Music Australia has published the second edition of The Bass Line report. It has found that between 2024–25, the Australian music industry generated $10.76 billion in revenue, contributing $4.28 billion in Gross Value Added (GVA) to the economy.

Photo © Matthew Jungling/Unsplash

This represents a marked increase (5.2 per cent) from The Bass Line’s first edition findings, which attributed the music industry’s 2023–24 revenue to $10.23b (reported originally as $8.78b, this figure has now been adjusted to include music education).

The major changes in this growth are attributed to a growth in music retail (+$48m), composition, songwriting and music publishing exports (+$29m) and synchronisation (+$2m). Live music GVA dropped by $36m, credited to an increase in major international touring acts such as Taylor Swift and Coldplay, as did music product exports.

State-based contribution to the GVA ranks NSW (36 per cent), VIC (30 per cent), QLD (16 per cent), WA (8 per cent), SA (5 per cent), TAS (2 per cent), ACT (1 per cent) and NT (<1 per cent).

Music education

The Bass Line has also found that music education is a huge economic force, generating $1.79b in revenue, contributing more to GVA than live performance.

However, arts enrolments in tertiary institutions have fallen 21 percent between 2015–2023, with the biggest declines in QLD (45 percent) and WA (44 percent). Year 12 arts enrolments have also seen a similar drop.

Image courtesy Sydney Conservatorium of Music, University of Sydney

The report points to a “structural ATAR disincentive” as a major reason why: as a subject, Music is usually scaled down relative to other subjects, which risks a reduction in ATAR result.

The Bass Line also reveals some data from the upcoming 2025 National Arts Participation Survey: Aussies taught an art form at school are more likely to listen to recorded music, attend live events (as are their parents) and engage with arts content online. Two-thirds of parents who were taught an art form outside of school also enrol their children in extracurricular arts.

“Music education is not only producing the next generation of musicians, it is producing the next generation of audiences,” The Bass Line notes.

“There is a direct economic line from education participation today to concert attendance, streaming subscriptions and live event spending in the years ahead.”

AI and the arts

Alongside insurance costs, cost of living increases and inflation, Music Australia also indicates that AI is another increasing pressure on the industry, with 82 per cent of the creators viewing it as a threat to income.

Dynamic ticket pricing, A&R automation, copyright, employing AI music in sync licensing (music paired with visual media like advertisements, theatre or film) and the displacement of session musicians, arrangers, producers and post-production workers are some of the looming threats for Australian musicians and arts workers reported by The Bass Line – though, as of yet, no copyright claims related to AI and music have been filed in an Australian court.

Creatively, the dominant use of AI in music production is assistive, rather than generative, used mostly in stem separation, and through EQ and mastering tools.

Photo © Jonathan Kemper/Unsplash

A 2026 survey from Tracklib found that only 6 per cent of artists are using fully generative AI tools (including prompt-based song creation), though the use of AI co-writing tools, including melody and lyric generation, is employed by 10 per cent of artists.

In January 2026, streaming service Deezer reported it receives 60,000 fully AI-generated tracks per day, while Spotify removed 75 million spam tracks between September 2024–25. Fully AI-generated music poses a viable economic threat to artist income and visibility on these platforms.

The Bass Line also echoes findings from Victorian Music Development Office in February, which shows that AI-generated playlists and algorithms disadvantage Australian artists.

A Commonwealth parliamentary inquiry has recommended that streaming services increase the amount of Australian music pulled by their algorithms, but currently, fine-tuning an AI-generated algorithm to recommend more Australian music is seemingly a responsibility that falls on the user. While algorithms can’t be “directly retrained” without platform intervention, they can learn to suggest similar content to a consumer who actively seeks it out.

Audiences’ and artists’ income

Despite overall industry growth, The Bass Line found that artist income rose only 0.9 per cent from the 2023–24 statistics for a total of $877m, showing artist income isn’t keeping up with inflation.

Live performance provides 49 per cent of artist income, while royalties make up 23 per cent; government funding (3 per cent) and sponsorships (1 per cent) ranking as the smallest sources of income. Artists earning lower incomes are more reliant on live performance, while higher-earning artists earn more in royalties.

Photo © Konstantin Shishkin/Shutterstock.com

Audience attendance is growing at festivals and dedicated venues, but falling in pubs and clubs, both key platforms for emerging Australian artists. The biggest barrier for audiences is ticket prices, though transport, accommodation, and food and drinks costs are also shaping audience behaviour. Despite these findings, Australians are spending more on entertainment and leisure than they did in 2019.

Audiences also tend to prioritise international artists over local, seeing these acts as a “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunity. In 2024, classical music concert attendance was seen to grow by 7.6 per cent and its revenue by 14.5 per cent; comparatively, opera took a 22 per cent hit in revenue, and a 16.5 per cent hit to audience numbers.

Read Music Australia’s full report here.