1. Researching the British Musicians’
Union: Bridging Troubled Waters?
Martin Cloonan & John Williamson
26 June 2013

2. Outline
• Part 1 – The Project and and our approach
• Part 2 – Issues surrounding the Union – labour
markets, technology, law

3. Part 1 – Project & Approach
• Introducing the Project
• A Brief History of the Musicians’ Union
• The Music Industries pre-1955
• Richard Peterson’s ‘Why 1955?’
• Musicians as workers

4. Part 1 – Introducing . . .
• 4 years from 2012 – 2016
• Funded by AHRC and ESRC
• Exhibition, Conference in Glasgow, 2016
• Sources: Union archives; other archives (BBC,
trade unions, etc.); interviews and previous
accounts / media reports

5. Part 1 – A Brief History
• Formed in 1893 by Joseph B. Williams as
Amalgamated Musicians’ Union (AMU)
• Merged with National Orchestral Union of
Professional Musicians (NOUPM) in 1921 to form
Musicians’ Union
• Membership (2011): 31 482
• Independent union; 120 years old

6. Part 1 – Music Industries pre 1955
• Music industries as “a network of industries
based on the production, publication,
exploitation and consumption of music”
(Williamson and Cloonan, 2007)
• “Historically, for most musicians, performance
has been the source of the majority of their
income.”(Williamson and Cloonan, 2013)

7. Part 1 – Peterson: Why 1955?
• 6 things that matter: law , technology, industry
structure, organisation structure, occupational
career and market
• Discusses changes in the music industry, radio
programming and entrepreneurial practice.
• Lacking musicians, working practices

8. Part 1 – Musicians as Workers
• Musicians as workers rather than / as well as
creators, celebrities, stars, etc.
• Musicians as workers – who are they and what
do they do?
• professionals, semi-professionals, amateurs?
• MU: ‘anyone following the profession of music’
• 3 considerations re: Union membership – who is
allowed? /who is forced? / who chooses to
join?

9. Part 1 – Musicians as Workers
• Diversity of musical employment / occupations
• Organising musicians – Union works regionally
and occupationally.
• Easier to organise orchestras than freelancers,
small ensembles.
• Musicians as particular type of worker who
shape and interact with broader societal and
industrial changes . . .

10. Part 2 – Issues affecting workers
• JB Williams: ‘a protecting Union, one that will
protect us from amateurs, protect us from
unscrupulous employers and protect us from
ourselves.’
• Protection – especially of live work – underpins
Union thinking
• Threats to live work from changes in labour
market in industries employing musicians;
technology; law.

11. Part 2 – Labour Markets
• AMU identified 3 main threats to work:
• amateurs
• police and military bands
• foreign musicians

12. Part 2 – Labour Markets
• Tours by foreign musicians routinely opposed
• MU gains veto on work permit applications with
Ministry of Labour – so-called ‘ban’ on US jazz
acts
• More complicated?
• ‘Ban’ = racist? Inflexibly applied?
• Reactions to working conditions – protecting
employment to exclusion of all others.

13. Part 2 – Technology
• 3 most important technological advances:
• The “talkies” – end of silent films (needing orchestral
accompaniment)
• Broadcasting / Radio – BBC formed in 1922
• The Gramophone and subsequent growth of
recording industry in 1920s
• MU’s approach to each of these was different
and not always oppositional.

14. Part 2 – Technology
• The Talkies: outright opposition / sense that
cinemas would ‘return to sanity’ – but MU
powerless in the face of US film producers
• Radio: policy of ‘regulating terms’ (1923); ‘has
not reduced the employment of musicians, but,
on the contrary, has increased it” (1925)
• Recording Industry: regulation and control
coupled with financial recompense via. PPL
• Union able to see opportunities as well as
threats from new technology

15. Part 2 – Law
• 2 types of legislation to consider: that which affects
the Union and that which it has (helped) instigate.
• Anti-trade Union legislation (1979-1997) –
weakening of Union powers / ideological opposition
to restrictive practices; opening up of markets in
broadcasting.
• Monopolies & Mergers Commission (MMC) report
on Collective Licensing (1988) had huge impact on
Union

16. Part 2 – Law
• Lobbying – MU advocate of the performers’ right
from post-War period. Recognised in Rome
Convention (1961) subsequently in EU (1992) and UK
law (1996)
• MU has subsequently supported other music
industries’ organisations in successfully lobbying for
extension of copyright term on sound recordings.
• Alignment of interests / temporary alliances
between union and employers

17. Conclusions
• Viewing musicians as workers allows us to:
• Understand some of the apparently incongruous
stances taken by the Union
• Question when the industrial conditions that
facilitated the advent of rock’n’roll actually came
about in the 1920s, 30s and 40s rather than 1955.

18. Conclusions
• Why not?
• 1921 – formation of Musicians’ Union
• 1922 – formation of the British Broadcasting Company
• 1927 – release of the Jazz Singer (first talkie)
• 1931 – formation of EMI
• 1934 – formation of Phonographic Performance Ltd
(PPL)
• 1946 – agreement between MU and PPL
• 1947 – agreement between PPL and BBC

19. www.muhistory.com