Does live electronic music make good business sense?

Most composers of live electronic music probably don’t think of their work in business terms. After all, there’s little or no money to be made from the medium even for the most well established artists, and even ‘big’ commissions are barely enough to make a living from. As a result of this, many creative types seek academic positions as lecturers or researchers, with institutions giving individuals a portion of their working hours to practice their art as research.

Whether an artist is funded via commission or through an academic position, it often seems inappropriate to consider the music-making process in business terms. However, in order to maximise the value generated through their creative work, musicians working with live electronic media should consider carefully the benefit/cost ratio of their chosen medium. Put simply: live electronics is very expensive to compose and perform, and brings relatively little financial benefit to the people involved in its production. So why is it so expensive?

• live electronics requires a technological development process that runs alongside the composition process in order to develop the electronics
• often technician(s) or musical assistant(s) are required, and this costs money
• additional equipment (computers, software, interfaces, amplification, speakers, microphones) are required in both the studio where the music is composed and in the performance venue
• additional rehearsal time is required for the performers to experiment with and master the electronics
• additional training is needed for composers and performers to learn about electronics

Compare this with ‘acousmatic’ or ‘tape’ music:

• The same finished ‘product’ serves as a representation of the piece, a recording of the piece and the playback medium
• No score production is required
• No performer costs for rehearsals
• Diffusion systems are expensive to hire/install/maintain but these are often also required for live electronic music
• Composer has role of composer, performer and technician
• Composers tend to use existing tools, less of a software development element

Or instrumental music:

• No loudspeaker/amplification
• No technicians/musical assistants
• No studio costs other than for recording
• Rehearsal time is reduced because no need to rehearse electronics
• No software development alongside composition process

It can be seen clearly from these ad hoc lists that from a ‘total cost’ perspective, composing and performing live electronic music is significantly more expensive than either acousmatic or instrumental music. In addition, many of these costs are financially ‘hidden’ from the composer, however regardless of whether the composer works in academia, professional music or both, the cumulative ‘cost’ of production could have significant impact on the following benefits:

• The number of minutes-worth of music a composer can produce annually
• The number of works an ensemble can perform
• The quality/substance of the music produced
• The number of repeat performances of a work
• The profile generated for the composer and/or performers
• The academic ‘research value’ generated annually
• The international prestige associated with the work
• The total audience members reached annually
• The willingness of ensembles to record the work

Clearly if live electronic music is more expensive to produce, then fewer works will be composed and performed, negatively impacting on the benefit generated. Taking into account the total cost of production and the above benefits generated for the three types of music considered, I have extrapolated the following graph.

Excluding the rare scenarios of large-scale film music and musical super-stardom, the benefit-cost ratio of all music production is low. However, it could be argued that despite its relatively high cost, live electronic music has a high research value due to its inherently experimental and developmental nature. How this translates to business value for academic institutions is a different matter. To be continued!