Before The Music Dies

    I would like to thank Dr. Turner, my professor for my class entitled Current Trends in Music Education, for exposing us to this video; Before the Music Dies by Andrew Shapter and Joel Rasmussen, www.imdb.com/video/hulu/vi3758949145/.  It is an eye opening video, written in 2006, about music today. I will summarize this video and insert some relevant correlations to some of the topics discussed in class.
     The main concern of this video is that music is losing its' heart and quality to commerce. Money is what is driving the music industry.  Radio inundates us with repetition of the same music and "dulls the senses" as Joey Burns stated. This is because of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which changed the ownership limits of radio stations. Before this Act was passed, a company was only allowed to own 40 or so radio stations. Now, parent companies of giant chains can own as many as 1200 stations. It is music for the masses. The advertising dollar is driving radio time and they, the corporation radio managers, decide how to fit the music in between the commercials. Erykah Badu stated when speaking of the length of music "they will cut it if it is over 4 minutes long".  A playlist of songs is made from music that gives the listener instant gratification, because, if not, they will change the channel and that radio station will not bring in the revenue that it needs to stay in business.  The music does not have to be spectacular, just good enough so listeners will not change the channel.
     Record labels are also more interested in money than talent. They let go of extremely talented musicians, because record sales are not large enough, instead of giving people exposure to new music and time to "catch up" to new music and also time for the musician to develop and find their own 'voice'.
The artists are expected to create something specifically for its' sale ability not quality. Lucy Green would say that this is poor music, music rooted in society and allowed nothing but interfering delineations. Many extremely talented artists are giving up on their craft because their self-worth is destroyed, putting their heart and soul into an album that does not sell. Their music did not celebrate them as musicians.
    Making millions does not require talent as our authors demonstrated; they had a songwriter write a song that took just a few minutes with which a teenager could identify, chose a pretty girl to sing and made a video. The chosen girl had intonation problems, which were easily fixed by a technology based program called Auto-Tune, and the end result was amazing. It was definitely something that would sell today using very little, if any, talent. We are studying delineated meanings and this is a clear example of the importance of the clothes, make-up, essentially the persona presented to the public in which the audience, in this case teens, will identify. Branford Marsalis stated that "superficiality is in and depth of quality is out". Bonnie Raitt said that looks matter if you want to make a million.  Talent used to be the focus, those days are gone.
     There is hope for the future. It is harder to find good quality music with heart than it used to be, for the reasons stated above, but the internet is a good resource. Many independent artists and independent labels are embracing the internet in order to gain exposure. Artists are understanding that their music is a business and want to form musician run music labels in which they get behind music that they believe in.  Music that is played and created from the heart and has autonomy; not concerned with fame, fashion or to make a buck.