Live music injects $1b into economy

Updated

Live music is worth more than $1.2 billion to the Australian economy, according to a new study.

The report by accounting firm Ernst and Young was commissioned by industry stakeholders including the Australian Council for the Arts and the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA).

It found that venue-based live music generated more than $1.2 billion in the 2009-10 financial year, with almost 42 million patrons attending more than 328,000 live performances.

It also found that the industry employs almost 15,000 full-time workers at almost 4,000 venues across Australia.

The council's director of music, Paul Mason, says the report can be used to examine the industry's health in future years.

"There was a strong feeling that there was a real lack of information about what goes on at those venues around the country, so this was an attempt to give ourselves a benchmark, an economic snapshot of that activity," Mr Mason said.

"With this report we have a benchmark for measuring any changes in activity around the country, and this will be invaluable in informing discussion amongst policy makers and stakeholders about how to maintain and develop this important industry."

APRA's head of corporate services, Dean Ormston, says the report offers an exciting insight and hopes the report will help the Government realise how valuable the industry is.

"There's been a strong sense of what the cultural value of live music is in venues, but without any real sense of [what] the economic contribution has been," Mr Ormston said.

"Music in small venues is the grassroots of our live music export market, so if we're going to have export occurring for live artists then we need a really solid base in terms of our venue-based live music industry."

But despite the good shape the industry is in, Music Victoria's CEO Patrick Donovan says one of the sad figures from the report is the $12,000 per year that live performance artists are earning on average.

"While it is a very healthy scene around Australia, the door prices haven't actually gone up much," he told ABC News Breakfast.

"It's still $10 to get in to see three original bands playing one-off shows, whereas the cinema is $18 and big festivals and big-ticketed items for overseas bands, those fees have sort of increased in line with all the other costs."

He points to the costs associated with the alcohol excise for performers not seeing more of the door earnings.

"It costs a lot of money to put on bands... some goes to security, some goes to overheads - and there are quite a few overheads - but a lot of it is actually going on alcohol that increased in the alcohol excise," he said.

Mr Donovan is hoping the Government will consider that when it meets with various stakeholders at next month's tax summit.

The report was based on surveying live music venues including hotels, bars, clubs, restaurants, cafes and nightclubs.

Topics: music-industry, arts-and-entertainment, music, business-economics-and-finance, industry, australia

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