If you have been circling around the social media scene recently, you may have heard of Clubhouse. If not, you’re going to want to hop on this train before it’s too late! Clubhouse is a drop-in audio chat platform where users can speak to each other and listen to conversations on any given topic. The app launched in April 2020 and has since grown to house approximately ten million users.

Last month, Spotify’s HR Blog announced the implementation of their new ‘Work From Anywhere Movement’ in which the company’s employees can decide to come into the office or work remotely. This movement comes in light of COVID-19 social distancing regulations changing how many of us view the workspace. With the ‘Work From Anywhere’ movement, Spotify is allowing their employees to work from where they feel the most productive.

As March 8th, 2021 marked another year of International Women’s Day, a study released by USC Annenberg showed that there is “little to celebrate” when it comes to women in music. The USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative has conducted annual studies on how the music industry has progressed regarding increasing women representation.

Analyzing information from Billboard’s Top 100 Year-End charts from the past nine years, the study revealed that only 21.6% of artists featured between 2012 and 2020 were female. On a much finer scale, only 20.2% of artists from 2020’s Top 100 Chart were female, further proving that there has been no significant change in the music industry regarding allowing female artists’ voices to be heard. The conductor of the study, Stacy L. Smith says, “It is International Women’s Day everywhere, except for women in music, where women’s voices remain muted.”

Sometimes listening to your same favorite songs on a playlist can be repetitive and predictable. There are times you may opt to hear a discussion on a particular topic of interest, or a conversation between two or more hosts. Podcasts are a form of entertainment that serve as a great substitute for music. They are very similar to radio shows, however they are more interactive in the sense that the listener is almost engaged in a conversation, rather than listening to one. As many know, Spotify has been one of the top contenders for podcast distribution and have been looking to use this service to expand their company as a whole.

In this day and age, COVID-19 has simply become a part of our daily lives. It has impacted our social interactions, our ability to travel, and for some areas of the United States who have it significantly bad, our ability to do regular life activities such as eating in restaurants or going grocery shopping.

As many of us are well aware, COVID has had a huge negative effect on the live entertainment industry. With multiple concert venues closed or even shut down permanently, artists have turned to live streamed events as the best alternative to in-person performances. As audience members, it is easy to view these events at surface level. You may think “I’m basically watching this person perform on video and interact with me”. However for artists, the value of live streamed concerts is immense. It is the best way to receive real time feedback from their fans, and it helps them connect with their audience during a time where direct interaction is limited.

On January 9th, Dr. Fauci -the infectious disease expert tracking the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States- predicted that if “everything goes right” regarding the distribution of COVID vaccines, then concert venues and theaters can reopen as early as Fall 2021. He stated,”by the time we get to the early to mid-fall, you can have people feeling safe performing onstage as well as people in the audience”. These claims were made at a conference held by the Association of Performing Arts Professionals.

The live music industry has been devastated by the pandemic since it came to the United States in March of 2020, and both fans and artists are anxious to finally put their old concert tickets and tour plans to use. With many venues shutting their doors for almost a year, quite a few locations across the country have fallen victim to bankruptcy due to the lack of income and rising expenses, and were therefore forced to close permanently.

It is pretty fair to say that 2020 has been a whirlwind of events. With the coronavirus pandemic putting the music industry to a halt, artists and labels have been forced to adapt to this new world of virtual performances, socially distant award shows, and tour cancellations.

However, with all of the changes surrounding COVID-19, one thing is certain: musicians and music lovers together have chosen not to give up. Instead, we have learned to be flexible by making extra efforts to connect with our audience, finding new ways to create and release content, and most importantly, keep the music alive. Throughout all of the negativity, the music industry has persevered because of the passion of the people in it, and the feeling of hope that we get from the songs we create.

Now that 2020 is coming to a close and we look ahead to the new year, the question stands: what is going to happen in 2021?