approach). Place-branding, wayfinding, regeneration, nightlife and iconic music institutions = tourism, FDI and inward migration/retention of “high value” human capital.

3. Music’s intrinsic value. Talk in very vague terms about how music is a wonderful thing, good for the soul, well-being, artistic excellence, community cohesion, egalitarianism and so on. Make tenuous links to psychological evidence. Ignore any negative aspects.

These are the standard justifications and strategies made to argue for more focused attention on artists, music-related businesses, the night-time economy etc., which would ostensibly benefit “the music community”. Because we all want thriving music scenes, don’t we?

And Mastering a Music City’s recommendations are basically: all of the above – studiously ignoring fundamental tensions, which could be picked up from a cursory reading not just of academic literature but industry’s own self-commentary too.

OK, music offers work opportunities. But what sort of work? Well we’re now swimming in testimonies, reports – and, slowly, data (though some of this is not great) – about how badly paid, insecure, unequal, damaging to mental health (etc!) work in these industries is.

“Occupations associated with Music, Museums, and the performing arts … have markedly low average rates of pay closer to that of intermediate and routine occupations.”
tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108…

The majority of new entrants to the sector leave within five years.
ccskills.org.uk/downloads/1319…

Broadly, there is gender and BAME parity at entry-level. But this goes rapidly downhill – after around 3-5 years.
ukmusic.org/equality-diver…

“behind the scenes – what we call backstage – artists, musicians, composers, students, record company employees, trainees and others testify of assault, sexual harassment and a sexist jargon”
dn.se/kultur-noje/21…

Representations of what “talent” looks like are “shockingly segregative”.
buzzfeed.com/fionarutherfor…

Anxiety, panic attacks and depression are commonplace in music, which sufferers attribute to poor working conditions, low pay, anti-social working hours, exhaustion and inability to plan for the future.
helpmusicians.org.uk/news/latest-ne…

Difficult to square this with notions of music as an unqualified good (package #3). Though I appreciate these are not necessarily things that help make policy arguments.

Possibly because these jobs continue to be in demand (that’s another story), these difficulties are not easily recognised by those working in music industries themselves. Pleasingly, some change seems afoot here.

But it is still common sense to assume creative, cultural and media types are more open, egalitarian, meritocratic and supportive than others. If you don’t know the work of @drdaveobrien and colleagues, get to know it.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.11…

And this
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.11…

And this
journals.sagepub.com/toc/cus/current

Much of the problems with package #1 (go music clusters!) are not helped – are exacerbated even – by package #2: music as a consumer resource, shaping city branding to attract hip new visitors, knowledge workers, start-up cultures…

But Creative Class regeneration strategies have very often worked to heighten inequalities – what Florida himself now refers to as the “dark side of our urban revival”. This has piled pressure on those without existing economic and social capital. theguardian.com/cities/2017/oc…

At the recent Bazalgette review launch, @andyedwardsbiz of Music Managers Forum stood up and commented that the cost of living in London (where so much of the work is) was one of the foremost concerns for those his organisation represents.

For all the (welcome) work of pushing the Agent of Change principle, and the work of highlighting tensions between property developers and music institutions, I see very little effort being directed at improving this.

(e.g. The London Music Board has businesses [small and large], trade bodies and consultants represented, alongside planners responsible for licensing and high streets, and a (private) college – but no housing officers or residents’ associations. london.gov.uk/sites/default/… )

There is something perverse about pushing music as part of an investment and regeneration strategy – that simultaneously undermines the conditions in which a diverse range of cultural participation might take place.

These strategies are entirely about competitive advantage: winners and losers. Not everywhere can be a winner. But handled poorly, they amplify myths in the name of branding and incentivise conditions that heighten structural inequalities.

We desperately need new knowledge in relation to all three policy justifications. We need to know much more about how this plays out for specifically for music. And we need a notion of “music community” that is not limited to typical industry players.

That’s more or less all I want to say for now. I have other issues but they can wait.

Again, I recognise the amazing achievement in even getting people to talk to each other. But it’s important to be open about where the conflicts are, who gets a say in addressing them – and to heed GOOD research that is not primarily advocacy!

Ahem.

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