The concentration of commercial success in popular music: An analysis of the distribution of gold records

Raymond A.K. Cox; James M. Felton; Kee H. Chung

doi:10.1007/BF01073995

The concentration of commercial success in popular music: An analysis of the distribution of gold records

Raymond A.K. Cox
, James M. Felton
, Kee H. Chung

Finance

Central Michigan University

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

38 Scopus citations

Abstract

This paper examines whether commercial success in the popular recorded-music industry, as measured by gold-record output, conforms to an empirical concentration. We find that Lotka's Law overestimates the number of artists with one gold record and underestimates the number of multiplegold-record performing artists. However, for all measures of "successful" records, the Generalized Lotka's Law provides an excellent fit, which suggests that the number of performers producing n gold records in about 1/n^c of those producing one gold record.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	333-340
Number of pages	8
Journal	Journal of Cultural Economics
Volume	19
Issue number	4
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01073995
State	Published - Dec 1995

Access to Document

10.1007/BF01073995

Cite this

@article{2c928f7c97ca49328899c6e00c732f9d,

title = "The concentration of commercial success in popular music: An analysis of the distribution of gold records",

abstract = "This paper examines whether commercial success in the popular recorded-music industry, as measured by gold-record output, conforms to an empirical concentration. We find that Lotka's Law overestimates the number of artists with one gold record and underestimates the number of multiplegold-record performing artists. However, for all measures of {"}successful{"} records, the Generalized Lotka's Law provides an excellent fit, which suggests that the number of performers producing n gold records in about 1/nc of those producing one gold record.",

author = "Cox, \{Raymond A.K.\} and Felton, \{James M.\} and Chung, \{Kee H.\}",

year = "1995",

month = dec,

doi = "10.1007/BF01073995",

language = "English",

volume = "19",

pages = "333--340",

journal = "Journal of Cultural Economics",

issn = "0885-2545",

publisher = "Springer",

number = "4",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - The concentration of commercial success in popular music

T2 - An analysis of the distribution of gold records

AU - Cox, Raymond A.K.

AU - Felton, James M.

AU - Chung, Kee H.

PY - 1995/12

Y1 - 1995/12

N2 - This paper examines whether commercial success in the popular recorded-music industry, as measured by gold-record output, conforms to an empirical concentration. We find that Lotka's Law overestimates the number of artists with one gold record and underestimates the number of multiplegold-record performing artists. However, for all measures of "successful" records, the Generalized Lotka's Law provides an excellent fit, which suggests that the number of performers producing n gold records in about 1/nc of those producing one gold record.

AB - This paper examines whether commercial success in the popular recorded-music industry, as measured by gold-record output, conforms to an empirical concentration. We find that Lotka's Law overestimates the number of artists with one gold record and underestimates the number of multiplegold-record performing artists. However, for all measures of "successful" records, the Generalized Lotka's Law provides an excellent fit, which suggests that the number of performers producing n gold records in about 1/nc of those producing one gold record.

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/7444222168

U2 - 10.1007/BF01073995

DO - 10.1007/BF01073995

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:7444222168

SN - 0885-2545

VL - 19

SP - 333

EP - 340

JO - Journal of Cultural Economics

JF - Journal of Cultural Economics

IS - 4

ER -

The concentration of commercial success in popular music: An analysis of the distribution of gold records

Abstract

Access to Document

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this