倾听：音乐发现与参与洞察

Cover image:Credit: Maja Baska.AcknowledgementCreative Australia acknowledges the many TraditionalCustodians of Country throughoutAustralia and honourstheirElderspast and present.We respect their deep and enduring connection totheir lands,waterways and surrounding clan groups since timeimmemorial. We cherish the richness of FirstNationspeoples’artistic and culturalexpressions.We are privileged to gather on this Country and to shareknowledge, culture andart,now and withfuturegenerations.Listening In: Insights on music discovery and engagementis published under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Non-Derivative Works 4.0 Licence.Attribution: Creative Australia 2025,Listening In: Insightson music discovery and engagement.This report was supported through a partnership with Untitled Groupand The Daily Aus, as well as a collaboration with The Push. ContentsForewordExecutive summaryMain findingsMusic discovery and engagement at a glanceIntroductionMethodologyPart One: Engagement with and attitudes towardsAustralianListening rates – for both Australian and international musicAttitudes towards Australian music and artist originPart Two: Discovering new music and attitudestowards algorithmic selectionMusic discovery methodsStreaming platformsMusic festivals and recommendations from friendsSocial mediaRadioViews on music discovery and algorithmsAppendicesAppendix A: Research project methodology 2357911music1323383943475153576161 ForewordThe last decade has seen tremendous change in the ways in whichwe discover and listen to music.Social media has emerged as a key sourceof music discovery through viral videos andmemes. There has also been a shift frombroadcast to narrowcast distribution, asstreaming subscriptions rise as the dominantmethod through which people listen to andlearn about music.The previous report in ourListening Inseriesinvestigated Australians’ attendance at livemusic. In this report, we move to considerthe impacts of changing technologies onAustralians’ listening habits – and what thismeans for our discovery of and engagementwith local Australian artists.Clearly, streaming and social media arechanging the ways in which people are listeningto and discovering music. Music academics,researchers and journalists are noting a dropin Australians’ rates of listening to Australianmusic, and this report cites much of thiscommentary and research.Many in the Australian music industry are alsorecognising these shifts in Australians’ listeninghabits and, in response, we are seeing the riseof initiatives geared to boosting the visibility oflocal content amongst Australian audiences.From commercial, national and communityradio stations to major streaming companiesand peak industry bodies, we are seeing arange of positive actions taken to address someof the current challenges for audiences indiscovering new Australian music.Music Australia has been established withinCreative Australia, the Australian Government’sprincipal arts investment and advisory body, tosupport and invest in Australian contemporarymusic. With this mandate, we also recognisedeclining consumption rates of Australianmusic as a critical issue and are committedto expanding the opportunities for localengagement with Australian music.LISTENING IN: INSIGHTS ON MUSIC DISCOVERY AND ENGAGEMENT TheListening Inseries is an important step inthat process, highlighting areas of potentialas well as those of challenge in this work.This second report, for example, provides arange of very positive material regardingaudiences’ sentiments towards Australianmusic – their desire to engage more with localacts, and the sense of pride they feel when theyrealise an artist they already know is in factAustralian. These are extremely valuableinsights, particularly given they sit alongside,and sometimes in contradiction to, already-published data on low listening rates forAustralian music across the country.We hope that these insights are of assistanceto the sector as well, adding to ourunderstanding of the changing landscapefor music engagement in Australia andproviding new data and actionable consumerinsights for our collective work in this field.Millie MillgateDirectorMusic Australia Executive summaryAustralians are major consumers of recordedmusic.In 2023, Australia was the tenth largestmusic market in the world, falling out of the topten in 2024.1Recorded music industry wholesalesales increased by 6.1% to $717 million in 2024– the highest recorded since the addition ofdigital sales in 2005.2However in recent years local engagementwith new Australian music has been declining.There has been a drop in the number ofAustralian musicians featured on the AustralianRecording Industry Association (ARIA) chartsand on triple j’s Hottest 100.3This contrasts withengagement with local music in non English-language countries (including France, SouthKorea and Japan). It is also at odds with thesuccess of many Australian artists overseas.Digital innovations have broadened access