Concert Industry Research Articles

Front row or backstage? Evidence on concert ticket preferences from a discrete choice experiment

Sophisticated ticketing practices have become widespread in the concert industry in recent years, with a wider range of musicians now experimenting with different ticket pricing schemes. The aim of these practices is to help musicians manage ticket capacity and maximize their concert income. However, there is limited evidence on how musicians can optimally allocate and price tickets with respect to how consumers value different ticket attributes. This study uses a stated preference discrete choice experiment and choice modeling methods to analyze consumer preferences for different attributes of concert tickets. The results of the modeling exercise highlight patterns in consumer preferences across different seating areas within a hypothetical venue, as well as average preferences for other common attributes of concert tickets. Finally, this study provides evidence of the significant welfare consumers derive from the availability of new ticketing innovations in the form of VIP packages.

XDN-Based Network Framework Design to Communicate Interaction in Virtual Concerts with Metaverse Platforms

In the trend of transforming existing systems and services into non-face-to-face models, the concert industry is also showing movements toward transitioning to virtual formats. Physical concerts in the real world require venues that can accommodate hundreds to tens of thousands of spectators, but non-face-to-face methods that can accommodate large audiences face various limitations. Moreover, to elevate the satisfaction level of virtual concert attendees to that of real-world concerts, it is important to implement interaction between performers and audiences. Modern metaverse platforms apply cutting-edge network technologies to accommodate numerous users within a single channel. Many researchers are adopting network technologies such as SDN (software-defined networking) and CDN (content delivery network) to set up a virtual concert that can accommodate large audiences. In this paper, we propose a network framework to be designed for the composition of virtual concerts. In particular, we separate a channel dedicated to interaction in order to provide an immersive experience of exchanging interactions between performers and audiences. As massive audiences transmitting interaction data to the performer in a 1:N format can lead to problems with acceptance and latency, this study introduces a concept of a channel form called ‘Zone’ and proposes an interaction data channel network framework that does not compromise immersion. The proposed framework supports tasks for effectively transmitting interaction data using network technologies for metaverse platforms such as XDN and clustering algorithms such as fuzzy c-means. We also suggest a CDN-based architecture that can ensure low latency for performers to transmit interaction data to the audience.

Memory Arousal: Research on the Communication Effect of Online Concerts

In the post-COVID-19 era, the offline gathering is limited, and many offline activities have changed to online activities. As a result, the online concert industry has developed and quickly moved to the public view. Among them, the online concert content with memory factor has a wider communication effect and higher audience participation than other theme online concerts. This paper analyzes the online concert during the epidemic by questionnaire and interview and explores its transmission effect. The study found that the closer the concert theme is to the audience's collective memory, the easier it is to attract the audience's attention; The more interactive and active the audience is, the stronger the audience's stickiness to the concert is

Review essay: Between the Material and the Ephemeral

Review essay: Between the Material and the Ephemeral

Popular Music Fans and the Value of Concert Tickets

ABSTRACTIn an age of streaming, popular music fans have shifted their expenditures on recordings to concert tickets. That shift raises the question of how fans discuss the value of concerts. As an answer to that question, this article argues that three key considerations – financial, emotional, and experiential – shape the discussion because of their influence on ticket purchases. Informed by John Fiske’s notion of capital accumulation, the article demonstrates that argument through a textual analysis of online conversations among fans of U2, Guns N’ Roses, and Coldplay. It concludes that those considerations have implications for fair pricing and profit sharing in the context of a consolidated concert industry that favors the few at the expense of the many.

Fairness constraints on profit-seeking: evidence from the German club concert industry

Unlike Kahneman et al. (Am Econ Rev 76(4):728–741, 1986) iconic snow shovel, live music is a performance good that fans attach a particular value to. Hence, an artist’s pricing decision might differ from standard rent-seeking behavior. In this paper, I propose a model that incorporates fairness concerns into the pricing decision for concert tickets. The hypotheses derived from this model are tested on data from the German club concert industry. The results are consistent with the model: Although (1) price dispersion is the dominant pricing strategy in the club concert industry and artists prefer to perform on a Friday or Saturday night, (2) artists do not set higher prices on the weekend. These results are consistent with fairness constraints, but are difficult to explain within a standard profit maximization framework. As a third result, (3) the data reveal that ticket prices are positively correlated with a city’s number of inhabitants .

Cannibalization and option value effects of secondary markets: Evidence from the US concert industry

We examine how reducing search frictions in secondary markets affects the value appropriated by firms in primary markets. We characterize two effects on primary‐market firms caused by intermediaries entering secondary markets: the “cannibalization” and “option value” effects. Separation between primary and secondary markets can drive which of the two effects dominates. Firms selling valuable and scarce products are more likely to have separate primary and secondary markets, and will therefore appropriate more value when secondary markets thicken. Firms selling products that are not valuable and scarce will be hurt. Further, we hypothesize that firms have incentives to engineer scarcity by limiting supply when secondary markets thicken to separate primary and secondary markets. We find support for these hypotheses in the U.S. concert ticket industry. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Concert Promotion Centralization and the Artist Management Response: 1990s - 2010s

IntroductionBeginning in the mid-1990s the concert promotion industry underwent significant changes, disrupting the thirty-five year business model of individual, regional concert promoters in favor of centralized, national control-first by SFX, then by Clear Channel Communication, and then by Live Nation (rebranded as Live Nation Entertainment after its merger with Ticketmaster). The ten-year period of centralization between 1995 and 2005 brought significant and long-lasting changes to the financial relationship among the artist, the promoter, and the venue, with the artist arguably experiencing the greatest disadvantage under this altered business model. This paper explores the early history of the concert business, the period of centralization, and responses that artist managers can employ to maintain the artist's interests in the new era of centralization.A Brief History of the Concert Industry: 1965-1995Up until the mid-1960s live music concerts by popular artists were primarily promoted by the artists' record labels. The labels would package most popular artists on multi-act bills, sending them out to tour regionally and nationally, booking whatever supper clubs, theaters, or civic halls happened to be available. While this business model was suitable when the primary goal was to increase record sales, it proved inadequate by the beginning of the psychedelic movement and the expanding youth market for live music in the 1960s. Artists and audiences, seeking places to interact through music, wandered through former vaudeville houses, to desanctified houses of worship, to moribund ballrooms and dance halls. The patchwork, hit-or-miss nature of the concert industry for and roll in the mid-1960s, created an opportunity for professionalization and integration among concert promoters.1Into this void came talent agent Frank Barsalona, who started Premiere Talent Agency in 1964 as the first agency to recognize and work with modem or rock artists.2 Barsalona thought the best way to build an artist's career was by developing a network of regional promoters who could promote his artists in markets.One of the reasons I started Premier was to bring in promoters that understood the music and were willing to work from the very beginning to help break the act-on the promise, and obviously I couldn't give them a contract, that if everything went well and they did what they were supposed to do, then we would endeavor to deliver that act to them as long as they did a good job and so long as offers were competitive. (Pollstar, Executive Profile: Frank Barsalona 1988 2012)Two of the first concert promoters he worked with, Bill Graham in San Francisco and Don Law in Boston, represented not only both the West Coast and the East Coast, but also the two epicenters of the college student and youth audience markets.3 As Barsalona was taking risks by backing his artists, people like Bill Graham and Don Law were taking the risks of concert promotion. One way of mitigating those risks was to come up with a mutually beneficial profit split between the artist and the promoter. While different split ratios were tried, eventually Barsalona and Bill Graham developed the 85/15 split deal.4According to this deal, after the promotion and production expenses (including the artist's guarantee) were deducted, the artist would receive 85% of the profits and the promoter would receive 15%. Familiarity with this system and skilled negotiation could often move the needle to 90/10 in the artist's favor5 for the larger acts. While the promoter would earn less per show, the personal relationship between the artists and the promoter was the key to the financial relationship, as long as the promoter could count on presenting the artists whenever they played in the promoter's city.During the 1960s it was common for local or regional promoters to have a virtual lock on any significant shows happening in their towns. …

A new SOM-based method for profile generation: Theory and an application in direct marketing

The field of direct marketing is constantly searching for new data mining techniques in order to analyze the increasing available amount of data. Self-organizing maps (SOM) have been widely applied and discussed in the literature, since they give the possibility to reduce the complexity of a high dimensional attribute space while providing a powerful visual exploration facility. Combined with clustering techniques and the extraction of the so-called salient dimensions, it is possible for a direct marketer to gain a high level insight about a dataset of prospects. In this paper, a SOM-based profile generator is presented, consisting of a generic method leading to value-adding and business-oriented profiles for targeting individuals with predefined characteristics. Moreover, the proposed method is applied in detail to a concrete case study from the concert industry. The performance of the method is then illustrated and discussed and possible future research tracks are outlined.

The Emerging Music Business Model: Back to the Future?

For many years, the music industry has consisted of two main components: the concert industry and the recording music industry. Throughout the 80s and 90s, thanks mostly to CD sales, the recording music industry was dominant in terms of revenue and visibility. It reached record US sales in 1999 and 2000 (over $14.3 billion in 2000, $13.2 billion of which for CD albums), and between the years 2000 and 2007, the industry has seen a decline of 44% in its sales of physical records. Reluctantly, the recording industry has joined the digital world by signing agreements with a variety of organizations providing music downloading, in particular with Apple and its iTunes downloading service. It earned 1.4 billion dollars from music downloading in 2007 (with another billion from other digital sales such a cellular phone ringtones). Obviously, digital sales have fallen short of compensating the industry for its losses of physical record sales. The concert industry is re-emerging as the potential dominant component of the music industry. In contrast to the recording industry, its revenues have not been affected by illegal Internet downloading. On the contrary, it is making use of the Internet to increase them. Recording artists are taking advantage of the weakening of the recording labels and of the opportunities offered by the Internet to loosen their dependence on the labels. Finally, the once well-defined separation between the concert industry and the recording industry may be disappearing: concert organizers are getting into the recording business and majors are getting into the concert business.

The Biggest Show on Earth: The U2 360-Degree Tour and Its Implications for the Concert Industry

The Biggest Show on Earth: The U2 360-Degree Tour and Its Implications for the Concert Industry

Customers' perceptions about concerts and CDs

PurposeTaking into account the increasing prices of attending concerts and gigs and the decreasing prices and better sound quality of CDs and music in file‐computer format, is the future of music events threatened by music CDs? Are clients' perceptions about concerts and CDs very different? This study aims to answer these research questions by comparing important perceptions of concert attendees and CD buyers.Design/methodology/approachAn empirical study is conducted in two different contexts: CD buyers and concert attendees. In order to answer the research questions outlined the most appropriate statistical tool is the student's t‐test. The variables to compare do not have normal distributions; therefore, non‐parametric tests have been conducted to confirm the results. In addition, a discriminant analysis has been applied in order to assure that both consumers sub‐samples differ with regard to the variables used in the study.FindingsThe future of music events is not threatened at all by music CDs. On one hand, the concert industry has been increasingly making more profits in many countries in last decade. On the other hand, consumer satisfaction, price fairness perception, willingness to pay, customer value, and product/service quality are significantly more highly ranked in concert attendees than in CD buyers. The statistical analyses show clients' perceptions about concerts and CDs are very different. All the variables analysed except image have been significantly different in both sub‐samples of consumers.Originality/valueThis paper examines customer perceptions of two of the most important sectors in the music industry: concerts and CDs, using variables that directly measure these perceptions. It is crucial for music managers to understand motives and feelings of music consumers of these basic sectors in order to make appropriate decisions.

The Impact of Price Discrimination on Revenue: Evidence from the Concert Industry

Abstract Concert tickets can be sold at the same price or at different prices that reflect different seating categories. Price discrimination generates about 5% greater revenues than single-price ticketing. The return to price discrimination is higher in markets with greater demand heterogeneity, as predicted by price discrimination theory. The return to an increase from three to four concert seat categories is roughly half that of an increase from one to two.

Concert Tour Success in North America: An Examination of the Top 100 Tours from 1997 to 2005

Radio airplay, album sales and concerts provide revenues to songwriters, music labels, and musicians. From 1997 to 2005, concert revenues in North America increased from $1.3 billion to $3.1 billion. We analyze concert trends by investigating pricing and attendance, the superstar phenomenon, and structural changes in the way the concert tour industry operates. To conduct this analysis we look at the performance of the top 100 tours from 1997 to 2005. These data comprise a chart of sorts—an annual review of the performance of the concert industry, with performers being ranked in terms of gross concert revenues.

Agency and Change: Berlioz in Britain, 1870–1920

Far from being always unjustly neglected until the late twentieth century, as a recent view would have it, Berlioz's music enjoyed dedicated attention and considerable admiration a century earlier. His orchestral works, in particular, were taken up by a range of skilful players and conductors in Britain from the 1870s, yielding performances in the English regions, the London suburbs and in Scotland that impressed ordinary listeners much more than many experienced ones. I argue that structural change and professional competition within the British concert industry to 1920 assisted this remarkable reception – largely ignored in the historiography of Berlioz's reputation as well as in that of British musical culture – while imaginative musicians, astute promoters, writers and thousands of listeners continued to benefit from contact with his work. Berlioz's challenging music indeed became an agent of aesthetic change in Britain – a benchmark, and a calling-card, of modern orchestral presentation that was both standard and commonly accessible before the First World War.

Amphitheater noise, a community perspective

Amphitheaters and amplified music often provoke strong community reaction. Leaders of approximately 20 community organizations near existing or proposed amphitheaters were surveyed, and three were selected for case studies. Their experience provides insight into the affected public’s perception of the concert industry, acoustical consultants, ordinances, and regulations.