Music industry corporations and creativity
Generally, creativity is associated with creation, originality and innovation. For that reason, it is generally not associated with the culture of musical corporations, at least not directly. Corporations may get benefits from musical innovation and integrate it, however not often in a direct way: they are more dedicated to the production of new pieces of music that sound familiar in a continual way. That operating mode explains why corporations build portfolios of music composers or rosters: they want to be sure that new materials will be delivered on a regular basis to satisfy the audiences.
In that context, music ‘genres’ are not defined only in relationship to musical criteria, but also according to the conventions and expectations that rule the music industry. So the music industry has an impact on the forms that musical creativity can take, trying to predict what kind of moves audiences will make across various media systems (music streaming services, online radio stations, etc.).
Communications between musicians and executives in the music industry
In ‘indie’ companies, owners communicate with musicians on a very regular basis, being present down corridors. In corporations, managers have less opportunities to share their daily questions with both their staff and musicians. They must spend quality time with musicians in order to develop artists and their production. In fact, developing artists means making their music known in live venues like concert halls, clubs, bars, theatres, and so on. So, the agenda of different musicians must be very organized.
Concerning the revenues of artists, transactions may be complicated due to partnerships between labels and various distribution channels such as, today, music streaming services and online radio but also touring and festivals organizers. Managers and accountants may feel pressure in a more or less vertical system, due to questions related to delays and sometimes to artistic portfolios. Executives must deal with objective criteria like statistics and facts, but also with more subjective ones, like intuition and belief in an artist. They must sometimes correct erroneous data or assumptions in order to get more nuanced pictures from statistics.
Who buys what, when, where, with what frequency? Where does their information come from? Why do people purchase or not? It is because they can answer these questions in an accurate way that major music companies attract small labels and touring organizers, not because they are artist-friendly or knowledgeable about music. Sometimes, some issues may arise and some researchers do not hesitate to write that music agencies have augmented their power over musicians, creating reserve of labour in order to decrease their fees. In that situation, technology may be incriminated, as platforms allow artists from various geographical areas to register. Musicians, like other types of professionals, have become in some ways victims of a certain sort of globalization. However, generally, they also get more exposure than some decades ago.