admin
Fri, 10/14/2022 - 16:38
Edited Text
Wesley T. A’Harrah
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing? A Cross-Genre Examination of Twitter Usage
Berklee College of Music, Valencia Campus
26 June, 2015
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
2
ABSTRACT
The music industry is home to some of the most famous people, groups and institutions in
the world. As the evolution of mass media and social media continue to drive changes in
the landscape of interpersonal interaction, musicians continually adopt new media in order
to maintain social relevance, influence and dominance over competing media forces and,
indeed, other musicians. Using Twitter data on 1000 musicians, cleaned from an initial
web-scrape data pool of 3500 musicians, and summary online social metrics collected
from Next Big Sound, this study seeks to identify trends and opportunities for musicians
and music acts of different genres. Examining data on musicians from all Billboardidentified genres, representing several hundred music acts, the researcher critically discuss
concepts of promotional differentiation through social media, relevance of social media to
target market segments and demographics in light of several music act/musician case
studies. Trends have been identified through the production of various data visualizations
and methods of regression analysis. Notable findings include the 89.5% absence of
classical musicians on Twitter accounts and an average following of
Keywords: classical music, digital marketing, marketing, media, music business,
musicians, new media, online social media, social media, Twitter
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
3
0.0 DEFINITIONS
By the author
General:
Music act: an individual or group that performs under one name
Musician: any member of a music act
Reach: in the context of Twitter, the number of possible “impressions” (visible in Twitter Analytics)
attainable within a given timeframe.
On tweets:
Personal: any tweet containing commentary or report of an individual’s experiences or opinions,
unrelated to their profession
Professional: any tweet containing commentary or report of an individual’s professional activity
All artists’ genres, when referenced in this report, are assigned by Apple, Billboard, and Next Big
Sound or a combination of the three.
By Next Big Sound
Audience Engagement: relationship between recent fan activity and overall audience size, identified
in Occasional, Moderate, Strong and Passionate
Audience Reach: growth in overall audience size, identified in levels of Small, Moderate, Large and
Enormous
Metric Trends: most recent changes across multiple (web-based, social) metrics, identified in
Slowing, Stable, Growing and Viral
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
4
(Artist) Social Stage: the size of an artist’s social reach compared to social reach values at
common career milestones, identified in Undiscovered, Promising, Established, Mainstream and
Epic—through either Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Vevo.
1.1 INTRODUCTION
It has been over four decades since the Internet first began to assist researchers in
sharing information with each other. For more than half of that time, the World Wide Web
has permitted the everyday computer user access to myriad websites and data points,
facilitating an exchange of all sorts of information on regional and global levels. With the
rise of massive online social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter, the potential
connectivity between individuals, subcultures and whole societies has never been higher.
Innovators—a descriptor that, here, means “people who seek to bring about significant,
positive change”—continually discover and invent methods and tools that inspire others to
publish to the world parts of their lives that were, until recently, considered private,
sometimes intimate, details. A growing trend of sacrificing privacy in place of microfame,
satisfying media-driven stimuli on a personal level and crafting one’s own social image is
dominating much of the Internet-connected world.
However, not all Internet users are equal in their utilization, understanding and
perceptions of the Internet. Though much of the population of Africa accesses Wikipedia,
Africans are markedly less likely to edit the free encyclopedia than Americans or
Europeans. Different age groups first access the Internet in different ways, from different
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
5
types of locations, and approach available content in distinctly differing manners. Only a
minor portion of Internet users are currently viewed as content creators. Facebook, Twitter
and blogs are notable for allowing users certain options surrounding the durability of their
personal documentation; in contrast, some users create content through only platforms
that destroy their created content within a set time, as is observable with SnapChat. Time
will tell how expendable content will influence social media and use of the Internet, at large,
though for now it is durable media that dominates the social attention of the Internet.
The entertainment industry requires media outlets for its survival. As durable
content on YouTube, Spotify, Twitter and other places can service an audience as limited
only by server constraints and the number of Internet-connected devices, it is now
possible for any musician with Internet-based content to be heard across some ten billion
devices. While this possibility leads content providers through cycles of competition for
attention and interaction with content consumers—as noted in theories of attention
economics, the paralysis of choice, the Blockbuster, superstar and water cooler effects—
there is a certain level to which the playing field is flattening. With the ability to reduce
mechanical and distribution expenses to the cost of placing music on a hosting platform,
the quality of the music and the renown of the artists become two of the greatest factors in
how many or few sales, streams or audience members a music act will have. Some level
of competitive advantage is required between music acts that perform similar types of
music at similar qualities. For example, consider two professional symphony orchestras of
comparable quality, operating within the same city, performing the same song in the same
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
6
type of concert hall. Even the audience members of this now-niche genre would have little
reason to prefer one performance to the other for reasons related to either music act.
These considerations raise critical questions about how music acts of differing
levels of renown, of differing genres and from differing regions engage with their audience
through social media. Over the last year, the researcher’s conversations with a renowned
jazz musician, a pioneer of digital distribution strategies and methods, a
nonprofit/professional orchestra manager and the founder of a major music crowd funding
platform have revealed remarkable inconsistency across the industry in the perceived value
of utilizing online social media for increasing the visibility and consumption of music acts.
2. LITERATURE REVIEW
A distressing lack of large scale, formal research is available on the quantitative or
qualitative opportunities and costs associated with a music act or musician maintaining a
Twitter presence and following. What is immediately observable, though, is that major
musicians maintain a near-obsession with popularity on Twitter. In January of 2015,
through the use of Twitter-specific analytic software, Music Business Worldwide—a leader
in music business industry original research, news and commentary—examined the base
of followers maintained by each of the five most-followed musicians on Twitter.1 Going
through Katy Perry, Justin Bieber, Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga and Rihanna, respectively, this
follower analyzing software estimated that some 65%, 58%, 67%, 55% and 62% of their
following base was fake. For Katy Perry, the most-followed Twitter account on the service
1
Music Business Worldwide, “The World’s Biggest Music Stars: Who’s Faking it on
Twitter?,“ Music Business Worldwide (London, U.K.), January 31, 2015.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
7
with, then, 64.2 million followers, over 41.6 million of her following was fake. As Twitter’s
active monthly user base has only recently exceeded 300 million as recently as April 2015,
months after Music Business Worldwide’s fake followers analysis, it is clear that a troubling
portion of Twitter seems to be for-hire.2 With this understanding, the number of followers,
retweets, favorites, and direct mentions surrounding major music acts and musicians
seem unsound measures of reach and engagement.
Despite its most recent valuations, the future of Twitter continues to grow.
Currently, Twitter is working to expand its platforms and mechanisms for facilitating and
curating massive experiences for its users. An upcoming “Project Lightning” will provide
regional and global curation of events, featuring both typical text tweets and all sorts of
media tweets.3 A current comparison to this coming platform facet is SnapChat’s Live
Stories, which successfully attracted some 40 million views of videos and photos of
Coachella. As SnapChat’s Live Stories views are believed to generate ad revenue for the
service, brands and music acts, alike, would soon be vying for visibility on a service as
large as Twitter—particularly with potential licensing opportunities for Twitter’s Periscope.
Cynicism aside, as long as real people do occupy and participate in the Twitter
space, there will be opportunity for benefits. Kelly Clarkson held a Twitter listening party
with her most recent album release, ‘Piece by Piece,’ tweeting commentary to her
2
S. Dredge, “Twitter passes 300m active users but growth questions remain,” Music
Ally (London, U.K.), April 29, 2015.
3
Music Ally Blog, “ Twitter’s Project Lightning will curate tweets from events,” Music
Ally (London, U.K.), June 19, 2015.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
8
followers as a global audience listened to it at the same time.4 While she boasts over 10
million Twitter followers, her Tweets received relatively low levels of interaction for someone
of her status around a release. That said, her music still placed on top of the Billboard Top
200. The contribution directly attributable to Twitter remains a mystery, as so many factors
go into a successful release. This is just the type of mystery that companies like Next Big
Sound hope to answer. In response to questions of value and reach through online media,
Next Big Sound was founded on the notion of tracking as many relevant online data
sources as could be accurately matched to an artist and working to map them. Through
years of measuring online social, sales and streaming numbers, Next Big Sound sets itself
as one of the best sources for interpretation of past and recent online trends for thousands
of music acts, with the hope of assisting labels and acts in taking more efficient datadriven strategies.
3. RESEARCH QUESTION AND RATIONALE
Research question: What differences exist in how musicians and music acts of
different genres utilize Twitter?
In light of this question, the researcher identified the following goals to guide the
data selection and methodological process for a large-scale study:
4
Music Ally Blog, “Kelly Clarkson holds Twitter listening party for new album,” Music
Ally (London, U.K.), March 5, 2015.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
9
Identify trends in how major music acts and their members use Twitter, and their
overall social reach, through
§
noting the presence/absence of music acts and their members on
Twitter.
§
noting the nature of content contained by tweets from music acts and
their members.
§
noting the types of on-platform interpersonal interaction pursued by
music acts and their members.
§
noting the number of tweets of music acts and their users.
§
noting the numbers of accounts following and followed by music acts
and their members.
§
noting the overall metrics of music acts of different genres, as
reported by Next Big Sound.
The pursuit of increased understanding of how established music acts of all genres utilize
Twitters in different ways, and pursuit of increased understanding on how different music
acts, musicians and their audience engages with each other on Twitter, stands as the
primary rationale for this study.
For this study, the researcher chose the geographic focus point of the U.K. for two
reasons. First, a sample size said by the U.K. government to be representative of the entire
populations is between 800-1000 persons. This meant that a targeted sample size of over
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
10
a thousand musicians based, or popular in, the U.K. would be fantastically robust.
Second, a substantial amount of study has been conducted of the U.K.’s Twitter
population, which drives further usefulness of future iterations of this study.
3.2 Subjects
Music acts were selected based on several factors, varying by genre. In the case of
classical acts, each examined act has been any combination of the following: featured
within any Billboard Charts within the last two months; been existence for an excess of fifty
years; or is classified by Next Big Sound metrics as having an Established social stage. For
acts of all other genres, which span all Billboard Chart-specified genres, each music act
has either been featured on any Billboard Chart within the last two months or has been
classified by Next Big Sound metrics as having an Epic social stage. Data on every
identifiable, current member of every act from each of the following Billboard Charts, as
populated of June 6, 2015 was collected for this study:
Twitter Emerging Artists; Catalog Albums; Digital Albums; Digital Music;
Heatseekers; Independent Albums; Latin Albums; On-Demand Songs; Next Big
Sound; Top 100 Songs; Social 50; Streaming Songs; Tastemaker Albums; Top 100
Artists; Top 200 Albums; Twitter Songs; U.K. Music/ Top U.K. Albums; U.K. Music/
Top U.K. Songs; YouTube Music; and every genre-specific albums chart (notably
including Adult Pop Music & Songs and Classical).
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
11
For purposes of granularity, the researcher provides brief case studies of five selected
groupings from this pool, represented by the London Symphony Orchestra (hereafter
LSO), the London Philharmonic Orchestra (hereafter LPO), Lindsey Stirling, Sam Smith and
Ed Sheeran, and finally Coldplay.
4.1 METHODS AND DATA
The researcher undertook the following process when measuring subjects.
§
Identify the presence or absence of a music act/member’s publiclyvisible Twitter account.
§
Record the number of tweets, number of accounts followed by,
number of accounts following and number of tweets favorited by
each account.
§
Observe the presence or absence of any account activity to declare
the account active or inactive.
§
Examine the content of the last six months’ tweets for if the examined
account Tweeted about personal, professional or both kinds of
activities, in order to better understand the intended audience of each
account.
§
Examine the presence or absence of mentions, hashtags and replies
for the examined account within the last six months, in order to
establish the fluency of use with which the account user utilizes
Twitter.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
12
The researcher populated a cloud-based database with this data for each act and its
members. The populated data fields for this first database are the following:
Name; Twitter handle; number of tweets; number of followers; number of following;
number of favorites; verified (Y/N); active/inactive; tweets contain content of a
personal, professional or combined nature (E,R,B); outgoing, original account
tweets contain hashtags, direct mentions, both or neither (#,@,B,N); # of unique
hashtags outgoing (most recent fifty tweets only, based on software constraints);
account age; number of tweets per day.
To this Twitter data, the researcher added the following fields, and populated each for
every account:
Type of act (group, soloist—G/S), descriptor of account (act main, member—A/M),
genre (multiple codes).
Finally, Next Big Sound metrics were added to the data sets for each musical act’s main
account row.
Based on the field, various null responses were coded and assigned to inactive and
nonexistent accounts.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
13
After cleaning the dataset of unusable rows and fields, the researcher charted several
experimental visualizations of each genre, and of genres side-by-side.
5.1 OVERVIEW OF DATA
Though publicly identifiable, much of the Twitter webscrape data carries highly personal
information. For these reasons, the original dataset and visualizations are not included in
an appendices section of this paper. The dataset and visualizations are considered
proprietary by the researcher, who will present them in defense of this report during
5.2 Twitter Data
The following data reflects significant numbers surrounding the aforementioned case
musicians.
Pop and other multigenre groups:
Lindsey Stirling, Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith and Coldplay each have verified Twitter accounts
for the main account of their acts. All accounts from each of these groups were recorded
as being active within the last three months. Followers range from Lindsey Stirling’s
408000 to Coldplay’s 15000000, and all account within these groups Tweet at least once
a day. Each of these accounts maintain the use of @ and hashtags, communicating with
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
14
others on the Twitter space. Interestingly, none of Coldplay’s members have visible Twitter
accounts associated with their name or group.
Orchestra-level Classical Music Acts:
LSO and LPO each have verified official Twitter accounts to spearhead their organizations.
Out of scores of LSO members—not including honorary and visiting musicians and
ancillary conductors—only sixteen have publicly-discoverable Twitter accounts. Of these
accounts, one is inactive and one is verified. This verified account is maintained by the
LSO’s current conductor. The number of tweets from these accounts ranges from 4 to
22500 (LSO official). The number of accounts followed by this group ranges from 22 to
14400 (LSO official). The number of accounts following this group ranges from 21 to
203000 (LSO official). Three of these sixteen accounts have only Tweeted personal or
professional content in the last six months, as opposed to having Tweeted both. Three of
these sixteen accounts have not used a hashtag or the @ sign within the last six months,
and one of these accounts has only used the @ symbol, as opposed to having Tweeted
using both.
Out of scores of LPO members—not including honorary and visiting musicians and
conductors—only nine LPO members maintain publicly-discoverable Twitter accounts. Of
these members’ accounts, none are verified. Two of these nine members’ accounts are
inactive. The number of tweets from these accounts ranges from 23 to 5225 (LPO official).
The number of accounts followed by this group ranges from 22 to 3656 (LPO official). The
number of accounts following this group ranges from 32 to 101000 (LPO official). The
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
15
official LPO account and one member Tweet only professional content. The official LPO
account only uses the @ sign, rather than utilizing hashtags as well. Two members’
accounts use neither hashtags nor the @ sign.
5.3 Next Big Sound Summary
Please see the definitions in section 0.9 of this paper for meanings behind Next Big Sound
metrics.
LSO is listed as having moderate audience reach, a slowing metric trend, moderate
audience reach and established social stage.
LPO is listed as having moderate audience reach, a slowing metric trend, moderate
audience engagement and established social stage.
Lindsey Stirling is listed as having large audience reach, a stable metric trend, moderate
audience engagement and epic social stage.
Ed Sheeran is listed as having enormous audience reach, a slowing metric trend,
moderate audience engagement and epic social stage.
Sam Smith is listed as having enormous audience reach, a slowing metric trend, strong
audience engagement and epic social stage.
Coldplay is listed as having enormous audience reach, a slowing metric trend, an
occasional audience engagement and epic social stage.
6. DISCUSSION
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
16
The researcher identifies three major observations about these groups, first in the
comparison of Lindsey Stirling to other classical musicians, second in the overall metrics of
classical music groups and third in the metrics of all other groups researched.
Lindsey Stirling is a solo musician who plays popular movie, video game and other songs
on the violin while wearing associative outfits and dancing. While this is a completely
different routine from the musical approaches maintained by featured soloists and visiting
members of LSO, LPO and BSO, it raises the interesting point of audience growth.
Though Lindsey plays nothing but the violin—granting her, by Billboard’s standards, entry
to the classical music genre—it is largely her unique performance elements and her
intelligently-selected selection of pieces that helps her grow and maintain her audience.
Next Big Sound lists her metric trend as “stable;” the researcher would suggest that this
stable type of growth is because no single franchise or catalogue holds her selection of
pieces, and fan association and recruitment is likely to occur as she covers a selected
work from a particular subcultural niche. Lindsey is a performer with each a unique
selection of works, a unique performance method, a low level of competition and a high
level of activity with online social media.
Unsurprisingly, the members of classical performance groups do not maintain
personal Twitter accounts at levels near approaching the comprehensive Twitter presence
of all other groups analyzed. Of a cleaned sample size of 505 classical musicians, 89.5%
of this group was absent from or inactive on Twitter. Of non-classical groups, over 85% of
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
17
act members were present on Twitter—often verified, and often boasting large
followers/following ratios. Not a single member of either of the two case orchestras has an
excess of 7000 followers—the minimum number of followers enjoyed by a member of the
non-classical group of examined accounts. A major consideration in the approach
adopted by classical musicians to Twitter may be the perceived audience, or the perceived
perception of using Twitter. Though the hundreds of members spread across LSO and
could drive any hashtag to trending within minutes, based on nothing other than sheer
power of numbers, these organizations seem to rely on natural demand rather than
promoting their groups’ activities or engaging a major audience through the targeted use
of the @ sign, engaging other Twitter accounts, or using tailored hashtags to drive unique
visibility. While most of the Twitter-present orchestra members do Tweet both professional
and personal content, their combined audience is so small that the impact and visibility of
such tweets are sure to be drowned out by other voices in the Twitter space.
Unsurprisingly, again, non-classical groups maintain enormous followings across social
media, whether they are solo acts or groups with Twitter-absent members. While the
presence of band members on Twitter is significant in that it allows the superfan of each
group to connect with specific members of the band in meaningful ways, Coldplay is an
excellent example of an older group with a huge following and little perceived need to
engage in personal, digital space social activity. Most every account from the non-classical
group featured personal and professional content to tweets, the targeted use of the @ sign
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
18
to engage other users and the ever present use of the hashtag in order to draw attention
to certain long-term or unique campaigns.
7. OTHER CONSIDERATIONS, CONCLUSIONS
Future studies would do well to examine other social media platforms in addition to
Twitter, and should attempt to uncover whether observed results are a symptom of the
associated music groups’ images/cultures, or if they are a cause. Other points worth
examining are how different methods taken by individual groups have influenced levels of
interaction, sales and popularity of the respective group. This sample size should be
considered very robust and representative of the U.K. music scene, based on size and
depth of analysis.
Not all Internet users are equal. Ancillary to this point is the fact that not all musical
group audiences are equal. Major consideration to the average and median age of each
music group’s members should be applied to future iterations of study, as it would be
unsurprising for the actual use of Twitter by group members to largely align with the overall
age demographic use of Twitter on a national level. Similarly, the perceived and projected
audience demographic of each group should be evaluated when discussing this study as,
again, it is likely that the perceived, projected and indeed real audience demographic of
each group is still aligned with the overall usage demographics within the nation. Further
consideration, still, must be applied to the intended image desired by each group, and
how perceptions of Twitter use may affect a music act’s willingness to drive its members
to engage with the public and its audience through online social media or not.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
19
The researcher draws two major conclusions from this study. First, there is
incredible difference in the ways classical groups and musical groups of other genres
utilize Twitter. Though the researcher has not developed a sophisticated scientific
framework for evaluating the entire Twitter landscape, the varying percentage of members
utilizing Twitter is so incredibly different between genres that there is certainly merit of
further study. Second, the classical music scene is failing to utilize online social media in a
way that insures the survival of an individual orchestra, or of classical music at large; as
dozens of professional orchestra span the musical landscape of the UK, and as the
performed repertoire is generally quite similar, this art form is doing itself discredits in
several ways. Without fostering engagement with younger generations, who are currently
growing up with Twitter, are Internet natives and are willing to listen to recordings of the
best orchestra rather than the closest orchestra, the failure to adopt Twitter in significant
ways is furthering dying business models propagated on scarcity and locality. Rather than
utilizing online social media as a major differentiator, the examined official orchestra
accounts and member do little to carry on a meaningful dialogue into the Internet. For the
survival of the genre as the researchers know it today, it is the researcher’s belief that this
failure to adapt will represent a major obstacle to a bright future for classical music.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
20
Bibliography
Crucchiola, J. “Taylor Swift is the Queen of the Internet,” Wired Magazine (San
Francisco, USA), June 22, 2015.
Dredge, S. “Twitter passes 300m active users but growth questions remain,” Music Ally
(London, U.K.), April 29, 2015.
Music Ally Blog. “Kelly Clarkson holds Twitter listening party for new album,” Music
Ally (London, U.K.), March 5, 2015.
Music Ally Blog. “Twitter adds Audience Insights,” Music Ally (London, U.K.), May 28,
2015.
Music Ally Blog. ”Twitter’s Project Lightning will curate tweets from events,” Music Ally
(London, U.K.), June 19, 2015.
Music Business Worldwide. “The World’s Biggest Music Stars: Who’s Faking it on
Twitter?” Music Business Worldwide (London, U.K.), January 31, 2015.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
21
List of Billboard Data Sources
Note: For purposes of observational replicability and verification, PDF copies of all utilized
Billboard charts can be made available upon request made to the researcher, should
Billboard.com ever cease offering lookup of past chart positions.
Billboard. “Adult Contemporary Music Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/adult-contemporary
Billboard. “Adult Pop Music & Songs Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/adult-pop-songs
Billboard. “Alternative Music/Top Alternative Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/alternative-albums
Billboard. “Billboard Twitter Emerging Artists,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/twitter-emerging-artists
Billboard. “Bluegrass Music/Top Bluegrass Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/bluegrass-albums
Billboard. “Blues Music/ Top Blues Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/blues-albums
Billboard. “Catalog Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/catalog-albums
Billboard. “Christian Albums/ Top Praise Music Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/christian-albums
Billboard. “Classical Music/ Top Classical Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/classical-albums
Billboard. “Comedy Albums/ Top Stand Up Comedy Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/comedy-albums
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
22
Billboard. “Digital Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/digital-albums
Billboard. “Digital Music Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/digital-songs
Billboard. “EDM Music & Dance Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/dance-electronic-albums
Billboard. “Folk Music/ Top Folk Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/folk-albums
Billboard. “Gospel Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/gospel-albums
Billboard. “Hard Rock Music/ Top Hard Rock Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/hard-rock-albums
Billboard. “Heatseekers Albums/ Up and Coming Musicians Chart,” Billboard, week of
June 6, 2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/heatseekers-albums
Billboard. “Independent Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/independent-albums
Billboard. “Jazz Music/ Top Jazz Albums & Songs Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/jazz-albums
Billboard. “Latin Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/latin-albums
Billboard. “Latin Pop Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/latin-pop-albums
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
23
Billboard. “Mexican Music/ Top Mexican Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/regional-mexican-albums
Billboard. “Music/ Top 100 Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100
Billboard. “New Age Music/ Top New Age Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/new-age-albums
Billboard. “Next Big Sound,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/next-big-sound-25
Billboard. “On-Demand Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/on-demand-songs
Billboard. “Pop Music/ Top Pop Songs Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/pop-songs
Billboard. “R&B Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/r-and-b-albums
Billboard. “R&B/Hip-Hop Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/r-b-hip-hop-albums
Billboard. “Rap Music/ Top Rap Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/rap-albums
Billboard. “Reggae Music/ Top Reggae Albums & Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/reggae-albums
Billboard. “Rock Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/rock-albums
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
24
Billboard. “Social 50,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/social-50
Billboard. “Streaming Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/streaming-songs
Billboard. “Tastemaker Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/tastemaker-albums
Billboard. “Top 100 Artists Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/artist-100
Billboard. “Top 200 Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200
Billboard. “Top Album Sales,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/top-album-sales
Billboard. “Tropical Music/ Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/tropical-albums
Billboard. “Twitter Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/twitter-top-tracks
Billboard. “U.K. Music/ Top U.K. Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/united-kingdom-albums
Billboard. “U.K. Music/ Top U.K. Songs Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/united-kingdom-songs
Billboard. “World Music/ Top World Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/world-albums
Billboard. “YouTube Music - Top YouTube Songs & Music Chart,” Billboard, week of
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
June 6, 2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/youtube
25
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing? A Cross-Genre Examination of Twitter Usage
Berklee College of Music, Valencia Campus
26 June, 2015
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
2
ABSTRACT
The music industry is home to some of the most famous people, groups and institutions in
the world. As the evolution of mass media and social media continue to drive changes in
the landscape of interpersonal interaction, musicians continually adopt new media in order
to maintain social relevance, influence and dominance over competing media forces and,
indeed, other musicians. Using Twitter data on 1000 musicians, cleaned from an initial
web-scrape data pool of 3500 musicians, and summary online social metrics collected
from Next Big Sound, this study seeks to identify trends and opportunities for musicians
and music acts of different genres. Examining data on musicians from all Billboardidentified genres, representing several hundred music acts, the researcher critically discuss
concepts of promotional differentiation through social media, relevance of social media to
target market segments and demographics in light of several music act/musician case
studies. Trends have been identified through the production of various data visualizations
and methods of regression analysis. Notable findings include the 89.5% absence of
classical musicians on Twitter accounts and an average following of
Keywords: classical music, digital marketing, marketing, media, music business,
musicians, new media, online social media, social media, Twitter
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
3
0.0 DEFINITIONS
By the author
General:
Music act: an individual or group that performs under one name
Musician: any member of a music act
Reach: in the context of Twitter, the number of possible “impressions” (visible in Twitter Analytics)
attainable within a given timeframe.
On tweets:
Personal: any tweet containing commentary or report of an individual’s experiences or opinions,
unrelated to their profession
Professional: any tweet containing commentary or report of an individual’s professional activity
All artists’ genres, when referenced in this report, are assigned by Apple, Billboard, and Next Big
Sound or a combination of the three.
By Next Big Sound
Audience Engagement: relationship between recent fan activity and overall audience size, identified
in Occasional, Moderate, Strong and Passionate
Audience Reach: growth in overall audience size, identified in levels of Small, Moderate, Large and
Enormous
Metric Trends: most recent changes across multiple (web-based, social) metrics, identified in
Slowing, Stable, Growing and Viral
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
4
(Artist) Social Stage: the size of an artist’s social reach compared to social reach values at
common career milestones, identified in Undiscovered, Promising, Established, Mainstream and
Epic—through either Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Vevo.
1.1 INTRODUCTION
It has been over four decades since the Internet first began to assist researchers in
sharing information with each other. For more than half of that time, the World Wide Web
has permitted the everyday computer user access to myriad websites and data points,
facilitating an exchange of all sorts of information on regional and global levels. With the
rise of massive online social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter, the potential
connectivity between individuals, subcultures and whole societies has never been higher.
Innovators—a descriptor that, here, means “people who seek to bring about significant,
positive change”—continually discover and invent methods and tools that inspire others to
publish to the world parts of their lives that were, until recently, considered private,
sometimes intimate, details. A growing trend of sacrificing privacy in place of microfame,
satisfying media-driven stimuli on a personal level and crafting one’s own social image is
dominating much of the Internet-connected world.
However, not all Internet users are equal in their utilization, understanding and
perceptions of the Internet. Though much of the population of Africa accesses Wikipedia,
Africans are markedly less likely to edit the free encyclopedia than Americans or
Europeans. Different age groups first access the Internet in different ways, from different
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
5
types of locations, and approach available content in distinctly differing manners. Only a
minor portion of Internet users are currently viewed as content creators. Facebook, Twitter
and blogs are notable for allowing users certain options surrounding the durability of their
personal documentation; in contrast, some users create content through only platforms
that destroy their created content within a set time, as is observable with SnapChat. Time
will tell how expendable content will influence social media and use of the Internet, at large,
though for now it is durable media that dominates the social attention of the Internet.
The entertainment industry requires media outlets for its survival. As durable
content on YouTube, Spotify, Twitter and other places can service an audience as limited
only by server constraints and the number of Internet-connected devices, it is now
possible for any musician with Internet-based content to be heard across some ten billion
devices. While this possibility leads content providers through cycles of competition for
attention and interaction with content consumers—as noted in theories of attention
economics, the paralysis of choice, the Blockbuster, superstar and water cooler effects—
there is a certain level to which the playing field is flattening. With the ability to reduce
mechanical and distribution expenses to the cost of placing music on a hosting platform,
the quality of the music and the renown of the artists become two of the greatest factors in
how many or few sales, streams or audience members a music act will have. Some level
of competitive advantage is required between music acts that perform similar types of
music at similar qualities. For example, consider two professional symphony orchestras of
comparable quality, operating within the same city, performing the same song in the same
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
6
type of concert hall. Even the audience members of this now-niche genre would have little
reason to prefer one performance to the other for reasons related to either music act.
These considerations raise critical questions about how music acts of differing
levels of renown, of differing genres and from differing regions engage with their audience
through social media. Over the last year, the researcher’s conversations with a renowned
jazz musician, a pioneer of digital distribution strategies and methods, a
nonprofit/professional orchestra manager and the founder of a major music crowd funding
platform have revealed remarkable inconsistency across the industry in the perceived value
of utilizing online social media for increasing the visibility and consumption of music acts.
2. LITERATURE REVIEW
A distressing lack of large scale, formal research is available on the quantitative or
qualitative opportunities and costs associated with a music act or musician maintaining a
Twitter presence and following. What is immediately observable, though, is that major
musicians maintain a near-obsession with popularity on Twitter. In January of 2015,
through the use of Twitter-specific analytic software, Music Business Worldwide—a leader
in music business industry original research, news and commentary—examined the base
of followers maintained by each of the five most-followed musicians on Twitter.1 Going
through Katy Perry, Justin Bieber, Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga and Rihanna, respectively, this
follower analyzing software estimated that some 65%, 58%, 67%, 55% and 62% of their
following base was fake. For Katy Perry, the most-followed Twitter account on the service
1
Music Business Worldwide, “The World’s Biggest Music Stars: Who’s Faking it on
Twitter?,“ Music Business Worldwide (London, U.K.), January 31, 2015.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
7
with, then, 64.2 million followers, over 41.6 million of her following was fake. As Twitter’s
active monthly user base has only recently exceeded 300 million as recently as April 2015,
months after Music Business Worldwide’s fake followers analysis, it is clear that a troubling
portion of Twitter seems to be for-hire.2 With this understanding, the number of followers,
retweets, favorites, and direct mentions surrounding major music acts and musicians
seem unsound measures of reach and engagement.
Despite its most recent valuations, the future of Twitter continues to grow.
Currently, Twitter is working to expand its platforms and mechanisms for facilitating and
curating massive experiences for its users. An upcoming “Project Lightning” will provide
regional and global curation of events, featuring both typical text tweets and all sorts of
media tweets.3 A current comparison to this coming platform facet is SnapChat’s Live
Stories, which successfully attracted some 40 million views of videos and photos of
Coachella. As SnapChat’s Live Stories views are believed to generate ad revenue for the
service, brands and music acts, alike, would soon be vying for visibility on a service as
large as Twitter—particularly with potential licensing opportunities for Twitter’s Periscope.
Cynicism aside, as long as real people do occupy and participate in the Twitter
space, there will be opportunity for benefits. Kelly Clarkson held a Twitter listening party
with her most recent album release, ‘Piece by Piece,’ tweeting commentary to her
2
S. Dredge, “Twitter passes 300m active users but growth questions remain,” Music
Ally (London, U.K.), April 29, 2015.
3
Music Ally Blog, “ Twitter’s Project Lightning will curate tweets from events,” Music
Ally (London, U.K.), June 19, 2015.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
8
followers as a global audience listened to it at the same time.4 While she boasts over 10
million Twitter followers, her Tweets received relatively low levels of interaction for someone
of her status around a release. That said, her music still placed on top of the Billboard Top
200. The contribution directly attributable to Twitter remains a mystery, as so many factors
go into a successful release. This is just the type of mystery that companies like Next Big
Sound hope to answer. In response to questions of value and reach through online media,
Next Big Sound was founded on the notion of tracking as many relevant online data
sources as could be accurately matched to an artist and working to map them. Through
years of measuring online social, sales and streaming numbers, Next Big Sound sets itself
as one of the best sources for interpretation of past and recent online trends for thousands
of music acts, with the hope of assisting labels and acts in taking more efficient datadriven strategies.
3. RESEARCH QUESTION AND RATIONALE
Research question: What differences exist in how musicians and music acts of
different genres utilize Twitter?
In light of this question, the researcher identified the following goals to guide the
data selection and methodological process for a large-scale study:
4
Music Ally Blog, “Kelly Clarkson holds Twitter listening party for new album,” Music
Ally (London, U.K.), March 5, 2015.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
9
Identify trends in how major music acts and their members use Twitter, and their
overall social reach, through
§
noting the presence/absence of music acts and their members on
Twitter.
§
noting the nature of content contained by tweets from music acts and
their members.
§
noting the types of on-platform interpersonal interaction pursued by
music acts and their members.
§
noting the number of tweets of music acts and their users.
§
noting the numbers of accounts following and followed by music acts
and their members.
§
noting the overall metrics of music acts of different genres, as
reported by Next Big Sound.
The pursuit of increased understanding of how established music acts of all genres utilize
Twitters in different ways, and pursuit of increased understanding on how different music
acts, musicians and their audience engages with each other on Twitter, stands as the
primary rationale for this study.
For this study, the researcher chose the geographic focus point of the U.K. for two
reasons. First, a sample size said by the U.K. government to be representative of the entire
populations is between 800-1000 persons. This meant that a targeted sample size of over
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
10
a thousand musicians based, or popular in, the U.K. would be fantastically robust.
Second, a substantial amount of study has been conducted of the U.K.’s Twitter
population, which drives further usefulness of future iterations of this study.
3.2 Subjects
Music acts were selected based on several factors, varying by genre. In the case of
classical acts, each examined act has been any combination of the following: featured
within any Billboard Charts within the last two months; been existence for an excess of fifty
years; or is classified by Next Big Sound metrics as having an Established social stage. For
acts of all other genres, which span all Billboard Chart-specified genres, each music act
has either been featured on any Billboard Chart within the last two months or has been
classified by Next Big Sound metrics as having an Epic social stage. Data on every
identifiable, current member of every act from each of the following Billboard Charts, as
populated of June 6, 2015 was collected for this study:
Twitter Emerging Artists; Catalog Albums; Digital Albums; Digital Music;
Heatseekers; Independent Albums; Latin Albums; On-Demand Songs; Next Big
Sound; Top 100 Songs; Social 50; Streaming Songs; Tastemaker Albums; Top 100
Artists; Top 200 Albums; Twitter Songs; U.K. Music/ Top U.K. Albums; U.K. Music/
Top U.K. Songs; YouTube Music; and every genre-specific albums chart (notably
including Adult Pop Music & Songs and Classical).
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
11
For purposes of granularity, the researcher provides brief case studies of five selected
groupings from this pool, represented by the London Symphony Orchestra (hereafter
LSO), the London Philharmonic Orchestra (hereafter LPO), Lindsey Stirling, Sam Smith and
Ed Sheeran, and finally Coldplay.
4.1 METHODS AND DATA
The researcher undertook the following process when measuring subjects.
§
Identify the presence or absence of a music act/member’s publiclyvisible Twitter account.
§
Record the number of tweets, number of accounts followed by,
number of accounts following and number of tweets favorited by
each account.
§
Observe the presence or absence of any account activity to declare
the account active or inactive.
§
Examine the content of the last six months’ tweets for if the examined
account Tweeted about personal, professional or both kinds of
activities, in order to better understand the intended audience of each
account.
§
Examine the presence or absence of mentions, hashtags and replies
for the examined account within the last six months, in order to
establish the fluency of use with which the account user utilizes
Twitter.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
12
The researcher populated a cloud-based database with this data for each act and its
members. The populated data fields for this first database are the following:
Name; Twitter handle; number of tweets; number of followers; number of following;
number of favorites; verified (Y/N); active/inactive; tweets contain content of a
personal, professional or combined nature (E,R,B); outgoing, original account
tweets contain hashtags, direct mentions, both or neither (#,@,B,N); # of unique
hashtags outgoing (most recent fifty tweets only, based on software constraints);
account age; number of tweets per day.
To this Twitter data, the researcher added the following fields, and populated each for
every account:
Type of act (group, soloist—G/S), descriptor of account (act main, member—A/M),
genre (multiple codes).
Finally, Next Big Sound metrics were added to the data sets for each musical act’s main
account row.
Based on the field, various null responses were coded and assigned to inactive and
nonexistent accounts.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
13
After cleaning the dataset of unusable rows and fields, the researcher charted several
experimental visualizations of each genre, and of genres side-by-side.
5.1 OVERVIEW OF DATA
Though publicly identifiable, much of the Twitter webscrape data carries highly personal
information. For these reasons, the original dataset and visualizations are not included in
an appendices section of this paper. The dataset and visualizations are considered
proprietary by the researcher, who will present them in defense of this report during
5.2 Twitter Data
The following data reflects significant numbers surrounding the aforementioned case
musicians.
Pop and other multigenre groups:
Lindsey Stirling, Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith and Coldplay each have verified Twitter accounts
for the main account of their acts. All accounts from each of these groups were recorded
as being active within the last three months. Followers range from Lindsey Stirling’s
408000 to Coldplay’s 15000000, and all account within these groups Tweet at least once
a day. Each of these accounts maintain the use of @ and hashtags, communicating with
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
14
others on the Twitter space. Interestingly, none of Coldplay’s members have visible Twitter
accounts associated with their name or group.
Orchestra-level Classical Music Acts:
LSO and LPO each have verified official Twitter accounts to spearhead their organizations.
Out of scores of LSO members—not including honorary and visiting musicians and
ancillary conductors—only sixteen have publicly-discoverable Twitter accounts. Of these
accounts, one is inactive and one is verified. This verified account is maintained by the
LSO’s current conductor. The number of tweets from these accounts ranges from 4 to
22500 (LSO official). The number of accounts followed by this group ranges from 22 to
14400 (LSO official). The number of accounts following this group ranges from 21 to
203000 (LSO official). Three of these sixteen accounts have only Tweeted personal or
professional content in the last six months, as opposed to having Tweeted both. Three of
these sixteen accounts have not used a hashtag or the @ sign within the last six months,
and one of these accounts has only used the @ symbol, as opposed to having Tweeted
using both.
Out of scores of LPO members—not including honorary and visiting musicians and
conductors—only nine LPO members maintain publicly-discoverable Twitter accounts. Of
these members’ accounts, none are verified. Two of these nine members’ accounts are
inactive. The number of tweets from these accounts ranges from 23 to 5225 (LPO official).
The number of accounts followed by this group ranges from 22 to 3656 (LPO official). The
number of accounts following this group ranges from 32 to 101000 (LPO official). The
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
15
official LPO account and one member Tweet only professional content. The official LPO
account only uses the @ sign, rather than utilizing hashtags as well. Two members’
accounts use neither hashtags nor the @ sign.
5.3 Next Big Sound Summary
Please see the definitions in section 0.9 of this paper for meanings behind Next Big Sound
metrics.
LSO is listed as having moderate audience reach, a slowing metric trend, moderate
audience reach and established social stage.
LPO is listed as having moderate audience reach, a slowing metric trend, moderate
audience engagement and established social stage.
Lindsey Stirling is listed as having large audience reach, a stable metric trend, moderate
audience engagement and epic social stage.
Ed Sheeran is listed as having enormous audience reach, a slowing metric trend,
moderate audience engagement and epic social stage.
Sam Smith is listed as having enormous audience reach, a slowing metric trend, strong
audience engagement and epic social stage.
Coldplay is listed as having enormous audience reach, a slowing metric trend, an
occasional audience engagement and epic social stage.
6. DISCUSSION
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
16
The researcher identifies three major observations about these groups, first in the
comparison of Lindsey Stirling to other classical musicians, second in the overall metrics of
classical music groups and third in the metrics of all other groups researched.
Lindsey Stirling is a solo musician who plays popular movie, video game and other songs
on the violin while wearing associative outfits and dancing. While this is a completely
different routine from the musical approaches maintained by featured soloists and visiting
members of LSO, LPO and BSO, it raises the interesting point of audience growth.
Though Lindsey plays nothing but the violin—granting her, by Billboard’s standards, entry
to the classical music genre—it is largely her unique performance elements and her
intelligently-selected selection of pieces that helps her grow and maintain her audience.
Next Big Sound lists her metric trend as “stable;” the researcher would suggest that this
stable type of growth is because no single franchise or catalogue holds her selection of
pieces, and fan association and recruitment is likely to occur as she covers a selected
work from a particular subcultural niche. Lindsey is a performer with each a unique
selection of works, a unique performance method, a low level of competition and a high
level of activity with online social media.
Unsurprisingly, the members of classical performance groups do not maintain
personal Twitter accounts at levels near approaching the comprehensive Twitter presence
of all other groups analyzed. Of a cleaned sample size of 505 classical musicians, 89.5%
of this group was absent from or inactive on Twitter. Of non-classical groups, over 85% of
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
17
act members were present on Twitter—often verified, and often boasting large
followers/following ratios. Not a single member of either of the two case orchestras has an
excess of 7000 followers—the minimum number of followers enjoyed by a member of the
non-classical group of examined accounts. A major consideration in the approach
adopted by classical musicians to Twitter may be the perceived audience, or the perceived
perception of using Twitter. Though the hundreds of members spread across LSO and
could drive any hashtag to trending within minutes, based on nothing other than sheer
power of numbers, these organizations seem to rely on natural demand rather than
promoting their groups’ activities or engaging a major audience through the targeted use
of the @ sign, engaging other Twitter accounts, or using tailored hashtags to drive unique
visibility. While most of the Twitter-present orchestra members do Tweet both professional
and personal content, their combined audience is so small that the impact and visibility of
such tweets are sure to be drowned out by other voices in the Twitter space.
Unsurprisingly, again, non-classical groups maintain enormous followings across social
media, whether they are solo acts or groups with Twitter-absent members. While the
presence of band members on Twitter is significant in that it allows the superfan of each
group to connect with specific members of the band in meaningful ways, Coldplay is an
excellent example of an older group with a huge following and little perceived need to
engage in personal, digital space social activity. Most every account from the non-classical
group featured personal and professional content to tweets, the targeted use of the @ sign
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
18
to engage other users and the ever present use of the hashtag in order to draw attention
to certain long-term or unique campaigns.
7. OTHER CONSIDERATIONS, CONCLUSIONS
Future studies would do well to examine other social media platforms in addition to
Twitter, and should attempt to uncover whether observed results are a symptom of the
associated music groups’ images/cultures, or if they are a cause. Other points worth
examining are how different methods taken by individual groups have influenced levels of
interaction, sales and popularity of the respective group. This sample size should be
considered very robust and representative of the U.K. music scene, based on size and
depth of analysis.
Not all Internet users are equal. Ancillary to this point is the fact that not all musical
group audiences are equal. Major consideration to the average and median age of each
music group’s members should be applied to future iterations of study, as it would be
unsurprising for the actual use of Twitter by group members to largely align with the overall
age demographic use of Twitter on a national level. Similarly, the perceived and projected
audience demographic of each group should be evaluated when discussing this study as,
again, it is likely that the perceived, projected and indeed real audience demographic of
each group is still aligned with the overall usage demographics within the nation. Further
consideration, still, must be applied to the intended image desired by each group, and
how perceptions of Twitter use may affect a music act’s willingness to drive its members
to engage with the public and its audience through online social media or not.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
19
The researcher draws two major conclusions from this study. First, there is
incredible difference in the ways classical groups and musical groups of other genres
utilize Twitter. Though the researcher has not developed a sophisticated scientific
framework for evaluating the entire Twitter landscape, the varying percentage of members
utilizing Twitter is so incredibly different between genres that there is certainly merit of
further study. Second, the classical music scene is failing to utilize online social media in a
way that insures the survival of an individual orchestra, or of classical music at large; as
dozens of professional orchestra span the musical landscape of the UK, and as the
performed repertoire is generally quite similar, this art form is doing itself discredits in
several ways. Without fostering engagement with younger generations, who are currently
growing up with Twitter, are Internet natives and are willing to listen to recordings of the
best orchestra rather than the closest orchestra, the failure to adopt Twitter in significant
ways is furthering dying business models propagated on scarcity and locality. Rather than
utilizing online social media as a major differentiator, the examined official orchestra
accounts and member do little to carry on a meaningful dialogue into the Internet. For the
survival of the genre as the researchers know it today, it is the researcher’s belief that this
failure to adapt will represent a major obstacle to a bright future for classical music.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
20
Bibliography
Crucchiola, J. “Taylor Swift is the Queen of the Internet,” Wired Magazine (San
Francisco, USA), June 22, 2015.
Dredge, S. “Twitter passes 300m active users but growth questions remain,” Music Ally
(London, U.K.), April 29, 2015.
Music Ally Blog. “Kelly Clarkson holds Twitter listening party for new album,” Music
Ally (London, U.K.), March 5, 2015.
Music Ally Blog. “Twitter adds Audience Insights,” Music Ally (London, U.K.), May 28,
2015.
Music Ally Blog. ”Twitter’s Project Lightning will curate tweets from events,” Music Ally
(London, U.K.), June 19, 2015.
Music Business Worldwide. “The World’s Biggest Music Stars: Who’s Faking it on
Twitter?” Music Business Worldwide (London, U.K.), January 31, 2015.
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
21
List of Billboard Data Sources
Note: For purposes of observational replicability and verification, PDF copies of all utilized
Billboard charts can be made available upon request made to the researcher, should
Billboard.com ever cease offering lookup of past chart positions.
Billboard. “Adult Contemporary Music Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/adult-contemporary
Billboard. “Adult Pop Music & Songs Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/adult-pop-songs
Billboard. “Alternative Music/Top Alternative Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/alternative-albums
Billboard. “Billboard Twitter Emerging Artists,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/twitter-emerging-artists
Billboard. “Bluegrass Music/Top Bluegrass Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/bluegrass-albums
Billboard. “Blues Music/ Top Blues Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/blues-albums
Billboard. “Catalog Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/catalog-albums
Billboard. “Christian Albums/ Top Praise Music Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/christian-albums
Billboard. “Classical Music/ Top Classical Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/classical-albums
Billboard. “Comedy Albums/ Top Stand Up Comedy Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/comedy-albums
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
22
Billboard. “Digital Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/digital-albums
Billboard. “Digital Music Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/digital-songs
Billboard. “EDM Music & Dance Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/dance-electronic-albums
Billboard. “Folk Music/ Top Folk Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/folk-albums
Billboard. “Gospel Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/gospel-albums
Billboard. “Hard Rock Music/ Top Hard Rock Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/hard-rock-albums
Billboard. “Heatseekers Albums/ Up and Coming Musicians Chart,” Billboard, week of
June 6, 2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/heatseekers-albums
Billboard. “Independent Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/independent-albums
Billboard. “Jazz Music/ Top Jazz Albums & Songs Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/jazz-albums
Billboard. “Latin Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/latin-albums
Billboard. “Latin Pop Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/latin-pop-albums
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
23
Billboard. “Mexican Music/ Top Mexican Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/regional-mexican-albums
Billboard. “Music/ Top 100 Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100
Billboard. “New Age Music/ Top New Age Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/new-age-albums
Billboard. “Next Big Sound,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/next-big-sound-25
Billboard. “On-Demand Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/on-demand-songs
Billboard. “Pop Music/ Top Pop Songs Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/pop-songs
Billboard. “R&B Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/r-and-b-albums
Billboard. “R&B/Hip-Hop Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/r-b-hip-hop-albums
Billboard. “Rap Music/ Top Rap Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/rap-albums
Billboard. “Reggae Music/ Top Reggae Albums & Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6,
2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/reggae-albums
Billboard. “Rock Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/rock-albums
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
24
Billboard. “Social 50,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/social-50
Billboard. “Streaming Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/streaming-songs
Billboard. “Tastemaker Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/tastemaker-albums
Billboard. “Top 100 Artists Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/artist-100
Billboard. “Top 200 Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200
Billboard. “Top Album Sales,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/top-album-sales
Billboard. “Tropical Music/ Albums,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/tropical-albums
Billboard. “Twitter Songs,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/twitter-top-tracks
Billboard. “U.K. Music/ Top U.K. Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/united-kingdom-albums
Billboard. “U.K. Music/ Top U.K. Songs Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/united-kingdom-songs
Billboard. “World Music/ Top World Albums Chart,” Billboard, week of June 6, 2015.
http://www.billboard.com/charts/world-albums
Billboard. “YouTube Music - Top YouTube Songs & Music Chart,” Billboard, week of
What Tune Does the Bluebird Sing?
June 6, 2015. http://www.billboard.com/charts/youtube
25
