Enovate, the Shanghai based research and insights firm, asked our opinions regarding music in China. A key insight from 2009 and a prediction for 2010. You can read the full article covering the spectrum HERE, and you can read what we had to say on this here site.
Questions:1. Please give us 1 trend/insight that you saw emerge over the past year within your relevant field. We prefer something youth focused but it does not have to be.
The government sponsored music festival.
After 10 years of Midi working their socks off in the margins, the arrival of more commercial entities like Modern Sky in Beijing, Yue Festival and JZ Jazz in Shanghai led to local Chinese governments believing that having their own music festival would be good for morale/ status/ cool factor. You take your pick.
So, in 2009, we had Zhangbei signing a 10 year commitment to put on a festival in Inner Mongolia, Chengdu backing heavily the Zebra festival and Zhenjiang paying Midi to relocate there, it was a crazy year. We’ve heard tell of many more in the works for 2010. Watch this space.
2. Please give us 1 trend/insight prediction for 2010 related to China, either within your field or the youth market.
An influx of International stars working with brands.
After the mega, mega over saturation of brands working with the insanely thin talent pool of recognizable Chinese musicians (Wang Lee Hom currently endorses a squillion brands from Chicken stock to mobile phones), international companies are realising that they need to differentiate to stand out. Expect a rash of TVCs and appearances by the Western pop-erati in 2010, especially with Expo performances by all the great and the good being planned about now.