Tue 3 Oct 2006
New Models for Music as Business: Brazilian Tecno Brega
Posted by Alexandre under Ongoing , Soapbox , Activists , Digits , Diversities , Ethnographies , Monies , Rights , Scenes[2] Comments
OnTheCommons.org | The Rise of Tecno-Brega, or How to Build Markets on Top of Social Commons
“The tecno-brega DJ’s usually acknowledge in their live presentations the presence of people from various neighborhoods, and this acknowledgement is of great value to the audience, leading thousands of buy copies of the recorded live presentation.”
In honour of the Day Against DRM, Cory Doctorow appeared on CNET’s The Real Deal podcast with Tom Merritt. Doctorow mentioned Tecno Brega in his discussion of DRM and the notion that those artists are not discouraging others from getting paid by selling recordings of their music. Like radio in other contexts, inexpensive recordings are promotional items for these artists. Contrary to radio, this promotion is done without control from labels (in a payola or other playlist scheme).
What strikes me even more, though, is the phenomenon of mentioning neighborhoods in these recordings. As is the case with hunters associations in Mali, musical acknowledgement represents a cultural value which may, in turn, bring about commercial value. In fact, in Mali, people who sponsor performance events for the hunters associations are often people linked to hunters without being hunters themselves. They simply want the musicians to talk about them.
Who said that Jessica Simpson’s customized “A Public Affair” was innovative?<—8aaefc15baed3937bf76d099efce10ac—>
October 3rd, 2006 at 11:23 pm
Actually, this write-up is also very interesting:
http://www.openbusiness.cc/brazil/brazil-haven-of-open-culture/
All the above indicates that the traditional 20th Century cultural industry is failing to provide the appropriate channels for Brazilian culture to emerge and be disseminated. As a result, creativity is moving to the global peripheries. Peripheries worldwide are appropriating technological tools to create their own networks for the production, distribution and consumption of culture. These emerging peripheral networks are taking place in spite of any Intellectual Property incentives. As a matter of fact, copyright and IP protection are simply not a factor for the emergence of these new forms of cultural production.
An example is the so-called “tecno-brega” music industry in Belém do Para, where a massive amount of CD´s by numerous artists are produced every year to be sold directly through the street vendors. In that city, a parallel music industry has been active for years. The “tecno-brega” parties attract every weekend thousands of people in the outskirts of Belém for the “sound system parties”. A couple hundred new records are produced and released every year by local artists, but both the production and distribution of these records take place outside the traditional music industry in Brazil.
The music is born “free”, in the sense that copyright protection is not part of the business model developed by the tecno-brega scene. The CD is considered as a mere advertising piece, in the sense that it works as vehicle for advertising the different sound system parties taking place every week. The whole production of tecno-brega CD´s is sold through an arrangement between the street vendors and the owners of independent recording studios. The CD´s are sold by the street vendors at an extremely affordable price, of approximately $1.50 dollar per copy. Artists do not make money out of CD sales. The price charged works exclusively as an incentive for the vendors to sell the CD´s, not for the artists to make music.
The artists make their money throughout very innovative business models connected with the sound system parties. By way of example, artists make money by recording their live presentations in the parties in “real-time” and selling them immediately after the concerts. Accordingly, the audience is able to go back home with a CD containing the concert that they have just attended. The tecno-brega dj´s usually acknowledge in their live presentations the presence of people from various neighborhoods, and this acknowledgement is of great value to the audience, leading thousands to buy copies of the recorded live presentation.
This practice to record “live” presentations for immediate selling obtained worldwide attention when the North-American rock band, “The Pixies” started doing the same thing during their 2004 world reunion tour. The press praised such practice as an innovative business model, for musicians in the digital era. Little they know that the same practice had been in place for at least 3 years in the tecno-brega scene in the city of Belém.
March 30th, 2009 at 5:10 am
[...] aterial and it could use some examples of alternative business models used by musicians in Brazil and elsewhere. Nonetheless, it’ [...]