On Researching Music in Everyday Life:Assessing the Musician as Producer of Commercialised Music

Adorno & Horkheimer (1998) argue that the Culture Industry generates cultural artefacts that fail to develop human consciousness and hence support the domination of the capitalist system. Steinert (2003) states that the pressures facing musicians to negotiate between the demands of the culture industry and the traditional role of the artist generates a fundamental contradiction within art which is symbolically enacted through artistic production. This study, which draws on on-going postgraduate research aims to develop a research framework that investigates how musicians negotiate this contradiction. The study considers if a more reflexive approach to art exists, typified by the Pop Art movement, which paradoxically lends itself to commercial appropriation whilst still remaining a legitimate art form in its own right. This study questions if the interaction of music with marketing represents a commodification or “sell-out” of music or if it can constitute a more reflexive approach towards musical production and the negotiation of Culture Industry pressures.