*** NOTE: This is the text of a paper presented at the Midwest Chapter of the Society for Ethnomusicology's Annual Meeting on April 8, 2011 at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, OH. ***
Just by a show of hands, how many of you dislike participating in “Hallmark holidays?” These would include Valentines Day, Sweetest Day, Grandparents Day, pet kitten days, or anything of the sort? Now, also by show of hands, how many of you know someone who always gripes about the commercial nature of Valentines Day, or how Christmas has become too commercialized? Well, the phenomenon these people, and you, if you raised your hand to the first question, are complaining about is commodification.
On the other side of the commercialization spectrum is commoditization, an economics-based term dealing with the use of music as a commodity. While the two terms are often considered synonymous and used interchangeably, they are vastly different concepts and affect our lives in different ways. And, as the 20th-Century drew to a close, music began to see a shift from commodification to commoditization. This paper will explore two companies, the first a great commodifier and the second a successful commoditizer of music, in order to better understand the difference between both concepts and how they impact our everyday lives. The commodifier is Disney and the commoditizer is Muzak.
Commodification and Disney: Marketing the Disney Experience
Disney stands as one of the most successful commodifiers in history. Walt Disney and his brother Roy created that iconic and beloved bastion of child and family entertainment in 1923. Since then, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and the rest of the Disney gang have been the most recognized subjects of movies, cartoons, comic books, music, and entertainment in the world. Today, Disney exerts its influence through full-length feature films, original broadcasting through its Disney Channel cable television network, Radio Disney, and Disney Records, among other outlets. Disney’s pervasiveness is noted most powerfully by ethnomusicologist Charles Carson:
In a recent commercial for the Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida, Disney pointedly elucidates the role of music in its project. A young girl in an elementary school spelling bee attempting to spell "microphone" gets only as far as "M-I-C" when she is interrupted by an older audience member's interjection of "K-E-Y". Immediately, the audience of parents and grandparents bursts forth in song, dancing around the auditorium while singing the "Mickey Mouse Club Theme" - much to the confusion of the children on stage.[1]
Let’s actually watch that clip.
In order to understand how this is representative of Disney as the Great Commodifier, it is helpful to have a fuller understanding of what commodification is, and what it is not.
Commodification is a Marxist-based idea dealing with the appropriation of something with non-economic value, such as gratitude, love, art, or music, and using it for personal or corporate profit. While Marx did not specifically coin the term, it arose from his ideas in The Communist Manifesto.[2] Marx, when discussing the bourgeoisie, suggests that it “has played a most revolutionary part… It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his ‘natural superiors,’ and has left no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous ‘cash payment.’”[3] He went on to state that “it has resolved personal worth into exchange value, and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom – Free Trade.”[4]
What Marx suggests here is that the bourgeoisie has taken the all-important notions of human connection and that which is important to our worth as humans and replaced it with dollar signs. Reinforcing this view is Marx’s claim that “the bourgeoisie has torn away from the family its sentimental veil, and has reduced the family relation to a mere money relation.”[5] This is one of the central principles of Marx’s philosophies and, as it happens, the basis for the existence of the notion of commodification.
The important thing to keep in mind when considering commodification is to understand that it involves an appropriation of something with some humanistic or intrinsic non-monetary worth and turning it into a tool for profit. Commodification is really about “modification.” In other words, turning one thing into something else. In the case of commodified music, it involves taking an inherently powerful and affective art form and turning it into a tool for profit. That is why commodification is such an appropriate term for the concept.
Ethnomusicologist Charles Carson describes the Disney Experience through music heard on Main Street USA, the section of the park greeting guests as they enter Disney World.[6] He describes Main Street USA as a “recreation of a circa-1900 pre-industrialized American town square.”[7] Guests will find live performances by individuals and small ensembles while background music is constantly piped through hidden speakers; this music designed to fill space when there is no live performance, yet kept at a low enough volume so as not to interfere with the live performances. Carson notes that “what draws people is undoubtedly not the Dixieland music but the propinquity of the live performance.”[8]
Main Street USA does not represent true American culture, but rather an idealized view of it. Therein lies the danger in what Disney does. Disney takes, and sometimes creates, an idealized notion of a time period, culture, or concept, and presents it to consumers in a manner most efficaciously designed to create a positive nostalgic association. What Disney really does is to sterilize something to the point where it barely passes recognition for what it is purported to represent. Nowhere is this more apparent than at EPCOT Center.
Carson actually considers the use of music at the various pavilions at EPCOT Center, e.g. German Oom-Pah Bands at the German pavilion and Mariachi bands at the Mexican pavilion, bringing the unique view of an ethnomusicologist to bear. Where cultural commodification may be somewhat subtle in the Magic Kingdom, it is inescapably blatant at EPCOT Center. Carson relates his Disney Experience by noting that his experience at EPCOT was “fractured” and that because of his “level of familiarity with (the German) culture, (he was) hypercritical of its representation.”[9] He also notes that, “as a classically trained musician, (he felt) that (his) own experiences with this culture (were) more informed by the Western art music tradition than by such folk elements, and the absence of this aspect of Austro-German cultural heritage (was), for (him), somewhat conspicuous.”[10] This is an interesting observation because, for one, it illustrates how Carson’s ability to “buy in” to the Disney Experience is somewhat tainted by his own training and experience. Second, it brings to light cultural innaccuracies existing in the various pavilions at EPCOT Center, also casting a pall upon other Disney cultural representations such as Frontierland and Main Street USA.
Through these examples at Disney World, we can see how effectively Disney has built its cultural empire through musical commodification. These traits carry over into all of Disney’s commercial ventures, from Disney Channel to Radio Disney, Disney’s feature-length films, its Disney Stores, its cruise line, and the countless other marketing arms Disney has created to perpetuate its commodified culture. Perhaps nothing better exemplifies the marketing savvy of the Disney machine than the following two clips. The first is a home recording, and the second is an actual Disney commercial:
Consider the purity of the emotions of the first clip, then how it is transformed by the simple addition of music.
One company possessing such power and influence is a frightening concept, but it illustrates two things. First, that Disney’s implementation of commodification, while incredibly effective, is not unique and we are influenced by commodification every day. It is inescapable. Second, though, is that commodification is somehow inherently tied to human emotion and the human experience. It is this emotional attachment that empowers commodification. This stands in contrast to commoditization, where power lays in subtlety.
Commoditization and Muzak: The Other End of the Spectrum
One manner in which most people misunderstand the notion of commodification is to associate it with the idea of a commodity. The implication is that a commodified resource or idea is being turned into a commodity. This is simply misguided because of what a commodity is. While there are countless ways in which to define a commodity, from economic writings, governmental agency definitions, statutory definitions, or the definitions provided by commodities markets, which are all fairly similar, one of the best statements of that definition for the purposes of understanding commodification and its relationship to commodities comes from investopedia.com, of all places.
Investopedia defines a commodity as “a basic good used in commerce that is interchangeable with other commodities of the same type… The quality of a given commodity may differ slightly, but it is essentially uniform across producers.” With that definition in mind, it is clear that most commodified objects are not, in fact, being treated as commodities. Lady Gaga, for example, has done a tremendous job of marketing herself as a product, but I doubt anyone would say that she is interchangeable with most other recording artists. Her success relies upon her individuality. Rather, commodified goods are simply being modified into tools for profit.
Commoditization, on the other hand, is the process of using something that is not inherently a commodity as a true commodity. With commoditization, unique characteristics are stripped from the object, in this case music, and it is packaged as a completely interchangeable and uniform product. When its uniqueness is removed, the basis for inflated cost disappears and the cost of the object decreases. Because of that, barriers for entry into a given market are eroded, increasing competition overall in that market. It is difficult to think of music in terms of commoditization, especially as musicians and academics, because we innately think of all music as unique. Even where we lump music into predefined categories or genres, we still recognize the individuality of music because of the relationship between music and both the composer and performer. Muzak, LLC, though, stands as a perfect example of how music can be commoditized.
The Muzak company was officially founded in 1934 by General George Squier.[11] General Squier invented multiplexing, which enabled transmission of music over utility lines to businesses across the country, the technology which gave rise to the phenomenon of ambient music in businesses. Sometimes called “elevator music,” Muzak was a pioneer in promoting music as a method of affecting consumers and workers. According to Muzak’s website, as early as the 1940s, Muzak utilized “industry experts in research, music and marketing to build a case for background music in the workplace. Muzak carved out its niche by piping in stimulating music that motivated workers.” Muzak has been the most well-known environmental music company in the world since that time.
Today, Muzak promotes its service as “Audio Architecture,” explicitly acknowledging that “its power lies in its subtlety.”[12] It offers services in music programming, digital signage, and on-hold messaging. Muzak’s promotional materials provide appropriately vague descriptions of its creative process and case studies demonstrating its effectiveness. There is no mistake, though, that Muzak treats music as a fungible good and sees its role as being a packager of that good. This approach has prompted significant academic interest, both critical and analytical.
Ronald Ronaldo, in an article published in American Music, notes that Muzak “aims to portray Muzak not as mere background music, but as a psychologically active, sonic accompaniment, carefully designed to remain below the threshold of common attention.”[13] The brains behind Muzak have calculated their product to the Nth degree, making absolutely certain it has the desired affect on you, the unwitting listener. Such a cold and pragmatic approach to music is a relatively foreign, and sometimes offensive, idea to musicians. Joseph Lanza, in his article The Sound of Cottage Cheese: Why Background Music Is the Real World Beat!, wryly notes that “the mere fact that a multi-million dollar industry like Muzak employs industrial psychologists to make us "relax" is as macabre as any David Lynch fantasy.”[14]
That, however, is what a commodity and, by extension, commoditization, is all about. It is about conceiving of something that is not, by its nature, a commodity as a commodity. In the context of music, it is taking music and stripping it of all artistic characteristics, then packaging it in a way in which it serves a commercial purpose, and only that commercial purpose. As noted earlier, commoditization lowers the cost of the commoditized good, thereby decreasing barriers to entry into that market and increasing competition. This can be seen in Muzak’s decreasing profit margins, as well as the fact that so many retailers, rather than subscribing to services such as Muzak, are producing their own “corporate soundtracks” in-house.
The danger from commoditization to music as an art form is negligible. Commoditization does not seek to appropriate music, art, culture, or emotion and harness their inherently human powers for monetary gain. That is the province of commodification. Commoditization, in fact, relies upon a robust extrinsic culture of production in order to feed its operations and create its product. Make no mistake, though, that there is a significant difference, both in intent and in effect, between commodification and commoditization. Douglas Rushkoff, one of the first scholars to consider that difference, suggests that “commodification is more of a crime of the market against humanity, while commoditization is more of a market problem for the manufacturers of branded goods.”[15] What he suggests is that commodification is a human problem, while commoditization is a market problem.
Whether his characterization is accurate or not is certainly open for debate, but most historic- and ethno-musicologists would agree that music possesses an often indefinable power over human beings and their emotions. By critically considering both commodification and commoditization, and understanding the difference between the two, we can better understand the ways in which that power can be harnessed, and how music truly affects our [1] Carson, Charles. “‘Whole New Worlds’: Music and the Disney Theme Park Experience.” Ethnomusicology Forum, volume 13, number 2. (Nov., 2004): 228-235, 228.
[2] Marx, Karl & Engels. Communist Manifesto. In Socialist Landmark by Laski, Harold J. George Allen and Unwin Ltd., 5th Impression. (London, 1961)
[3] Marx @ 122-123
[4] Marx @ 123
[5] Marx @ 123
[6] Carson, Charles. “‘Whole New Worlds’: Music and the Disney Theme Park Experience.” Ethnomusicology Forum, volume 13, number 2. (Nov., 2004): 228-235, 228.
[7] Carson: 229
[8] Carson: 230.
[9] Carson: 232.
[10] Carson: 231.
[11] The Official History of Muzak: http://75.muzak.com/# (accessed Dec. 9, 2010)
[12] Muzak LLC Official Website: http://music.muzak.com/why_muzak/ (accessed Dec. 9, 2010)
[13] Radano, Ronaldo. “Interpreting Muzak: Speculations on the Musical Experience in Everyday Life.” American Music, volume 7, number 4. (Winter, 1999): 450.
[14] Lanza, Joseph. “The Sound of Cottage Cheese: Why Background Music Is the Real World Beat!” Performing Arts Journal, volume 13, number 3. (Sept., 1991): 49.
[15] Rushkoff, Douglas. From http://rushkoff.com/index.php?s=commoditization&x=0&y=0 (accessed April 6, 2011)
