Explaining famous composers' productivity!

[Borowiecki]

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

I am writing in order to draw your attention to this original (economic) research on the history of classical composers and their music.

This recent paper estimates the causal gain of locating in important centres for music (such as Paris in XIX century) on the production of classical composers. Composers who worked in geographic clusters have composed approximately one additional work of significance every three years. It is further shown that the disclosed productivity gains are attributed to peer effects, that is, the interaction that took place between composers in geographic clusters. The paper is forthcoming in the Journal of Urban Economics (here the paper: http://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/juecon/v73y2013i1p94-110.html).

Here are several other research papers on the lives of classical composers (http://ideas.repec.org/f/pbo539.html).

Please get in touch if you have any comments on these...

[petershott@btinternet.com]

I doubt if this research will stop the earth spinning on its axis. What you seem to be saying is that composers who live around some 'centre' or city, and therefore who have access to concert halls, academies, conservatories, libraries, publishers, places where they can obtain paper and pencils, places where they can teach and have pupils to teach, railway stations from which to embark on tours, affordable accommodation, cafes to meet with other like minded folk, and all the other sundry paraphernalia of a musical life tend to produce more music than they would if you picked up the poor creatures by the scruff of the neck and deposited them way out in the forest or desert.

Did we not rather suspect this independently of the research?

[Christopher]

That's the kind of snidely-put answer that has driven so many people from this forum. While the line of argument may be fair, it could have been entirely differently written.

[petershott@btinternet.com]

Heavens, I'm really the most good humoured of fellows! But I do have some intolerance of those who closet themselves in the ivory towers of academe and use precious research monies to 'explain' what we know already. On the face of it this seems to be one such project.

And, please, no intemperate spats about forums. Music is what matters and is infinitely more important than factions or folk choosing to go off in a bit of a huff!

[TerraEpon]

I think what Peter is basically getting at is that it's kinda of obvious that as a rule more famous people will be in population centers, and that having other famous people around will help make people become famous themselves through association.

[Alan Howe]

Has anyone actually read the research paper? I suggest that contributions to this thread should be restricted to those who have...

[semloh]

Karol -  It's a very technical paper, which I see has been highly rated by your peers, and you employ some very clever statistics, so congratulations are in order. Any critique I could offer would both be limited and misplaced, and (I admit) would inevitably reveal my highly sceptical attitude toward scientific economics.

However, I will venture that the potential synergistic effect of participating in a productive subculture (community) is already well-known, and so too that big cities are often the locus of such subcultures, especially in relation to the arts. There can surely be little doubt that the same results would be found in relation to artists, writers, skilled craftspersons, and many others.

Nonetheless, I am very interested to hear the relevance you believe the study has in relation to unsung composers, since they may well be a group with rather different characteristics! 

[Borowiecki]

Thank you for all these comments.

Indeed, the association between a person's productivity and the quality of his environment is quite well established. It is however not so clear what is the causal effect. Are geographic clusters attracting the most productive individuals or are people who cluster more productive because of positive externalities associated with cluster locations? In other words, is self-selection driving the previous empirical evidence on better performance in geographic clusters, or does there exist a clustering benefit?

This question is perhaps of some interest to people who cluster and policymakers, and I hoped it would interest also people with some fascination in music...therefore my my post here. Sorry if it appears to be spamming...

* If you do not have access to the Journal of Urban Economics article, here is a link to an earlier working paper version: http://ideas.repec.org/p/tcd/tcduee/tep0611.html