the future of music

Is the Turntable a musical instrument?

Can it work as a ‘classical’ instrument?

These were the first questions posed by idea of a Concerto for Turntables.

Gabriel Prokofiev’s Concerto for Turntables & Orchestra (Heritage Orchestra Feat. DJ Yoda) attempts to answer those questions.

Should the turntable join the instruments of the classical orchestra?

Give it a listen and let me know what you think.

via apc

via the Times UK:

This is the graph the record industry doesn’t want you to see.

It shows the fate of the three main pillars of music industry revenue – recorded music, live music, and PRS revenues (royalties collected on behalf of artists when their music is played in public) over the last 5 years.

We’ve broken each category into two sub-categories so that, for any chunk of revenue – recorded music sales, for instance – you can see the percentage that goes to the artist, and the percentage that goes elsewhere. (In the case of recorded music, the lion’s share of revenue goes to the record label; in the case of live, the promoter takes a cut etc.)

Hopefully, this analysis – and there’s more on the nuts and bolts of our method below – sheds some factual light on the claims and counter-claims that are paranoically sweeping across the music industry establishment, not least that put forward by the singer Lily Allen in this paper recently – and the BPI – that artists are losing out as a result of the fall in sales of recorded of music.

The most immediate revelation, of course, is that at some point next year revenues from gigs payable to artists will for the first time overtake revenues accrued by labels from sales of recorded music.

Why live revenues have grown so stridently is beyond the scope of this article, but our data – compiled from a PRS for Music report and the BPI – make two things clear: one, that the growth in live revenue shows no signs of slowing and two, that live is by far and away the most lucrative section of industry revenue for artists themselves, because they retain such a big percentage of the money from ticket sales.

The long and short of it – the music industry’s “decline” isn’t as simple as record labels would like us to believe, and that musicians are getting a bigger slice of the music industry pie than they have in the past.

Check out this insanity!

The 5 Gum Augmented Reality Music Mixer uses augmented reality – the idea of combining real world and computer-generated 3D graphics in real-time – to create a virtual DJ mixer that you control with controller “glyphs”.

The glyphs are used as the input device and allow users to:

• Change the volumes of each track by moving the glyph relative to the central reference glyph.
• Modify the tracks themselves by rotating the glyphs on their axis. This will add distortion, bit crusher and echo effects.
• Remove the audio track from the mix by covering or removing the glyphs.

The project is part of Wrigley’s 5 Gum “Stimulates Your Senses”promotion. Read more…

The drum corps tradition is dying. And synthesizers are to blame.

At least, that seems to be the point of this very odd video, 128 in G, by drumcorpsisdying.

Are synthesizers really killing off drum corps?

Or is it rat poison?

I’ve got no effin’ idea, but this video is pretty creepy and kinda makes me want to stay away from drum corps performances for the near future.

Give it a look and let me know what you think!

We’ve given Trent Reznor and NIN a lot of credit for pioneering new ways of connecting with audiences via the Internet. Reznor has used free music downloads, Creative Commons licensing and fan remixes to reinvigorate his career.

Whenever we mention Reznor and his new media music experiments, though, the most common comment is that “sure – that works for an established act, but what about unknown artists?”

Reznor addressed that question at the NIN site today with a post that offers his “thoughts on what to do as a new / unknown artist”:

If you are an unknown / lesser-known artist trying to get noticed / established:

Establish your goals. What are you trying to do / accomplish? If you are looking for mainstream super-success (think Lady GaGa, Coldplay, U2, Justin Timberlake) – your best bet in my opinion is to look at major labels and prepare to share all revenue streams / creative control / music ownership. To reach that kind of critical mass these days your need old-school marketing muscle and that only comes from major labels. Good luck with that one.If you’re forging your own path, read on.

Forget thinking you are going to make any real money from record sales. Make your record cheaply (but great) and GIVE IT AWAY. As an artist you want as many people as possible to hear your work. Word of mouth is the only true marketing that matters.

To clarify:

Parter with a TopSpin or similar or build your own website, but what you NEED to do is this – give your music away as high-quality DRM-free MP3s. Collect people’s email info in exchange (which means having the infrastructure to do so) and start building your database of potential customers. Then, offer a variety of premium packages for sale and make them limited editions / scarce goods. Base the price and amount available on what you think you can sell. Make the packages special – make them by hand, sign them, make them unique, make them something YOU would want to have as a fan. Make a premium download available that includes high-resolution versions (for sale at a reasonable price) and include the download as something immediately available with any physical purchase. Sell T-shirts. Sell buttons, posters… whatever.

See the NIN site for the full article.