Band Business Money Tips

Know your music capitals in the USA…

If you are into being a professional musician with a Band, than knowing the hot spots in the U.S.A. will help you get to powerful places to find connections, opportunities, and great music to inspire you.

Here are the Top 7:

1. Austin:

BRIEF: Austin, Texas. Austin's official slogan is The Live Music Capital of the World. Austin has a vibrant live music scene boasting more music venues per capita than any other U.S. city. Austin's music revolves around the many nightclubs on 6th Street and an annual film/music/multimedia festival known as South by Southwest. The longest-running concert music program on American television, Austin City Limits, is videotaped on the University of Texas at Austin campus. Austin City Limits and Capital Sports & Entertainment run the Austin City Limits Music Festival, an annual music and art festival held at Zilker Park in Austin. Other annual events include Eeyore's Birthday Party and the Austin Reggae Festival in April and Carnaval in February. Halloween, St Patrick's Day, Mardi Gras, July 4th, and Juneteenth (Emancipation Day) are all celebrated with enthusiasm, as many Austinites seem to be eager for any excuse for a public party.

2. Branson:

BRIEF: Branson, Missouri. Branson, MO is considered "The Live Music Show Capital of the World". With over 40 theaters playing host to over 100 shows, you'll have no problem finding a show in Branson that suits your taste!

3. Chicago:

BRIEF: Chicago, Illinois. After New Orleans and before New York and the West Coast, Chicago was the capital city of Jazz in the thirties after black people's Great Migration to the North. In the forties and fifties it turned Blue Mecca, while it has remained the shrine of Gospel music until this day.

4. Memphis:

BRIEF: Memphis, Tennessee. The mythical city that straddles the Mississippi River with one (small) foot in Arkansas and another in Tennessee Memphis has an aura that most American cities can only dream of.

The 'queen of the cotton kingdom' is best known as the birthplace of recorded Blues from the 50s onwards. Memphis had already been a blues nucleus for Mississippi Delta musicians for two decades by the time Sam Phillips invested in a recording studio and recording company, Sun.

In the second half of the fifties Elvis Presley was in the center of the Rock 'n' Roll storm. He had the 'Negro sound and feel' the producer had been scouting for. He clearly was not the first, nor the best of the budding revolution, but he had the looks, drive and flexible personality.

In the sixties and early seventies Memphis acted as a springboard for southern Soul musicians. The new music was instrumental in articulating the Civil Rights Movement claims for an integrated society. Almost for the first time in the history of the African-Americans pride in their race and identity was expressed in lyrics.

Later on, the local scene further developed into vibrant tradition-infused styles from Funk, to R&B to hip hop. While modern Memphis music is looking to its exceptional heritage for inspiration, it is also looking forward.

Remarkably enough, Gospel is the one musical idiom that has traveled down the ages with unflagging popularity in the black community. It may have evolved formally over the decades, sometimes absorbing pop, funk and even rap ingredients, the overall inspiration, musical and thematic, has lived on virtually unchanged.

Memphis boosts some iconic musicians in a lot of genres. Though not necessarily natives, they broke through in Memphis, mostly via Sam Phillips's Sun studios and recording company and later, Stax and Hi. Among those soon-to-be legends were, for instance, Bessie Smith, Howlin' Wolf, Koko Taylor, Albert and BB King (Blues), Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, Booker T, Al Green and Rufus Thomas (Soul and R&B), or Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison and Johnny Cash (Rock 'n' Roll and Rockabilly).

5. Nashville:

BRIEF: Nashville, Tennessee. Music City USA owns its flattering nickname to Country Music even if Nashville's mythical recording studios have produced gospel music, rock 'n' roll and Elvis Presley in particular, and even black rhythm 'n' / blues musicians.

It all started with the Grand Ole Opry radio show in 1925. It has been broadcasting recorded music and live shows held in its theater ever since, and the longest-running radio program has firmly put country music on the world's map.

Critics claim that music now plays second fiddle to business. This massive record-making industries indeed rakes billions every year. As the Nashville Sound bordered on mellow commercial music, other traditional or cutting edge styles grew in popularity like Bluegrass, or Alternative Country movements.

Austin, Texas looked as if it could have some claim to the crown in the 70s with the Outlaws movement, but although it has a pulsating country-blues rock scene today, it cannot compete as a recording capital city.

Branson, Missouri has been a family-oriented country music resort since the 1960s. Country stars own their own theaters, live and perform there from May through October. That popular town provides a welcome alternative to Nashville's grander schemes.

Yet, at the end of the day, and for all the criticism, Nashville, Tennessee still remains the hub for recording, performing and broadcasting Country Music. Today's musical spectrum ranges wide from Honky-tonk music to jazz-influenced instrumental Newgrass and from earnest acoustic songwriters to arena acts with an attitude.

6. New Orleans:

BRIEF: New Orleans, Louisiana. There is so much history it would be futile and ridiculous to attempt to put this musical gumbo in a nutshell.

That the city that delivered jazz and nurtured it through the first two decades of the 20th century is still pulsating to its bouncing rhythms is refreshing news.

That New Orleans has always opened up to various styles and made them its own is hardly news to those who have been listening.

Experience speaks louder than words. Music is everywhere: on the street and on steamboats; at school and at church; in concert halls, and out-of-the-way clubs, at jazz funerals and in festivals.

7. New York:

BRIEF: New York, New York. New York city, now considered by many to be the capital of the world, hosts phenomenal culture, culture, culture – and with that comes music from all around the world with incredible diversity.

The subways that roar below the sidewalk, converge at Times Square, where music, theater (many of it musicals), and nightlife meld into a new kind of pop culture that is broadcast across the country. In midtown, the publishing, radio, and advertising businesses present products, ideas, celebrities, and ways of life to audiences of immense size across America.

New York City is home to the Broadway Musical. Jazz became famous in New York, found a world-size home there, and made ”The Jazz Age” possible because of its life there.

New York city is still a great place to connect and get connected to global opportunities.