Music should be about participation in my opinion. While it is and has been for millions of people around the world, in many places (such as Australia, where I’m based), the twentieth century has seen music move from being largely amateur and participatory, to being professional and, for most people, a passive listening activity. Recording and associated technology has driven that process.

That’s changing.

While recording and listening (rather than live performance) are still the most common forms of musical activity for many people, it is much easier to be involved with the tools of production than it was even ten years ago. Look what’s happened to the music industry and large professional studios, in particular. Tools of music production are available to anyone with the appropriate technology (computers, for example).

I was at a music conference in Brisbane last week (Bigsound) and Google gave a team presentation centred around what they call “Gen C” – a generation of people (although it’s not actually about age so whether that’s the right term is open to question) who focus on “creation, curation, connection, and community“.