Artist and Entrepreneur: Identifying and developing key qualifications pertaining cultural entrepreneurship for musical acts

I have chosen to study cultural entrepreneurship, particularly focused in the popular music industries. I have been fascinated by the apparent randomness of which new artists gets signed by established agents in the industries and how they work to break through the clutter and launch their career. The fascination pertains what qualities or skills these artists possess that renders them as desirable signings for the established agents in the music industries. In a survey where students that have graduated from performing arts institutions 64 per cent of the respondents identified that “the ability to “develop entrepreneurial skills” (…), that their music education taught had little to no relevance as a starting point (for a future in the performing arts field). Through comments to the survey multiple individuals mentioned that their music education should have offered or provided a more thorough training in skills related to entrepreneurial development, such as economics and accounting, as many of them are freelancing or running their own business (Arnesen et al. 2014, p. 9, personal translation). I used this as a backdrop for the thesis. I interviewed four established industry professionals, and used the insights provided in a manner to guide and inform both performers in the performing arts (artists and cultural entrepreneurs) and identify possible areas of improvement in the current music education curricula pertaining entrepreneurial learning