Hitting a High Note

By Ma Miaomiao

On September 21， 2019， several hundred people gathered in a small music venue in Beijing to hear a Chinese band perform. When members of Click#15， a band of three playing funk music， appeared on the wooden stage， the wild screams from the crowd made it hard to imagine that some months ago， this band was hardly known.

Ma Xin， a 27-year-old working in Internet advertising， was one of the crazy fans. She got to know them from a variety show in the summer of 2019， The Big Band， which brought some of the lesser-known indie and rock bands to the fore.

Ma told Beijing Review the music lights her up every time she hears the rhythm.“But what struck me most was the band saying they earned only 2，000 yuan （$291.6） a month before they played in the show，” she said.

According to the Report on Chinas Musicians 2019 released by the Communication University of China （CUC） in November 2019， nearly half of the musicians surveyed earned less than 2，000 yuan a month.

Now thanks to The Big Band， Click#15 is getting more gigs than before. They did their fi rst tour of 10 cities last year with Beijing as the last stop. The members can now make a living with their music.

According to a report by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry（IFPI） in April 2019， the music business in China is a rapidly developing， vibrant industry， which climbed from 12th to 7th place in the IFPI global recording market rankings in just two years. While the industry continues to expand with more consumers entering the market， a slew of favorable measures are expected to ensure its healthy development.

Online and offline status

The music industry was worth 374.79 billion yuan （$53.82 billion） in 2018， up 8 percent year on year and marking a five- year high， said a report released at the Sixth Music Industry Forum in Beijing in November 2019.

“From CDs to todays digital music， the production， distribution and consumption of the music industry have experienced a significant upgrade，” Zhang Fengyan， an associate professor at the School of Music and Recording Arts of CUC， said.

In 2019， the market size of digital music climbed from 61.24 billion yuan （$8.93 billion） in 2018 to 62.77 billion yuan （$9.15 billion）， with music forms represented by digital albums gradually becoming mainstream. Correspondingly， users awareness of paying for content got enhanced.

More than 6.7 million new songs were released online in 2019， the number of digital albums released continued to rise， and the number of paid subscribers on music platforms continued to grow. Tencent Music， for example， saw 35.4 million paying users in the third quarter of 2019， up 42.2 percent year on year， according to a Tencent Entertainment white paper released on January 7.

Today， TV shows， live houses—venues featuring live music—and mobile apps are presenting indie music to the public， especially young people. “Various music forms like Indie， punk and British rock can now reach a wider audience，” Ma said.

“Live houses bring me closer to music both physically and emotionally. They are a visual and vocal treat for music fans like me，” she added. Ma is also a paid subscriber to two music apps because she wants to search for more songs after watching The Big Band.

Maoyan， a Chinese film and TV rating platform， conducted a survey on the audience of The Big Band on Chinese streaming site iQiyi. The data shows people aged between 18 and 30 account for 58 percent， and one quarter of them are between 18 and 24.

The Music Industry Forum also said active Internet users such as Gen Z， those born between 1997 and 2012 and who have grown up in the Internet age and are familiar with mobile technology， as well as other groups such as fans and enthusiasts have become the main force of music consumption. According to the 2019 second quarter report of Bilibili， a popular Chinese video-sharing platform， Chinas Gen Z numbers 328 million. They support both online purchase of digital music， records and instrument， and offl ine tickets for concerts， music festivals and live houses.

Boosting content creation

Bilibilis new-year countdown concert on the last day of 2019 attracted 82 million online viewers at its peak and generated 845，000 bullet comments during the live streaming. Bullet comments， or danmu in Chinese， are an emerging feature on online video sites in China and Japan， allowing real-time comments from viewers to fly across the screen like bullets.

The concert， a combination of symphony with Chinese traditional instrument， theme songs of Chinese films and animations as well as famous TV series， the background music of popular video games， and ancient Chinese culture-inspired songs， won wide praise on Chinese social media platforms.

“Inheritance and openness， classical and modern， pop and retro are not in confl ict，” Bilibili stated in its media release. “A well design will allow all of these elements to resonate with each other and with the audience.”

On January 2， Bilibili announced its strategic cooperation with QQ Music under Tencent. Under the partnership， they will share musicians and music resources and jointly create new contents including online events， remixes of popular songs and live performances.

“Our platform is home to a large number of talented music creators， as well as music amateurs who are keen on secondary creation. They have brought more highquality music works to the video platform. And our partner， QQ Music has rich experience in operation of music copyright， album release and promotion of musicians，” Li Ni， COO of Bilibili， told National Business Daily.

Bilibili now has over 500，000 music creators producing an average of more than 1，000 songs every month. Videos in the music section received over 2.2 billion views and 320 million bullet comments by the end of 2019.

NetEase Cloud Music， a subsidiary of Chinas Internet technology giant NetEase， has set up an incentive program since May 2018 to boost musicians income and recently， increased the fund to more than 100 million yuan （$14.58 million） per year.

Last but not least， governments at all levels have released policies to support the development of the music industry. For example， Beijing announced last December that it aims to make the capital a global center of Chinese music with a targeted music and related industries revenue of 120 billion yuan （$17.23 billion） by 2025. To achieve this， measures such as encouraging original music with subsidies and setting up a special fund for the industry will be adopted.