Music Venue Trust Launch 2024 Annual Report with Special Event in Senedd
Concerns Raised over Collapse of National Touring in Wales
Report Reveals Welsh Grassroots Music Venues Subsidised Live Music by £8.8 million in 2024
Music Venue Trust (MVT), which represents hundreds of UK Grassroots Music Venues (GMVs) will launched its 2024 Annual Report in the Senedd on Tues 4th February 2025, with a special event for politicians, policy makers, venues and key stakeholders featuring a performance from The Anchoress and a keynote speech from Jack Sargeant, Minister for Culture, Skills and Social Partnership.
Despite highlighting positive activity such as MVT celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2024, the continued success of Music Venue Properties (MVP), which has now secured freehold ownership of two venues in Wales, and the publication of a Culture, Media and Sport (CMS) report that made strong recommendations to support grassroots music, it is clear that significant work is still needed to prevent a continued decline of the sector.
A survey of the 44 members of the Music Venues Alliance Wales (MVA Wales), who employ over 1600 people throughout the GMV community, found that they staged over 8,800 live events comprising over 80,000 individual artist performances given to a total audience of just over 1 million live music fans. The total direct value to the Welsh economy from these events was £28.4 million. However, on average, GMVs (33% of which are now registered as not-for profit entities – a 29% increase in not-for-profit registration since 2023) operated on a profit margin of just 0.48% with 43.8% of them reporting a loss in the last 12 months. This means that the sector as a whole effectively subsidised live music activity in Wales to the tune of £8.8 million.
One of the most concerning trends to have emerged from this report is the huge decline in locations on the UK’s primary and secondary touring circuits. In the 30 year period between 1994 and 2024 those touring locations have collapsed, with an average tour in 1994 including 22 dates and the equivalent tour in 2024 consisting of only 11 dates. Furthermore, touring in 1994 was spread across a range of 28 different locations across the country. In 2024, just 12 locations, all of them major cities, remained as primary and secondary touring circuit stops, acting as regular hosts to grassroots tours.
Only one location in Wales remains on the national touring circuit, Cardiff, with even thriving music locations like Swansea, Wrexham and Newport struggling to be included on the majority of national tours by new and emerging artists. In Wales, this means swathes of the country have been cut off altogether from the opportunity to see the hottest new acts, resulting in people having to travel further or simply being unable to access live music at all. The result, demonstrated in this report, is a decrease in the total number of live music shows (down 8.3% since 2023) accompanied by an even steeper decline in ticket revenues (down 13.5% since 2023).
Mark Davyd CEO of MVT
Venues, despite all the very welcome good intentions and acknowledgements they are receiving for their vital work, are still closing, still under extreme and totally unnecessary financial pressures, still failing to be recognised, as everyone agrees they should and must be, when government designs policy, taxation, and legislation. It isn’t good enough to keep saying how much we all value them, we’ve got to practically do something about it.
We need action not words.”
To access the full 2024 Annual Report, please click here
To view Welsh Sector Key Statistics, please click here
