By: Doug Heath
Members of the Mormon music industry discussed the future of LDS music and radio Friday. The panelists included Andrew Maxfield, Steven Kapp Perry, Dr. Quint Randall, Ron Saltmarsh and Bob Ahlander.
BYU students and professors were present to listen to the views shared by the panel. The session was entirely focused on questions and answers.
With a focus on Mormon music, the panel took time to explain that the Mormon music industry is an offshoot of the Christian music industry.
The panel answered questions posed to them through Facebook and by members of the audience. They discussed the necessity of sharing the Gospel through their music and the difficulty of marketing LDS music outside of the LDS community.
“As disciples, it is our responsibility to share the gospel. Period,” Ahlander said.
The other panelists were in agreement and noted different ways in which LDS artists can share the gospel through their music. Perry said that he liked to be very direct with the gospel messages he conveyed through his music, while other artists prefer to be more subtle.
There was a focus on the small size of the Mormon music industry, which was described as a niche within a niche of the overall industry. This is a challenge when it comes to spreading the gospel message to the world through music.
There have been some artists, such as Hillary Weeks, who have seen their music actually make it on Christian music charts; but Ahlander, who had marketed for some of these artists, admitted that the success of these artists was only through the members of the Church.
The panel also took a moment to discuss the downturn of revenue in the music industry.
“Music piracy continues to present a problem,” Randall said.
To add to that, the digitization of music has also made revenues drop. Perry noted that there has been a 27 percent increase of people listening to music on Pandora. Record labels are struggling to adapt as album sales drop. There was an emphasis on the need for scarcity, which increases demand.
“Live music works because it is fundamentally scarce,” Maxfield said.
