Cultural production and the corporation: musical genres and the strategic management of creativity in the US recording industry

Abstract

This article focuses on how the major US recording companies attempt to strategically manage their different genres of music. It then considers the consequences of this for creative and commercial practices through illustrative case studies of the corporate management of rap and salsa. In broad terms, the article is intended as a contribution to debates about the `culture industry' and the interrelations between `culture' and `economics'. Two themes are used as a way of highlighting this relationship and the role of the music companies in cultural production: that an industry produces culture and that culture produces an industry. These themes are developed through an interrogation of detailed empirical material brought together from research conducted in the USA during 1996.

Contesting culture: a case study of commodification in Cuban music

“…While scholars such as Negus (1998), Scott (1999Scott ( , 2001Scott ( , 2004, and Power and Hallencreutz (2002) theorize the production and consumption of symbolic forms, Bourdieu (1993) interrogates cultural production as both cultural expression and commodity. According to Bourdieu, actual artists, such as writers, painters, poets, and in my case, musicians, largely judge success based not on money, but rather on the internal logic of that sub-field.…”

Rethinking the music industry

“…Subsequent work by Negus (1996Negus ( , 1999 has been equally lacking in detailed study of the non-recording parts of 'the music industry', instead concentrating on the work of the record companies and, in particular, the majors. Although he sometimes makes it clear that his analysis is restricted to the recording sector (Negus 1998), Negus' failure to embrace the other music industries, and to use the term 'music industry' in a manner that is interchangeable with 'the recording industry', is particularly frustrating as he actually addresses many of the issues which show the need for a wider definition of 'the music industry'.…”

The emergence of a post-industrial music economy? Music and ICT synergies in Stockholm, Sweden

“…If we think in terms of, for example, an industrial systems approach we can see that the production of music products involves a variety of inputs and agents (sometimes collaborative, sometimes bitterly competitive) all of which are intrinsic parts of the 'creative' process which must be understood as essentially rooted in an industry based commercial logic that is often highly spatialised (Frith, 1991;Leyshon et al, 1998;Negus, 1998;Scott, 1999a;Hallencreutz et al, 2000;Hallencreutz, 2002).…”