Music Industry? What industry?

[Martin Naef]

On 16.09.2013 2:59, Jay Vaughan wrote:
>  tl;dr- the music industry isn't dying because of piracy - its dying
> because of competition.  In a nutshell: there are too many people
> trying to be professional musicians.
>
> What thinks the -bar?

Disclaimer first: A sizeable part of our family income comes from 
performing music live. That's not me, mind you... ;-)

The basic economy is clear: There's a lot of competition, not just from 
amateurs.

But there still needs to be a model where somebody can make a decent 
living from music, for the simple reason that we need professionals. 
Why? There's a large body of music that really needs extremely skilled 
performers. Apart from the odd, hugely talented exception, only somebody 
who spends all their life doing music can reach that level. If nobody is 
willing to pay for music any more, all we get is mediocrity. If you ever 
had the pleasure to record professional musicians, you'll know the 
difference. Or can you imagine progressive rock where the rhythm section 
isn't perfectly tight? Imagine a big orchestra diverging and not exactly 
in tune. Thank you, I've heard amateur orchestras, and I've heard even 
more amateur bands. They're having great fun, and if a member is a 
friend of yours, you'll enjoy the performance because of the personal 
link. But no, you're not going to enjoy a Rachmaninov concert unless 
it's really well played. And you wouldn't want to listen to me trying to 
keep up with a Rush song on the drums...

I have no good answer, but I think we'll have to think about models to 
support musicians because our culture needs them. Obviously, selling 
MP3s doesn't really work for most. Reconsidering our attitude to what 
we're willing to pay might help.

Martin