Transmission of Music

Music has historically been transmitted historically in one of three ways. Aural transmission, which is a song is performed by one person and remembered and passed down by others. Mass transmission which can be recording, videos, the internet and live concerts, and Commercialization which involves the modern business model for selling music on the open market. All of these concepts have changed and evolved as the industry has changed over the years, and what I find most interesting is where they have, and are beginning to intersect with each other.

One of the most glaring examples of how these concepts can interact with one another is The Grateful Dead. The Dead remains an incredibly popular band today with its living members all having successful careers jamming to Dead tunes, and if you ask any fan what really draws them to The Grateful Dead, nine times out of ten they will cite the live performances as a main reason they are so infatuated by the Dead. The Dead are famous for improvising with, expanding upon and jamming nonstop through their original material and the tunes they cover. You are never going to hear the same performance twice, and this created a large fan base of people who wanted top hear The Dead as many times as possible so that they could experience how the band would approach the songs next. This led the Grateful Dead shows being recorded frequently and disseminated throughout the fan base basically for free from members of the bands entourage because they knew that their live shows is where they would build true fandom. They were able to become very successful live musicians by giving away music for free, which is a model most record labels would cringe at but has secured The Dead a legion of lifelong fans who will always support and show up for new shows.

I think this model could com back to life in our modern age of streaming we find ourselves in. Because of how easy it now to find a song on a streaming service, and how easy it is as an artist to post your work on said services, It opens up the ability for artists to spread their live performances to potential fans through both these services and video services like Youtube. If the pandemic has taught the music industry anything its that it is much easier to distribute live music over the internet than it used to be. It is way easier and cheaper to broadcast a live performance on the internet than ever before, and more and more you start to see popular jam bands like Widespread Panic and The String Cheese Incident stream their live shows because it is in their best interest to. Nowadays fans want to know what they’re getting into, so they look up live performances on the internet, and they exist either the artist likes it or not. By releasing live content by yourself as an artist, you are both securing the fact that you will be the main profiteer of your content being on these services, and you are advertising to potential fans the allure of you live show. There is no way to replace the experience of a live performance, so fans will feel they’ve only had a taste of the experience by hearing it virtually, and will be hungry to attend a live show. As these concepts continue to intersect and the industry changes, I hope artists will be begin to see the advent of mass dissemination through the internet as a tool rather than a burden.