Where The Music Business Is Located

So you think you know where the music business is centered? Well, think again.

When one thinks of the music business, usually Los Angeles or New York City immediately spring to mind, but the chart below is a giant surprise. In a paper entitled The Economic Geography in the US, Richard Florida, Charlotta Mellander and Kevin Stolarick looked at numerous cities throughout the US and Canada and came up with some surprising results.

Yes, Nashville, although always a major music hub, far and away has the highest concentration of the music industry.

While everyone thinks of Nashville as the home of country music, it's a lot larger and more diverse than that. According to the report:

"Over the past several decades, Nashville transformed itself from a rather narrow country music outpost in the 1960s and 1970s into a major center for commercial music. In 1970, Nashville wasn't even one of the top five regions by this measure. By 2004, it was the national leader, with nearly four times the U.S. average. Today, it  is home to over 180 recording studios, 130 music publishers, 100 live music clubs, and 80 record labels."

But the big surprise is the 3 major Canadian cities ranking before New York, and some of the other cities that usually don't register when thinking about the music business.

The chart is a perfect example of the democratization of the music business in Music 3.0. You can be anywhere and not only register on the industry's radar, but be a major player as well.

For more on the study, check out this article in The Atlantic.

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