In these Covid times, there are many different obstacles musicians and all artists are facing.  It is really wonderful that art is becoming more accessible but with this accessibility comes a  feeling of entitlement to that art for free. With so many online listening and viewing options, general audiences find music as an art form to be less valuable. Because of that, many people don’t want to pay to watch concerts online, because to many it seems like an almost identical experience to watching someone play a piece on YouTube. Without the in-person experience of hearing live music, it is very difficult to keep paying audiences engaged and connected to performances.

 

Additionally, a lot of musicians are keeping their income up by designing and selling merchandise. In some ways, this is a good alternative, but it is also a bit of a problematic solution. This is because this current environment is forcing musicians to do something else besides create music and labelling it as a sort of equal replacement, devaluing the music itself. This is not to say that these musicians should not be doing this, because it is a smart way to be making money in this time when most people are not making money from live performances. But I do not think it should be viewed as the sort of “ideal solution” we should be striving for. I think that the best thing we can do is to find ways to succeed by creating music.

 

I think that no matter how much innovation and accessibility comes out of this situation, there is no way to find something that replaces the magic of live performance, and I think that because of this there will be no exact “ideal situation” where musicians are all working as often as they used to and making as much money as they used to. But I think that livestream performance methods are the best options right now. Something about a performance only existing for a brief moment before disappearing forever makes live performances really special and I think it makes audiences feel more connected, and more likely to attend. I think this also creates a situation where people are more likely to pay for a ticket, rather than something that is recorded and posted on a website. I don’t think there’s any true answer to this problem, because I am someone who finds live in-person performances to be a really special thing for both the performers and the audience, and I don’t think there’s any way to truly recreate that virtually, but I think that musicians can continue to build a social media presence, and create as much music as possible for livestreams and other projects before we are eventually all able to gather again.