LIVE reports another record year for UK live music

LIVE, the voice of the UK’s live music industry, has published its 2024 annual report which incorporates analysis from 55,000 gigs, concerts, festivals and events, showing that the sector has enjoyed another record year.

The data shows one gig took place every 137 seconds across the UK in 2024, with mainstream pop music (driven by the likes of Taylor Swift, Charlie XCX and Dua Lipa) accounting for 32.1% of consumer spend from the top 2,000 concerts of the year — a year-on-year increase of 4.7 percentage points.

Total consumer spend has reached a record £6.68bn, which equates to a year-on-year increase of 9.5%, which in turn is 28.2% more than in 2022 and over £2bn more than in 2019, the last full year before COVID.

With over 23.5m music tourists enjoying live music in the UK over the last 12 months, one of the most notable changes in the market was the split between concert and festival income. While festival spending only rose by 1.9%, concert turnover jumped significantly by 12.2%. This meant concerts attracted 75.3% of live music spending in 2024—nearly two percentage points more than in 2023.

This was partly due to a slowing of growth in music festivals with some events struggling to sustain themselves through an extended period of high-cost inflation – an issue that could be offset if Government introduced a much-needed festival tax relief. However, it should be noted that another key factor was the stellar line-up of major-league artists in 2024 with stadia and arenas the big beneficiaries.

Unsurprisingly, London remained the capital of the UK’s live music scene attracting 28.9% of all expenditure in 2024. The city remains the country’s priority destination for touring artists with substantially more venues and concertgoers than anywhere else. However, London’s share was down slightly year-on-year, while Manchester made up some ground, partly thanks to the opening of the Co-op Live, and Glasgow was the UK’s third biggest city for live music, despite having a much smaller population than fourth-placed Birmingham. Elsewhere in the rankings, Cardiff overtook Edinburgh to become the fifth highest earning live music city in 2024.

Live music also continues to be a hugely important provider of jobs in the UK. It employed more than 234,000 people in 2024 — a 2.2% increase year-on-year with the data indicating that approximately four in five (78.8%) jobs in live music are casual or freelance.

However, despite the positive headline figures, significant challenges remain for grassroots music venues, small festivals, independent promoters and up-and-coming artists all of which are vital to the future of UK live music. Acknowledging these issues and the need to address them LIVE has played a pivotal role throughout the last 12 months in working with government and the wider music industry to advocate for policies that will improve trading conditions and develop sustainable funding solutions.

Following the 2024 Culture, Media and Sport (CMS) report calling for an industry-led voluntary solution to the crisis in the grassroots music, the LIVE Trust was established to build on the pioneering work of the Music Venue Trust to manage a funding programme founded on a voluntary £1 ticket contribution on arena and stadium shows with a capacity over 5,000. With trustees now appointed and commitments already secured from a number of high-profile artists performing stadia and arena shows throughout 2025 and 2026 the LIVE Trust is confident it can soon begin offering financial support where it is needed.

Jon Collins, CEO of LIVE said: “2024 was a standout year for LIVE as we took our seat at the top table of Government. While UK live music continued the post-lockdown trend of strong performance for the biggest names at the biggest venues, pressure built across our grassroots as venues closed, tours were cancelled or cut back and festivals called time. And yet, as the figures in this report show, we can be a driver of that growth in all regions, towns and cities across the country.

“Live music is a joyous experience and venues and festivals of all shapes and sizes, operated by world-class teams and showcasing world-class established and emerging talent, will continue to delight audiences for decades to come as long as industry and Government protects and nurtures the ecosystem."