The real “crossroads” of live music – the conventions of performance at open mic nights in Edinburgh

Building the Virtual Dancefloor: Delivering and Experiencing House Music Events in the Time of COVID-19

“…These may be encouraged and vital to the experience; equally, depending on the style of music or audience profile, they may be unwanted or even prohibited [75,87,89]. It is perhaps this unpredictability which marks live performance as the authentic experience of music [89][90][91], superseding passive listening to recorded music as an interactive experience; it is represented as such in the way live music is promoted as a leisure experience [59,66] and indeed in the body of research into music event experiences, as outlined herein.…”

“…This research has covered the nature of the festivalscape [58,59,62], festival communities [98][99][100], guest motivations [94,101,102] and wider impacts [92,95,103], creating a significant body of research within the event studies field. However, there is also a lesser body of research into smaller/grassroots events, which provide the lifeblood of the UK's music scene [15,91,104,105] and represent a different eventscape and experience. Smaller events and eventscapes are the realm of amateur musicians, local scenes and up-and-coming performers [91]; indeed, on a local level in the UK, it is perhaps this part of the industry which, both economically and socially, has been missed the most.…”

“…However, there is also a lesser body of research into smaller/grassroots events, which provide the lifeblood of the UK's music scene [15,91,104,105] and represent a different eventscape and experience. Smaller events and eventscapes are the realm of amateur musicians, local scenes and up-and-coming performers [91]; indeed, on a local level in the UK, it is perhaps this part of the industry which, both economically and socially, has been missed the most. In these eventscapes, the divide between performer and audience is less delineated both physically [89] and conceptually, as performers mix freely with, and may form part of, the audience and community [104].…”

“…In these eventscapes, the divide between performer and audience is less delineated both physically [89] and conceptually, as performers mix freely with, and may form part of, the audience and community [104]. This sense of music communities is widely noted in research [91,104,105] as a key element of experience which can sometimes be even more important than the music itself [106]. This community element of grassroots events is self-evidently different from events staged by global artists in large venues, which by nature draw more disparate audiences for what tend to be one-off spectaculars as opposed to smaller events which can happen far more frequently.…”