The Atlantic Cities: Thanks, Taylor Swift: Nashville Has America's Most Robust Music Economy (2013)

[ariesjow]

Here's an excellent article from Richard Florida of the Atlantic Cities regarding Nashville's music industry and its impact on our economy. It's well worth the read in full, but here's how he sums it up:

Most of all, Nashville's music economy is a key case study in our understanding of the evolving, creative knowledge economy. The music industry is unlike traditional heavy industries, which cluster around raw materials and large factory complexes, and differs even from typical high-tech industries, which cluster around great research universities and knowledge institutions. In our current age of the internet, social media and recording technology, musicians have little reason to cluster and good reasons to fly apart geographically. If anything, one would expect musicians to cluster around the big markets markets offered by the largest cities and metros. But Nashville has shown the persistent ability to nurture and grow it music economy, even in the face of ferocious competition by much bigger cities and regions like New York and L.A.. The city has now developed a strategy to extend the music industry's assets and benefits more widely, leveraging it for further growth. For these reasons, Nashville provides a growth model that everyone concerned with economic development and job generation needs to better understand.

Thanks, Taylor Swift: Nashville Has America's Most Robust Music Economy

[nashvols]

He's definitely been high on Nashville for a while. I think sometimes he's a little too high on us...but the numbers really speak for themselves here.

I think the best side effect in the growth of our music industry is the ripple effect it has created in the art and creative communities in general. The talent here is attracting other talent...visual and performing artists. It's really elevating our city in many ways.