Recession hits concerts: 2010 ticket sales down

The box-office take for the 50 biggest grossing tours in the world fell 12% to $2.93 billion, from $3.34 billion in 2009, according to Pollstar, a trade magazine considered the leading monitor of ticket sales.

In North America, the drop was even more pronounced, with a 15% decline to $1.69 billion.

Underscoring how the industry leans on aging but tried-and-true acts, Bon Jovi's 53-city tour was the biggest in the world this year, grossing $201.1 million.

By comparison, a 31-city tour by U2 topped the list for 2009, with a haul of $311 million.

Even before this year, signs of trouble had been brewing. Though industry-wide total grosses had increased in eight of the previous nine years, that growth had largely been driven by rising ticket prices, even as the number of tickets sold held roughly even.

That led many in the industry to warn that if fans' tolerance for rising prices were to wane, the gravy train could grind to a halt.

That appeared to be part of the equation in 2010, even as promoters scrambled to offer last-minute discounts, slashing prices for some underperforming shows to $10 or $20 a ticket.

Among the acts whose tickets were discounted were the Jonas Brothers, Rihanna, Santana with Steve Winwood, Creed, Maroon 5 and The "American Idol" live tour.

World-wide, average ticket prices increased 3.9% to $76.69, up from $73.83 in 2009.

In North America, the average price declined $1.55, or 2%, as concert promotion giant Live Nation Entertainment Inc. engaged in widespread last-minute discounting.

Despite those efforts, the number of tickets sold declined both world-wide and in North America—and even more steeply than the number of shows did, suggesting weak interest among fans.

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Bon Jovi performs on stage at Rod Laver Arena on Dec. 10.

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Throughout the world, concert-goers bought 38.3 million tickets this year, down 15% from 2009's 45.3 million. The 26.2 million tickets sold in North America represented a 12% drop from the 2009 level of 29.9 million. The ongoing slump in recorded music sales has been a major hurdle to getting top acts to accept less money for concerts, as concerts have become an important financial cushion.

Some in the concert industry had argued that because a live concert is a unique experience that can't be duplicated digitally and downloaded, their business would be immune to the problems that have pushed down recorded music.

U.S. album sales are down 13% this year compared with 2009, to 319 million, according to Nielsen SoundScan. Sales of CDs, which are often more profitable for record labels than cheaper digital albums, are off 20% so far this year. Sales of individual digital songs have ticked up a mere 1% compared with 2009, to just over 1.1 billion.

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Those shifts have hit many acts in the pocket book, and older acts with established fan bases turned increasingly in recent years to concert tours, with regularly rising prices, to steady their finances.

Irving Azoff, Live Nation's executive chairman and the manager of numerous major acts, last year told The Wall Street Journal that recorded music represented as little as 6% of some clients' income—down from 50% a decade ago.

Last month, in a conference call with stock analysts Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino vowed to reduce prices. "We know that if you lower the price, they'll come," he said. "If you want to get a casual concert buyer to come to a show that he's debating, we know in the amphitheaters that if you price it at $20 all-in they will come."