Getting to know which genre is popular is very important to you as a songwriter. Why? Because of its importance in marketing your music as an indie musician. In that post, it is emphasized that the first step should be knowing your audience.
A very popular and high demand genre will enable you to get more audience that translates to higher income, exposure and music licensing opportunities of your original work. Also with respect to music artist, belonging to a popular genre assures that you have plenty of audiences and even more gig opportunities.
If the music genre is on a decline or is not popular anymore, your music will also get a fewer opportunities to earn and attract business. This means less income for a songwriter or music publisher where you are talking about music business. For an artist, it means less fans and audience. There will be fewer places that accept your gig offer or invite you to play because your genre is not that what most people love to listen.
Therefore what are currently the most popular and the best music genre for last year 2011? This is a worldwide survey using Google trends.
But first, let’s mention the top nominees. These are the most common type of music genre:
1.) Pop music genre
2.) Rock music
3.) Country music genre
4.) Hip Hop music
5.) Instrumental music
Top Music Genres as of 2011
Below is the Google trends result:
Popular music genre of 2011
When you examined the trend above, it’s a close battle between rock music and country music. These two are currently the most popular and the best music genre to target for this year, and possibly for the coming years. Other music genre did have some popularity but it cannot match with the rock and country music genre. For example, pop and hip hop music is comparable. It is also observed that instrumental music is “slowly” becoming more popular. It’s because in the year 2004, it is the most “unpopular” form of music genre among the top 5 choices. Now it has attained similar popularity with pop and hip-hop music.
Top Rock Sub-Genres as of 2011
One thing to take note is that “rock” music is a broad type of music genre. You might hear of sub-classification of “rock” music which are as follows:
1.) Heavy metal music (see: Top 10 Best Heavy Metal Songs of All Time)
2.) Christian rock music
3.) Punk rock music
4.) Alternative rock music(see: Ten Best Grunge Songs of the 90s)
5.) Death metal music
So what the most popular form of rock music in 2011? Below is the trend comparison result:
rock musi genre breakdown
You have noticed that it’s the heavy metal music which is the most popular form of rock music. And this is followed by alternative rock, punk rock, Christian rock music and death metal music.
Top Country Sub-genre
Like Rock music, country music also has a lot of different sub-genres. Let’s see what the most popular sub-genre for the following choices:
1.) Pop country
2.) Country rock
3.) Folk country
4.) Country ballads
5.) Traditional country
And this is the result:
Country music sub genre
It shows that the strongest sub-genre of country music is country rock and pop. The rest did not have significant popularity compared to this two.
Recommendations:
1.) If you are a songwriter/publisher needing to maximize the exposure of your music catalog. You need to target the most profitable genres which are the following: rock and country music.
It might be worth the investment and time of producing country music style out of your original-written songs if you are targeting songs to be performed by a solo artist.
If you are a songwriter and a band member, rock would be lucrative genre for your band as you have a lot of opportunities due to the high amount of listeners, fans and followers of this genre.
The pop music is still popular but it seems that the “majority” of people nowadays are more inclined to listen to rock and country for primary reasons:
a.) In rock and country music; it seems the artists songs are more meaningful compared to those found in hip-hope and RNB. They can write captivating songs with catchy hook and lyrics (read: How to Write or Make a Hit Song). This can easily attract most people attention and a wide variety of audiences (old, young, female and male audiences). Some genre like hip-hop and RNB are only popular to young audiences.
In addition, most rock and country musicians are great live performers and can play an instrument.
b.) Think twice of the genre you need to select. Sometimes this requires expertise in your part. This includes your singing and performing style.
2.) Write songs that can be classified as more than one genre. For example you can write a song that is more of a country rock feeling, so that it can be classified as both “rock” and “country” thus allowing you to market the songs in two genres instead of one. You should focus on writing really good songs. You can learn the 6 most proven hit songwriting tips. Those tips provide some guidelines on writing good songs.
This would allow you to maximize the exposure of your song in both of these highly popular music genres.
Content last updated on June 14, 2012