News

Earlier this year, MusicFutures supported the Keeping Music Venues Thriving event, delivered in collaboration with the Liverpool City Region Music Board and University of Liverpool’s Institute of Popular Music. The conversations and insights gathered helped to inform the findings of the newly published consultation report.

The event, held earlier this year at Camp and Furnace, brought together venue operators, promoters and sector partners from across the Liverpool City Region for a series of roundtable discussions focused on the future of live music venues.

MusicFutures helped facilitate the discussions, creating a space for industry voices to share experiences, explore the challenges currently facing venues and identify opportunities to support a more resilient and sustainable live music ecosystem.

Bringing the sector together

The consultation captured feedback from 55 venue operators and promoters, gathered through a series of themed roundtable discussions. These conversations explored the realities of running live music venues today, including changing audience behaviours, rising operational costs, transport and parking challenges, licensing, staffing pressures, training needs, innovation and the importance of stronger shared data across the sector.

Participants provided valuable insight into the pressures affecting their businesses and the wider live music landscape, while also highlighting where collaboration, investment and strategic support could have the greatest impact.

A clear message emerged throughout the consultation: the sector is facing significant challenges, but it is not without solutions.

These insights have directly informed the Keeping Music Venues Thriving report, helping to build a clearer understanding of the issues affecting venues and shaping future priorities for the Liverpool City Region Music Board.

Identifying opportunities for the future

Alongside the challenges, the consultation also highlighted opportunities for positive change. The report sets out a number of practical recommendations and areas for further exploration, including:

• Continuing to lobby for improved late-night transport provision across the Liverpool City Region
• Exploring how local grassroots venues could benefit from the LIVE Trust ticket levy model
• Hosting further focused sessions on alternative revenue models, venue multi-use and audience communication
• Considering the development of a regional touring resource directory
• Exploring a venue quality audit framework, covering areas such as sound, accessibility and facilities
• Engaging with licensing and transport colleagues around the specific needs of venues, artists, staff and audiences
• Supporting ideas around live sound training, safety guidance and a possible regional Music Charter or Music Strategy
• Exploring better regional listings, venue mapping and shared data tools
• Encouraging peer-to-peer funding support or “funding surgeries” for venues

By drawing together experiences from across the sector, these findings provide a valuable foundation for future work to support venues, artists, audiences and the wider music economy across the region. They will help shape the Liverpool City Region Music Board’s future priorities by identifying where it can advocate, convene partners and enable collaborative action to strengthen the region’s live music sector.

Read the full article and download the report here