The evolution and changing role of the music video from 1900, and its likely development in

the future.

The role of music videos has changed since 1900, from serving mainly artistic purposes to

now serving promotional purposes. The way that we watch music videos has also evolved

from TV and jukeboxes and is now expanding to online and downloads.

When music videos first came about they were mainly artistic. For example Komposition in

Blau by Oskar Fichinger in 1935 was one of the first music videos and simply matched sound

and sight in an artistic stop motion video. 10 years later juke boxes in America began

showing music videos alongside the music and so this is where the use of music videos as a

promotional tool began. One example of this is The Frim Fram Sauce by Nat King Cole which

was shown on these juke boxes.

In 1967 The Beatles created a music video for Top of the Pops because they were in America

at the time of the show. As The Beatles were well known, this included lots of artist close

ups which would attract fans. There was no story line to this video but it was both

promotional and artistic. With the introduction of music channels on television such as MTV

more artists created music videos to promote their music.

Today, this is still the case with artists featuring in their music videos. However, the cost of

creating these videos has declined. Where videos used to cost hundreds of thousands of

pounds to make, they now cost just a fraction of this. Partly causing this change is the

decline in viewers who watch music channels. To try and pull back viewers these channels

are branching out, such as creating their own TV shows like My Super Sweet 16. This means

that music videos get less air time and so artists focus less on them and instead may

concentrate on other areas of their careers such as tours, interviews or radio plays.

In the future music videos may remain a promotional tool, but this will be transferred from

TV such as MTV to online on sites such as YouTube. This is because people are becoming

more connected online and the idea of being able to access what you want, when you want

and from where you want through the use of 3G internet on portable devices such as

smartphones or tablets is appealing to an increasing market. This will benefit artists as

people can easily share their favourite videos through social networking sites which serves

as free promotion. Users can also add their opinions to music videos, such as commenting

or liking a video on YouTube which allows artists or music companies to interact with their

customers.Also, with a growing number of people using music devices such as iPods, I think

that more people will download music videos to watch. This means that artists and

companies will profit more from music videos as sales will increase.

However, I believe that the cost of buying a music video will decrease as less people are

willing to pay for music and music videos. For example, in the last six months of 2012 more

than 33 million albums and 10 million singles were illegally downloaded from one file

sharing site alone called BitTorrent [1]. This means a loss from the music industry of more

than £500 million and so cheaper prices may prevent people from doing this. Otherwise, the

music industry could face trouble if not enough people purchase their product.

The use of 3D may also be introduced into music videos as this may capture and excite the

audience. I think that this feature may be introduced within the next 10 years as 3D movies

are already popular and so 3D music videos may be too.

As star iconography is increasing, with people being increasingly interested in celebrities, I

think that there will become 2 different types of music videos. Those who follow this and

show lots of artist close up shots, and those who try to challenge this, for example Ed

Sheeran isn’t featured at all in some of his videos such as The A Team. Therefore it depends

on how distinct an artist’s voice is and the message that they are trying to get across

through their music video.

In conclusion, I think that music videos will still be used as a promotional tool in the future.

However this will be online and through downloads rather than on television. Also, music

videos will remain to be artistic and feature the artist but they may become more creative,

use more special effects or try to challenge stereotypical music videos.

[1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/music-news/9547974/UK-second-worst-in-

world-for-illegal-music-downloads.html

By Katie Clover