This paper will take the form of a 13-minute documentary film called “The Cost of Music” followed by a 7-minute paper discussing the music creation as a form of environmental consumption. It will also discuss the challenges of practice-led research arising from releasing recorded music (as opposed to producing it). Created by Matt Brennan (with onscreen contributions by Jo Collinson-Scott and Kyle Devine) and directed by Graeme O’Hara, the film was conceived as a vehicle for public engagement with current research on the economic and environmental cost of recorded music on the one hand, and practice-led research (based on Brennan’s experience of releasing his debut album as a solo artist) on the other. A film synopsis in italics follows: “Disillusioned by prevailing attitudes about the disposability of new music and the decline of the album, a musician and researcher sets out to record his own songs and release them in an unusual format: not so much a ‘concept album’ as a musical sculpture that explores the concept of albums as historical artefacts. In doing so, he uncovers how the cost of listening to records has changed over the past century: while the economic cost of listening to one’s choice of recorded music has never been lower, the environmental cost has never been higher.” The paper draws on research from a wider project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, which explores new directions in music and sustainability research.
