Traditional music in digital economy: challenges and benefits

Abstract

 This work is an investigation into the state of traditional music in this period where every aspect of human endeavour including music is gearing towards digitization. Nigeria as a developing country has welcomed this innovation in her quest to measure up with the global world, irrespective of some obvious challenges associated with it. It is pertinent to interrogate how traditional music has responded to this seemingly ‘new normal’ both in functions and usages. While the work relies on information from literature, and personal observations, it anchors on Joseph Schumpeter’s theory of “creative destruction” which propounds that, long-standing practices be dismantled in order to make way for innovations. By implication, analogue should give way to digital operations to enhance greater economic opportunities. Observations showed that for traditional music to engage fully in the wave of digitization and continue to remain relevant in the global market, Schumpeter’s creative destruction theory must come into play, the possibility of some bizarre and or unhealthy consequences notwithstanding.