Cultural production and the corporation: musical genres and the strategic management of creativity in the US recording industry

Abstract

This article focuses on how the major US recording companies attempt to strategically manage their different genres of music. It then considers the consequences of this for creative and commercial practices through illustrative case studies of the corporate management of rap and salsa. In broad terms, the article is intended as a contribution to debates about the `culture industry' and the interrelations between `culture' and `economics'. Two themes are used as a way of highlighting this relationship and the role of the music companies in cultural production: that an industry produces culture and that culture produces an industry. These themes are developed through an interrogation of detailed empirical material brought together from research conducted in the USA during 1996.