In December 2014 Music Venue Trust organised
the first national gathering of small and medium scale music venues from across
the UK, Venues Day 2014. This week
sees the first publication of the research conducted by the Institute of Contemporary Music Performance
in the lead up to and during Venues Day. Understanding
Small Music Venues: An Interim Findings Report is intended to be a
discussion document about how these venues operate, the challenges they face
and the role they play.
Over 120 venues
were represented at Venues Day and 107 participated in the research project
which is still ongoing. Music Venue Trust CEO Mark Davyd explained the need
for action:
"There is a national challenge to our live music
venue circuit brought about by a sequence of events and developments which have
left that network in a perilous and precarious state. Music Venue Trust feels
that we need to take an overall view of the challenges out there. We need to be
openly discussing and airing those challenges with our live music industry
colleagues, and working together to tackle that range of issues so we not only
maintain and preserve this circuit but actively start to improve it. We feel
that past failures to talk about the ecosystem of UK music have meant that
people who don't actively work in it perhaps don’t understand the structure of
the industry, or the vital role that this network of venues plays in
maintaining it.
The UK is, quite literally, a music world leader,
punching vastly above its weight in terms of the impact our artists and
musicians make across the globe. A huge proportion of the music we export,
which generates thousands of jobs, develops the artistic careers of our best
writers and musicians, and is such an important part of the UK's standing on
the international cultural stage, starts in a small venue. This is the
grassroots of our industry, the research and development department of our
major international music industry partners. It is impossible to overstate this
enough; no Troubadour or 12 Bar Club, no Adele.
Our UK music scene, arguably the best in the world, is
built on a robust ecosystem that starts with a first live concert in front of
as few as ten people on a Tuesday night in Guildford and climaxes with 3 nights
at Wembley Stadium. And it's not just the musicians - our industry and other
parts of the creative sector are filled with people who cut their teeth
promoting, booking or simply working the door at a small venue. This small
venue circuit is the training ground and the entry level experience for our
lighting engineers, sound technicians, and cultural organisers at all levels;
we need to ensure we do all we can to protect it."
The interim report is available to read online or
download from this link: https://www.scribd.com/doc/253772403/Understanding-Small-Music-Venues
A full report will be released on Monday 9 March 2015,
when Music Venue Trust will be announcing its response to what has been
learned.
