Mr. Chair, vice-chairs and members of the committee, thank you so much for inviting me to speak with you today.
I would like to acknowledge Alexandre. Thank you as well.
The short notice to appear provided me with a challenge I was happy to accept, because I am always proud to talk about the remarkable impact that our members have on Canadians, on the Canadian economy, on Canadian businesses and on Canadian artists. I'm really grateful to have this opportunity to be before all of you today.
My name is Erin Benjamin. I am the president and CEO of the Canadian Live Music Association, and I have the great privilege of representing Canada's live music industry. While we don't represent artists directly, we do represent the venues, clubs, concert halls, stadiums, festivals, concert promoters, talent agents and the vast supply chain that facilitates live music, in all its shapes and sizes, for artists and their fans from across the country and around the world.
We are the touring infrastructure, indoors and out. You know us as your favourite local festival or maybe as the punk rock club where you used to mosh as a teenager, and you certainly know us as the industry that brings Taylor Swift to town.
Our budget submission contains three very important and specific recommendations, but rather than walk through the submission, which you've seen, I would instead like to share some additional information for your consideration as you think about how to situate the power of live music into the next federal budget and beyond.
In our brief, particularly in the second recommendation—although it does relate directly to all three—we talk about the potential and the opportunity music tourism is representing here in Canada and globally, and about how it's growing.
Music tourism is basically when you visit somewhere you don't live, no matter how far away, to see a show, and it's about the money you spend along the way. That is music tourism. In fact, in a few short weeks, the Canadian Live Music Association will release the first-ever economic impact study of Canada's live music sector. It will say that in 2023, visitor spending associated with live music tourism reached an estimated $9.9 billion, which in turn contributed $8.9 billion to GDP. That is in addition to the direct $2 billion in GDP from the live music industry itself, without the tourism piece, all while creating nearly 80,000 jobs combined.
This means not only that live music is about connecting artists and fans, but also that live music means tourism, and these numbers are basically without trying. Barely any policy or investment strategies that could wrap themselves around our industry exist, but they should and they could. We have comprehensive programs for the creation of content, but we have very few that focus on the infrastructure required to showcase that content.
The Canadian Live Music Association has a road map to level up Canada's live music activity and to compete with the international music tourism marketplace, which is growing by 10% per year because our industry is like no other. When our concert halls are full, our neighbourhood restaurants are full. When our festivals are sold out, our hotels are full. Our margins are very slim. We take on the risk, and everyone benefits. Just ask the city of Toronto next week.
Here's the thing; this is across our ecosystem. The Taylor Swift effect is scalable, whether it's a mid-sized performing arts centre in Calgary, a concert series in Prince George or the Festival d'été on the beautiful Plains of Abraham in Quebec City.
I want to reinforce, too, that the music itself matters. The artists are why we do this in the first place. Without them, none of this happens. Sometimes when we talk about the economics of this business, the fear is that this will get lost. The truth is that the more live music activity there is, the more opportunities there are for artists and their fans to create and share lifelong memories together. We bring them together.
I want to thank the committee for your time and for allowing me to amplify our recommendations by focusing on the solution we represent for Canadians, for the Canadian economy and for Canadian artists.
I look forward to future questions. Thank you so much.