Framing Performance and Fusion - 2022 - Article - 151

American Journal of Cultural Sociology (2022) 10:285–315
https://doi.org/10.1057/s41290-022-00151-8
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Framing performance and fusion: how music venues’

materiality and intermediaries shape music scenes
Myrtille Picaud1
Accepted: 24 November 2021 / Published online: 12 March 2022

© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited 2022
Abstract
How do performances contribute to meaning-making processes in cultural fields?
This paper focuses on the spaces where performances happen and how music is
framed and staged by intermediaries. I engage critically with cultural pragmatics
from a Bourdieusian perspective to argue that performance contexts are central to
the structure of music scenes, and that fusion may be understood as a moment when
the “rules of the game” (Bourdieu 1993) of a cultural field are enacted, perpetuated,
or contested. This article points to the role that cultural intermediaries play in shap-
ing performances, interpreting systems of collective representation, and achieving
fusion. I devise a framework to analyze how the Parisian music scene is organized
and structured by a pure/impure binary linking specific music genres to performance
contexts. I also examine how cultural intermediaries in Paris work within this frame,
playing with performance “rules” to shape audiences’ understandings and experi-
ences of music in particular venues. Drawing on ethnographic observations con-
ducted in two major venues, I show how bookers attempt to transform the “rules of
the game” and position their venues as part of the avant-garde by mixing “pure” and
“impure” elements of performance during the events.
Keywords Performance · Music · Genre · Cultural intermediaries · Fusion · Mixed-

methods
Introduction
Music has frequently been at the center of academic debates concerning how taste,
distinction, and cultural hierarchies (Bourdieu 1984) are related to consumption
practices (Peterson 1992). However, this line of research overlooks how music is
experienced in everyday life (Benzecry 2011; DeNora 2000; Small 1998) and
very rarely examines live music on stage. Indeed, the sociology of music has been
* Myrtille Picaud
[email protected]
1
Pacte/CEE, Grenoble Alpes University, Grenoble, France
Vol.:(0123456789)
286 M. Picaud
influenced by a “production–consumption paradigm” (McCormick 2012) and until

recently has devoted little attention to performance. As Simon Frith (2007) states,
“live music matters,” not only on an economic level but also as a collective site of
meaning-making for audiences and performers alike (Hesmondhalgh 2007). It forms
the very basis of many music scenes.
How do performances contribute to meaning-making processes in cultural
scenes? How is meaning in performance influenced by the structure of local scenes?
How are musical performances, and the audience’s reception of music, shaped by
the people who organize concerts and the spaces where they are staged? Answering
these questions requires paying attention to live music’s material context (the types
of venues and their architecture) and to the diversity of listening practices. These
questions produce fruitful paths for further enquiry, where analysts might examine
how these contexts interact with systems of collective representations about music.
Furthermore, focusing on music as performance also brings attention to the cultural
intermediaries who orchestrate the meeting between audiences and artists and whose
role often remains invisible. Not only are these intermediaries gatekeepers, but they
also shape how music is experienced, appreciated, and understood (Hennion 2003;
Lizé et al. 2011; Negus 1999; Wynn 2012).
This paper aims to engage critically with the analysis of music as performance by
focusing on the spaces in which performances take place. In addition to emphasiz-
ing materiality, it focuses on the way that music is framed and staged within these
spaces by intermediaries. In the first section, I present the theoretical framework that
informs my analysis. I discuss how a cultural pragmatic approach to music (McCor-
mick 2006) as “social performance” (Alexander 2004) can be fruitfully combined
with research on cultural intermediaries and their role in bridging artistic production
and reception in artistic fields. Although the strong program in cultural sociology is
often presented as incompatible with Bourdieusian field theory (Santoro and Solaroli
2015), bringing them into conversation opens up new directions in understanding
performance fusion, which, as we will see, can be understood as the moment when
the “rules of the game” (Bourdieu 1993) within a field are enacted, perpetuated, or
contested. Bridging both theoretical approaches, I analyze the structure of the Paris-
ian music scene, which rests on the pure/impure binary, to understand performance
contexts. In the second section, I examine two cases where intermediaries intend to
transform the scene’s “rules of the game” by playing on the different elements of
performance. My analysis emphasizes the role of intermediaries and the structural
context surrounding performance fusion.
Live music, performance fusion, and cultural fields
Research about music consumption practices has devoted much attention to cultural
legitimacy. Often national statistical surveys are used to examine individual prefer-
ences for music genres, or attendance at concerts, in order to analyze the changing
features—or disappearance—of cultural hierarchies; a considerable number of these
surveys study musical omnivorism (Coulangeon 2003; Friedman et al. 2015; Liz-
ardo and Skiles 2015; López-Sintas and Katz-Gerro 2005; Savage and Gayo 2011).
Framing performance and fusion: how music venues’ materiality… 287
However, researchers have rarely considered how performance shapes these hier-
archies within music fields, despite the influence that consumption styles have on
the formation of status judgments and the creation of hierarchies between cultural
objects (Holt 1998; Jarness 2015).
Performance, indeed, remains understudied. It has been argued that sociologists
“have understood music either as a product of cultural industries and art worlds, or
as a resource in social action; in both cases the main interest is the social relations
surrounding the musical object and its use in social settings, not the properties of
the music itself” (McCormick 2015, p. 21). Contrary to this, Lisa McCormick draws
on the strong program’s theory of cultural pragmatics to develop a “performance
perspective” on music. In accordance with this perspective, developed by Jeffrey
C. Alexander, performance is “the social process by which actors, individually or
in concert, display for others the meaning of their social situation” (2004, p. 529).
Alexander argues that contemporary, complex societies continue to be permeated
by symbolic, ritual-like activities. Although these activities differ from the rituals
performed in earlier societies, their aim remains the same: “to create, via skillful and
affecting performance, the emotional connection of audience with actor and text and
thereby to create the conditions for projecting cultural meaning from performance
to audience” (Alexander 2011, p. 53). It is only by establishing these conditions of
fusion that performances can be considered successful. Performative success rests
on the audience’s perception of the performance’s authenticity, which, according to
Alexander, is achieved through the re-fusion of the basic elements of performance—
i.e., systems of collective representations, actors, observers/audience, means of sym-
bolic production, mise-en-scène, and social power (see Alexander 2011)—that have
been de-fused in complex societies. Re-fusion of all six elements in performance
thus occurs relatively rarely, in moments of short-lived effervescence (in the Dur-
kheimian sense).
This paper engages with Alexander’s cultural pragmatics from a theoretical per-
spective that draws on Bourdieu’s field theory. These perspectives are often situ-
ated in stark opposition. However, a reexamination of the concept of performative
fusion through the lens of cultural fields can serve as a useful heuristic for the fur-
ther development of a “cultural pragmatic” theory of performance within the strong
program. How can fusion be understood in this sense? Marco Solaroli and Marco
Santoro offer two ways forward. First, they argue that “one of the less developed
parts of the strong program is precisely a meso-level theory of social organization
and of social positioning—exactly what field theory can offer” (2015, p. 65). Sec-
ond, they point to the role Alexander gives to critics in the interpretation, evaluation,
and consecration of performative fusion, and emphasize how this resembles the role
that cultural intermediaries play in cultural fields. I develop these ideas and point
to potential compatibilities in these lines of research by drawing on the notion of
“fusion.” According to Bourdieu (1993), cultural fields are relatively autonomous
social spaces characterized by specific “rules of the game.” In a cultural field, the
“rules of the game” are not dictated by the social or the economic; they are refracted
according to the specific cultural rules that structure the field. Agents within the field
compete to achieve recognition and impose their conception of cultural legitimacy,
288 M. Picaud
and their positions differ depending on their amount of capital, which is specific to
each field.
If performance re-fusion denotes a short-lived effervescence that enables the
reenactment of meaning and collective representations, it can be understood as a
moment when the field’s “rules of the game” are represented and embodied, whether
that is for their enforcement or their contestation. This would mean that, from a field
perspective, a fused social performance would draw on the systems of collective rep-
resentations that structure the field. These representations can be supported by those
who are dominant in the field to uphold their position. Subordinate social groups, in
turn, may draw on these same systems of collective representation in their struggle
to upturn existing hierarchies. In the music field, a fused performance would, thus,
not only be a “good concert” but also a musical event that brings together the field’s
rules and values such that it affects its agents’ positions and symbolic capital.
To examine “fusion” from this perspective, this paper studies diverse music ven-
ues showcasing all music genres in Paris, including auditoriums, classical music
halls, operas, musical bars, clubs, jazz clubs, cabarets, and squats. Although I do
not strictly conceive of the Parisian live music scene as a field in Bourdieu’s terms,
I draw on his approach to define it as a relational space in which specific meanings
about music derive from performance contexts, agents’ positions, and capital. This
space is relational because venues represent competing opportunities for audiences
to listen to music, or for presenters to book artists in a geographically defined scene.
Looking for cultural intermediaries in the fusion of performance
Having established how fusion can be conceptualized within a field-oriented theory,

the next question to address is who makes performance fusion happen within these
fields. Alexander has emphasized the role of critics, who “provide public judgments
before lay members of the public, and even other artists […]. The effect, in a large
and complex society, is not just to offer an evaluation but to create a context for its
reception” (Alexander 2011, p. 213). It could be added that some critics also have
the power to recognize, or evaluate, whether or not a performance is fused. Further-
more, other intermediaries contribute to the fusion of the performance by shaping
its conditions and by framing how the actors and the audience interpret the perfor-
mance, including the systems of collective representation at play.
Most research places the audience on one side and the artists on the other, over-
looking the cultural intermediaries who organize performances in complex, differ-
entiated societies where culture has become professionalized. One notable exception
is Howard Becker’s (1982) work on the cooperation between networks of diverse
groups to create art. Recent work on cultural intermediaries in diverse artistic fields
also shows how they participate in artistic legitimation (Bielby and Roussel 2015;
Jeanpierre and Roueff 2014; Lizé et al. 2014). Drawing on Bourdieu’s theory of cul-
tural legitimacy, which entails a structural homology between the social space and
the cultural field, Roueff (2013) suggests that cultural intermediaries are the “magi-
cians” who create this homology, linking specific audiences to specific works of
art. This homology evolves as a result of transformations in the social structure and
artistic fields, as well as through the work of cultural intermediaries. Bookers are
especially important. They assess the suitability of artists for a stage by considering
their music and the venue’s artistic preferences, as well as the size of the venue and
expected attendance rates within a geographic locale.
Cultural intermediaries are thus central to the meaning-making process in per-
formance. Whereas some intermediaries, such as critics, are more important on the
reception side, others, such as bookers in music venues, contribute to the preparation
of performance. However, as Roueff (2013) points out, Bourdieu rarely considered
how the latter bring together artists and audiences. The same can be said of Alex-
ander’s research (Santoro and Solaroli, 2015). How do these intermediaries shape
the way systems of collective representations appear in social performance? As we
will see, they play on the interaction between musical scripts, the venues’ material
layout, and the different listening practices linked to specific music genres within a
field defined by its own “rules of the game.”
“Pure” versus “impure:” performance and material listening contexts

and practices
Looking at the cultural intermediaries’ role (and more specifically, the bookers) in
performance fusion redirects our attention to how performances are shaped to influ-
ence audience reception. It is through the material context and listening practices
that bookers influence which frameworks are brought to bear in a performance.
These frameworks rest on the systems of collective representation that organize the
field and its “rules of the game.”
Cultural pragmatics draw our attention to the mise-en-scène of the performance
and its means of symbolic production:
[M]usical texts cannot completely determine meaning because they are never
performed in a vacuum. Rather, they are enacted in particular contexts, such as
a religious service, a gala or a subway platform. The social setting introduces
its own set of collective representations, which may or may not be congruent
with those evoked through the scripts, and the interaction between these sym-
bolic frameworks shapes the musical experience for both the performer and
the audience. (McCormick 2015, p. 23)
By exploring how bookers work to shape performance contexts and practices, I
build on this insight and thereby contribute to a richer understanding of the con-
ditions for psychological identification and cultural extension—or fusion—between
text, actors, and audiences.
Work by scholars such as Simon Frith focuses on the material and embodied
dimension of performance in live music. Frith, for example, analyzes the sound, per-
formance, and packaging conventions as well as the embodied values that “deter-
mine how musical forms are taken to convey meaning and value, which determine
the aptness of different sorts of judgment, which determine the competence of dif-
ferent people to make assessments” (1996, p. 95). In his analysis, Frith emphasizes
290 M. Picaud
that these conventions and practices vary depending on the music genre. Indeed,
objects and materiality in music venues shape listening practices and embody cul-
tural structures, thereby distinguishing genres: the seats in an opera house mate-
rialize silent and seated listening, whereas the glasses people drink from on the
dance floor, sometimes plastic ones crushed by many raving feet, seem to point to
the functional, leisurely aspect of nightclubs. Even the venues’ architecture differs—
their walls, stairs, bars, do not enable the same consumption of music, and do not
give it the same meaning.
Given these reflections on the different “genre rules” of performance, this paper
suggests that performance contexts should be examined relationally by bridging dif-
ferent music genres: sitting audiences should, for instance, be understood compared
to standing audiences. These performance practices also relate to collective repre-
sentations and oppositions that structure music scenes and distinguish music genres.
As we will see, the Parisian live music scene is strongly structured by representa-
tions that draw on the opposition between the “pure” and the “impure.” Mary Doug-
las (1966) shows that this binary is a structuring element in many societies, and that
it can be considered as foundational for the social order. Artistic fields thrive on
oppositions between the pure and the impure, the sacred and the profane, and the
aesthetic and the vulgar (Bourdieu 1984).
Within the musical field, the pure–impure binary is strongly attached to the con-
texts and materiality of listening practices. The development of “musical idealism”
in the 19th century transformed music venues and listening habits: the adoption of
a “pure/sacred/aesthetic” serious demeanor during concerts, for example, led to a
social homogenizing of audiences (Goehr 1994). This contributed to a “process of
‘aestheticizing’ art […], producing pure judgements of taste from the distinction
between musical and nonmusical aspects” (Weber 2008, p. 102). In the French con-
text, the positive side of the binary confers cultural legitimacy. Indeed, the scale of
cultural legitimacy theorized by Bourdieu is defined not only “by the segmentation
between genres, but also by differentiating between practices, [with] ‘pure’ listening
being opposed to ‘functional’ listening” (author’s translation, Coulangeon 2003, p.
15).
Many struggles around “authenticity” in contemporary music scenes (Peterson
1997; Bennett and Peterson 2004), as they have been defined following initial work
by Will Straw (2004), also are based on the binary between the pure and the impure.
In these scenes, the “impure” maps onto the inauthentic, and generally occurs when
economic stakes (as opposed to artistic ones) are at the forefront; although, judg-
ments may vary according to actors. Perceived authenticity is therefore strongly
linked to the venues’ material context as well as its types of audiences and listening
practices (Grazian 2005). Howard Becker demonstrates this with respect to how the
meaning attributed to jazz music is shaped by the social place where it is consumed.
Warning against “too facilely substituting a classification of people for one of activi-
ties” (Becker 2004, p. 27), he insists that distinctions in jazz are not based on the
opposition between “jazz players” and “commercial players,” since these often are
the same persons who are simply playing in different (and opposed) performance
contexts.
In what follows, I examine how systems of collective representation, and specifi-

cally the pure–impure binary, structure the Parisian live music scene by placing ven-
ues in oppositional distinction to one another according to their listening contexts
and practices. By undertaking this examination, I reveal how bookers bring these
systems of collective representation to bear in performance, and how they position
their venues in the local scene when performative fusion is achieved.
Data and methods
This study focuses on Paris for two reasons. First, selecting a single city delimits a
music scene that is recognizable to audiences and professionals. For potential audi-
ences in Paris, venues represent opportunities to listen to music. Audience mem-
bers choose to attend concerts in venues by considering a range of factors including
musical line-ups, ticket prices, geographical locations (e.g., proximity to home, or
whether venues are in a “cool” or “relaxed” neighborhood), and schedules. This live
music scene is the space that shapes their (live) music listening practices. For music
professionals, it is also a relational space. Bookers compete to book the “best” art-
ists. Artists, in turn, try to be booked in the “good” venues, or those that project an
image that attracts their intended audiences.
The second reason for focusing on Paris is its central role in the French cultural
landscape. Many acts are showcased in the capital before touring the country. This is
especially the case for international artists. Paris has the most venues in France and
plays a defining role in the national music field (Picaud 2021). The venue which first
presents an artist largely determines how their music will be labeled. As one booker
put it, “Paris is a city for showcases.”
Paris […] polarizes the industry, meaning that Paris, well, what I often say is
that it’s a city for showcases. An artist, for his first time in France, will neces-
sarily go through Paris, but he won’t necessarily go to Dijon or Tourcoing. He
goes to Paris for the good reason that the media is in Paris, the industry is in
Paris… Bookers, most of them, are in Paris. It’s a place where you start your
projects. You create an artistic profile and then it can go on a French tour or
somewhere else.1
My analysis draws on three data sources. The first is a tailor-made database listing
all venues in Paris (n = 217) that met simple criteria: indoor places2 promoting at
least four musical events per month (including those involving DJs), which may or
may not charge admission. All music genres and venue types are included: night
clubs, jazz clubs, big arenas, concert halls, churches, and so on. The database lists
material, geographic, economic, and symbolic characteristics of the venues (see list
in Appendix). The second data source consists of semi-structured interviews with
1
Booker in a medium-size venue with diverse music styles including pop, rock, electronic, hip hop, and
chanson. Interview in Paris on October 29, 2015.
2
Because festivals take place only once a year, they were not included in the database. Similarly, at the
time of the study, there were no permanent open-air music spaces in Paris, which thus do not appear in
the database either.
292 M. Picaud
cultural policy authorities (n = 10) and music bookers affiliated with 30 different
venues. In Paris, bookers are typically employed by venues to select artists. The
bookers, who are anonymized, were selected to represent the diversity of music ven-
ues. Interview questions concerned their representations of music and performance,
working practices, artistic selection and tastes, the venue’s audiences and material
configuration, as well as their own career. The third data source draws on ethno-
graphic observations of 152 musical events in various venues over a five-year period
(2012–2017). This allowed me to see how a venue’s material configuration shaped
audiences’ appreciation of the event and the artist and the artistic positioning of the
musicians. The interviews and ethnographic observations also informed the defini-
tion of venue variables in the statistical analysis, allowing the inclusion of mean-
ingful information on the artists’ presentation and the audiences’ experience during
events.
The database of venues was analyzed using Multiple Correspondence Analysis
(MCA) to determine how performance contexts and the materiality of venues struc-
tures the Parisian music scene. MCA has been used extensively by Bourdieu and by
those adopting his perspective to analyze the homology between cultural practices
and social positions (Bennett et al. 2010; Duval et al. 2016). Because it synthetizes
the relationships between entities described by complex datasets, MCA is the most
appropriate method to map the relations between venues and to see how genres are
positioned within this space (as supplementary variables). In other words, it maps
the context within which bookers operate and enables the visualization of how per-
formance contexts and listening practices differentiate music genres in Paris.
I, thus, draw on a specific MCA3 with 15 active variables (61 active modali-
ties and 10 supplementary modalities with missing or redundant information). The
active variables concern the materiality of the venue, its economic organization and
legal status, the audiences in the venue, and the venues’ symbolic capital and visibil-
ity. A further set of 21 variables are retained as supplementary items detailing the
venues’ musical bookings and music genres (see the Appendix for complete descrip-
tion of variables).
Pure or impure? Collective representations structuring the Parisian

music scene
Examining how bookers attempt to create the conditions that lead to performance
fusion and position their venues within the local scene initially requires mapping
the collective representations that structure the field and its “rules of the game.”
Although the music field is influenced by transnational cultural flows, scenes tend
to be differentiated according to local and national contexts, as research on cultural
globalization has shown: “rock,” “pop,” or “jazz” do not correspond to the same
3
For further information on this method, which avoids the contribution of irrelevant modalities to the
formation of the axis, see Le Roux (2004, pp. 378–394) and Le Roux and Rouanet (2004).
meanings, performances, audiences, or professionals in the United States, France,

Indonesia, or Japan (Atkins 2001; Grazian 2005; Regev 2013; Wallach and Clinton
2013).
The first two axes of the MCA illustrate different modalities that contrast venues
and listening contexts, pointing to the systems of collective representation based on
a pure/impure binary that structures the local scene. This binary does not strictly
map onto the venues’ symbolic capital—it is a relational notion that depends on the
types of bookers, artists, and audiences involved. For example, the binary may be
read and mobilized differently vis-à-vis a grand symphonic concert as opposed to
a small punk gig. However, those with the most symbolic capital within the field
have more power to define the “rules of the game” and as such, how the pure/impure
binary should be read and mobilized in the music scene. As we will see, in the Paris-
ian scene, this binary is strongly linked to the performances’ material contexts and
listening practices, and as such, also distinguishes between music genres, according
to different “genre rules” (Frith 1996).
Both oppositions structuring the Parisian scene, as it appears in the MCA,
draw on the binary between pure and impure. First, the distinction between ven-
ues depends on the centrality of music in their activities and the revenue it gener-
ates, and is something that often translates into the venue’s design (i.e., whether the
building was initially built to become a concert hall or is an old industrial building
that was transformed). This can be summarized as the venues’ (musical) symbolic
capital (Axis 1). Second, the scene is structured by the opposition between listen-
ing practices, distinguishing venues according to the types of performances pre-
sented and the audience participation they enable (Axis 2). Venues where audiences
must stand and remain open late, such as nightclubs, are opposed to those where
audiences are seated and only stage concerts in the evening. Both axes reflect the
oppositional relation of music genres and testify to the unequal legitimacy of venues
depending on the performance contexts. The pure/impure binary is also mobilized
by the local and national government (through subsidies), as well as private spon-
sors, to hierarchize the music scene and define the “rules of the game.” I briefly
interpret the first two axes of the MCA, which represent 14.33% of the total variance
(see Tables 2 and 3 in Appendix).
The first principle structuring this music scene (see Fig. 1) reveals how mate-
rial contexts influence the meaning that is given to the venues’ activity: is it specifi-
cally “musical,” or is music secondary to other activities, such as eating, drinking,
or socializing? The characterization of music as a primary or secondary activity is
strongly linked to the venue’s importance in terms of recognition, economic weight,
visibility, and seating capacity (the axis represents 8.4% of the Φ2 of the cloud).
This first axis could be defined, in Bourdieusian terms, as one that places venues
in opposition depending on their specific musical capital. Venues where music is
“secondary” are recoded by those in a dominant position as supporting an “impure”
practice. Axis 1 draws a continuum opposing two types of venues: those that have
the power to define themselves as primarily musical (on the left), and those whose
main activity is elsewhere, e.g., bars (on the right).
294 M. Picaud
Fig. 1 Axis 1 and 2, active variables
The professional venues with larger capacities have strong institutional sup-
port, and their reputation is international. These include historical venues (built
before 1945) featuring theatrical architectures, which are located in the bour-
geois Western districts of the capital. They enjoy considerable recognition, as
evidenced by their pervasive social media presence and expensive ticket prices
(more than 100 €). The internationalization of the venues’ line-ups is linked to
their symbolic capital: larger venues host more artists from foreign countries,
while foreign artists are uncommon in smaller venues. Indeed, the right side
of Axis 1 includes venues whose relative invisibility can be attributed to their
small size. Admission is inexpensive or even free, and the artists tend to be less
renowned. These venues do not benefit from patronage or public funding.
The venues’ specific musical capital is thus strongly linked to their economic
model, i.e., how much they rely on musical performances and how much financial
support they receive, which also testifies to their degree of recognition from public
institutions and private patrons. But musical capital also rests on the professionaliza-
tion of the musical activity. For example, in most musical bars, the general manager
selects bands and artists when she has the time, whereas in professionalized venues,
the labor is more differentiated. Specific professionals are paid to manage the dif-
ferent aspects of performances, such as the box office, public relations, lighting and
sound, booking, and production. The bookers I interviewed insisted on differenti-
ating their work in these professionalized venues from what they call “soda mer-
chants” (limonadiers). This vocabulary reinforces professional hierarchies and the
meaning associated with their work by indicating that they work for music’s sake,
whereas the others only showcase musical acts to earn money through bar sales,
leaving artists poorly compensated. The dominant bookers, thus, have the power to
determine the “purity” of a musical activity.
This opposition between venues according to the degree of perceived “musical
purity” also structures the distribution of musical genres (see Fig. 2). The first Axis
shows a strong opposition between lyrical, classical, and contemporary music in
large venues on the left side, and noise, metal, and punk (three genres that rarely
appear in Paris)4 in the less professionalized venues on the right side. The other gen-
res, such as rock, Francophone chanson, and electronic music, are less differentiated
by this first opposition. This also illustrates how genres excluded from French cul-
tural policies promoting popular music are marginalized in the Parisian scene (noise
or funk, for instance). The label musiques actuelles (“current music”) usually com-
prises rock, pop, chanson, rap, and increasingly electronic music, which appear in
dedicated professionalized and subsidized music venues.
The pure/impure binary is not only drawn upon to hierarchize venues in the pro-
fessional realm; it also distinguishes audiences’ listening practices, as can be inter-
preted in the second principle differentiating music venues (vertical axis). The sec-
ond factor represents 5.93% of the Φ2 of the cloud. The performance contexts vary
in terms of temporality and the physical engagement of audiences. At the top of the
Axis, the venues receive no public subsidies, they stay open after 2:00 a.m., and
their audiences must stand. On the bottom, there are very different types of ven-
ues: large public organizations and not-for-profit places which open during the day
and close before 2:00 a.m. The disciplined, seated, and quiet experience they offer
audiences has been linked to upper-class listening practices since the 19th century
(Johnson 1995).
This opposition between night and day venues is also found in the music genres
they book. On the top are those genres most often heard at night while standing or
dancing: house music, techno, electro, hip hop, and to a lesser extent, funk. At these
venues, the line-ups are relatively internationalized, and the program of events is
strictly musical. Conversely, other genres are often heard while being seated, such
as opera, contemporary music, classical, jazz, and experimental music. Venues pre-
senting these genres also organize a multidisciplinary program of events and remain
open during the day to host events like exhibitions and meetings. Less institutional
examples include cafes or restaurants offering different types of artistic activities.
The unequal degrees of institutional recognition of venues, and the amount of pub-
lic or private subsidies they receive, is not only linked to the music genres that are
booked, but also to the venues’ performance contexts. As noted, the pure/impure
4
Only 14% of the venues book noise, metal or punk acts.
296 M. Picaud
Fig. 2. Axis 1 and 2, supplementary variables
binary is mobilized by the venues with the most capital and is supported by local
and national government so as to give meaning to the listening practices accord-
ing to their supposed distance from art and music. These serve to categorize venues
that sometimes showcase the same musical genres. Indeed, electronic music appears
both in clubs and venues that receive public subsidies. The performance context
here is more akin to a traditional rock concert, with concerts ending by midnight.
As a local head of cultural policies points out, “Now, nightclubs in Paris, […] I don’t
see what public service missions, truly artistic, they address, so it doesn’t seem rel-
evant to me for us to support this sector.”5 In addition to being ineligible for public
subsidies, night clubs (discothèques) were also charged a higher VAT rate (20%)
5
Interview in Paris, May 21, 2014.
until 2015. Concert and theatre venues benefited from a reduced rate (5.5%) by vir-
tue of their “cultural” activities.
Furthermore, nightclubs have historically fallen under the jurisdiction of the
police rather than cultural authorities because of their late opening hours. It was
only after 2010 that Parisian public authorities integrated “nightlife” and its clubs
into their policies; however, they are managed by the office of tourism, not culture.
The political management of the COVID-19 crisis in the performance sector testifies
to the persistence of these hierarchies between “pure” and “impure” in French cul-
tural policies, and their differential effect on music genres. Indeed, only venues with
seated audiences were allowed to reopen temporarily during the pandemic. There
was no explicit scientific justification for this decision; instead, it was implied that
only audiences frequenting venues with seats would respect the rules.6
The space drawn by the MCA shows the different interpretations of the pure/
impure binary, and how collective representations—anchored in institutions, cultural
policies, economic and legal models, and material layouts and architectures—struc-
ture the Parisian scene. It should be noted that this structure, and the meaning given
to performance contexts and listening practices, are not uniformly perceived by all
music professionals and audiences in Paris. The fact that they are strongly supported
by cultural policies and by the dominant venues in the scene lends them an air of
permanence, leading many bookers to abide by these “rules of the game.” However,
music scenes can change over time because each performance is an opportunity to
reenact, question, tweak, and contest the “rules of the game,” depending on the dif-
ferent elements that are central to the (re)fusion of performances.
Fusing performance: the part bookers play
This section illustrates how bookers play with the elements of performance to
transform their venue’s position. They draw on the pure/impure binary in novel
ways to rework the traditional associations between material contexts, listen-
ing practices, and music genres. For example, bookers have been instrumental
in severing the link between classical music and seated, contemplative contexts
by encouraging new practices intended to renew this genre’s image. In so doing,
bookers attempt to reposition their venue as avant-garde with an aim to attract
younger and more diverse audiences.
I draw on ethnographic accounts of two performances that are representative
of alternative booking practices presenting contemporary classical music in less
traditional contexts. This is a relatively rare situation in Paris; there are probably
fewer than 30 such events each year. Cultural policies in France have generally
discouraged genre-mixing, especially contemporary and electronic music, which
are strongly differentiated by the MCA. Indeed, although contemporary music has
6
See https://www.culture.gouv.fr/Actualites/Reouverture-des-lieux-culturels-un-dispositif-general-et-
progressif accessed August 22, 2021.
298 M. Picaud
Fig. 3 Axis 1 and 2, music venues
historically defined itself in opposition to classical music, both genres are usually
presented in the same Parisian venues.
I selected these concerts for two reasons. First, they involve situations where
bookers worked to bypass the “rules of the game.” These practices are unusual,
since bookers often reinforce the status quo in professionalized venues. However,
transformative practices reveal the choices some bookers make that twist some
elements of performance. In these particular cases, the subversive practices take
place in new venues seeking to establish themselves within an existing scene.
Second, these events showcase the differences in achieving performance fusion.
In addition to drawing on interviews with bookers and event organizers, I com-
pare the reactions of artists and audiences with critics’ assessments of the con-
certs and venues. This allows me to determine whether the bookers succeeded in
positioning their venue as “rule-breaking” (i.e., avant-garde), and whether their
experiments have tweaked the rules more generally by inspiring others to imitate
them.
This allows for a more dynamic understanding of the structural elements favoring
performance fusion. In both cases, the venues are highly professionalized, publicly
subsidized, and renowned (on the left-hand side of the MCA’s first axis, see Fig. 3).
The Gaîté Lyrique showcases different music genres and is less strictly associated
with specific listening contexts (in the middle of Axis 2), whereas the Philharmonie
is strongly linked to classical music practices (at the bottom of Axis 2). Both ven-
ues are new buildings with unusual architecture, which is conducive to reinterpreta-
tions of listening practices. However, the Philharmonie, a new concert hall designed
by star architect Jean Nouvel, was conceived and presented as Paris’ new classical
music venue, which inscribed it in those venues’ long tradition and local history.
This limited the booker’s ability to change its position by tweaking the rules and
reinterpreting the pure/impure binary.
The Philharmonie: when performance misses out on the “rules of the game”
The most visible classical music venues are large concert halls which sell expensive
tickets and receive the most public and private subsidies. Newer venues, such as
the Philharmonie de Paris, try to appear more socially and culturally open. Their
bookers help achieve this by selecting artists of other music genres, but these are
presented in specific events rather than mixed with traditional classical music con-
certs. These events are perceived by many bookers in classical music venues as an
effective way to democratize their audiences. In other words, it is a strategy to attract
members of the working classes, those with lower levels of education, or young peo-
ple. Cultural policies in France have focused on democratization for some time, but
classical music concerts continue to draw an older and predominantly upper-class
audience (Dorin 2016). Bookers optimistically claim that audiences who discover a
venue by attending a popular music concert will return to try concerts in other gen-
res previously thought to be intimidating, thus fostering interest in classical music:
We are daring, in opening things up constantly […]. We must leave the doors
open so that a large draft comes in, and we may have, with a little luck, some-
thing unique, artistic, that will come in. […] I like the idea of entertaining,
don’t we need entertainment in a society that replicates itself, reproduces its
elites, tries to put culture in a category made for people who “think,” while
the others consume…? I try to break barriers down and cross borders, and I’ve
kept with this policy and multiplied the audiences here by four or five.7
This booker’s venue regularly books jazz and pop artists, stand-up comedians, as
well as musicals. Even if the audiences attending these different events never mix,
the genres’ performance contexts can still be transformed through the prescription of
disciplined and silent listening practices that are alien to most jazz clubs or pop ven-
ues. Rather than diversifying the venue’s audiences, the mixing of genres transforms
the image it displays—something that could be likened to individual “distinctive
eclecticism” (Coulangeon and Lemel 2007). This can in turn influence the “rules
of the game” and the venue’s position within the field, as well as the genre’s place
7
Interview with director of one of the main Parisian classical music halls, Paris, November 10, 2014,
translation from French by the author. The interview excerpts presented here were selected because they
are representative of the discourses of bookers interviewed.
300 M. Picaud
in cultural hierarchies. “Heritage rock” (Bennett 2009), for example, has found its
place in these classical music venues.
The first case presented here is an attempt to position a classical venue as an
“avant-garde” space that only achieved partial fusion. Soon after its inauguration in
2015, the Philharmonie hosted the international exhibition “David Bowie Is.” The
show Low/Heroes, Un hyper cycle berlinois by Renaud Cojo presented two sym-
phonies by Philip Glass which were inspired by the albums Bowie created in Berlin,
Low and Heroes. We will see how the pure/impure divide is reworked within the
show and examine different elements of performance.
The Philharmonie opened amidst many political debates about its substantial
cost. The massive building is situated within a park in the more popular Northeast
area of Paris; all other classical music venues are situated in the Western, bourgeois
part of the city. The building is visible from the highway encircling the capital, and
its architecture was thought to represent an outstretched hand to the poorer suburbs
on the other side. The building attracts attention from passersby and music aficio-
nados alike. The main concert hall’s design features the same vineyard-style seating
arrangement as the Berliner Philharmonie, with the stage at the center, surrounded
by seated audiences on all sides.
When audience members8 arrive for the Low/Heroes concert, many become lost
looking for the entrance of the Philharmonie because, unconventionally for a clas-
sical music venue, it is an escalator. It seems as though few have visited the hall
before, or any other classical concert venue for that matter. They continue to appear
lost after their tickets have been checked by ushers, even though the spatial organiza-
tion is similar to other modern classical music venues and opera houses, with cor-
ridors leading to different balconies. Many audience members in their forties wear
clothes associated with rock culture (e.g., rock band T-shirts). These audiences con-
trast sharply with the usual classical music audience in other venues in Paris, as well
as those attending subsequent classical concerts at the Philharmonie. Some express
surprise about the vineyard-style venue, which shows they were expecting the more
traditional shoebox architecture. For others, this seating arrangement is less disori-
enting because it resembles big arenas. Audience members comment on the lavish
surroundings: “We aren’t used to this, are we?”
Onstage, a few instruments are set up in front of a very large screen. The musi-
cians of the Orchestre National d’Île-de-France, the Philharmonie’s main orchestra,
occupy the stage beneath it. Although they usually dress in suits, tonight they wear
long-sleeved black T-shirts printed with the show’s logo. There is minimal applause
when the conductor enters at the beginning of the show, as is the tradition for clas-
sical and lyrical concerts. Most seem unaware of this custom. During the concert,
the orchestra remains dimly lit, unlike most philharmonic shows where the orches-
tra is center stage. In the first part of the concert,9 the musicians play Philip Glass’
first symphony while a movie is projected on the screen showing scenes of a man
roaming contemporary Berlin. The hall’s architecture contrasts with the industrial,
8
Ethnographic fieldwork notes, Saturday, March 7, 2015 from 7:30 p.m. to 12:30 p.m., Philharmonie,
Paris, as audience member.
9
The show’s promotional video can be found at: https://vimeo.com/124932936 (accessed September 6,
2019).
graffiti-covered wastelands shown on film, which are reminiscent of Bowie’s years

in Berlin. In the second part of the concert, the rock singer Bertrand Belin enters the
stage and reads part of Bowie’s text, “The Diary of Nathan Adler.” Images onscreen,
controlled by a VJ, illustrate the storyline. A dead woman appears in an abandoned
swimming pool along with close-ups of Belin and the musicians occupying the stage
above the orchestra. They accompany the reading with a cover version of Bowie’s
song “Art Decade” (Low, 1976) by musician Stef Kamil Carlens. In the final part
of the concert, the orchestra plays Philip Glass’ second symphony. This time, the
screen shows contemporary dancers in an abandoned industrial space. The dance is
choreographed by Louise Lecavalier, who worked with Bowie and whose hairstyle
explicitly references the star.
During the intermission, many audience members explore the hall by visiting
the different balconies on various floors, musing at the different beverages at the
bar. At the end of the concert, enthusiastic applause greets the artists, and specta-
tors seem happy as they leave the Philharmonie, discussing how the show offered
different perspectives on Bowie. In this event, elements of performance were mobi-
lized to contrast music genres, listening practices, and the venue’s material layout.
Firstly, the organization of this concert during the international exhibition on Bowie
enhances its visibility among those unaccustomed to visiting such venues. These
audience members arrive with expectations about the mise-en-scène that have prob-
ably been developed through previous concert experiences involving standing at
rock concert venues. Although they enjoy this unusual event, conversations between
them indicate that this concert comes across as an institutional tribute to Bowie. It
is not interpreted as “avant-garde” compared to the traditional (rock) performance
rules, and it does not necessarily encourage any psychological identification with the
artists, although Belin is well-known. Classical music critics also insist on the con-
tinuity between this event and the contemporary and classical music tradition, rather
than emphasizing any rule-breaking through the reinterpretation of the pure/impure
binary. For example, one critic describing the show for a national radio broadcast
inscribed Glass’ homage to Bowie within a longer musical story:
Philip Glass was an artist who, at the beginning of the ’60s, worked with danc-
ers, with other types of musicians, people working with sound, you know,
overtones as they say in English…. He smoked a lot of marijuana, that must
also be said. […] And that’s the proof that this kind of music interests a quite
diverse and large audience, there were loads of people at the concert, rather
young people, people we don’t usually see at classical music concerts. That’s
to say that the crossroads you’ll be listening to tonight is something quite natu-
ral, it’s not an artificial graft. (Machart, 2015)10
The mise-en-scène and means of symbolic production reinforce this view. Although
the symphony orchestra is in the pit rather than occupying the center of attention, it
is brought together with the screen, the singer, the cover band, and the VJ. Classical
10
Transcribed and translated from French by author.
302 M. Picaud
music thus seems relegated to a secondary position, as already suggested by the

departure from conventional practices such as applauding when the conductor takes
the podium, and orchestra members in formal concert attire. However, although
David Bowie and non-classical musicians are at the center of the show, contempo-
rary classical music remains central. Musical texts are no different from traditional
concerts in such venues and remain divorced from audiences’ expectations. Further-
more, these slight twists to listening practices are hardly transformative. Because the
concert fails to attract either the regular Philharmonie (or classical music) audience
or pop-rock critics, it cannot reposition the venue within the scene. The “rules of the
game” remain intact, binding performance contexts and practices to specific music
genres. As such, this performance fails to fuse all elements.
Gaîté Lyrique: repositioning a venue by playing on genre rules
Bookers in popular music venues also try to reposition their venues within the scene
by showcasing music genres normally presented in other performance contexts. For
example, the publicly subsidized Gaîté Lyrique, a renowned mid-sized music con-
cert venue, organized events mixing contemporary classical music (e.g., Terry Riley,
Steve Reich) with electronic music (e.g., Carl Craig, Nathan Fake). Unlike the con-
cert at the Philharmonie, this was not a tribute to a specific artist, but an encounter
between two genres that are starkly opposed by performance contexts, as the MCA
previously illustrated. These genres are combined during the same event, targeting
the Gaîté Lyrique’s regular audiences as well as aficionados of both genres:
A rather new thing is to make people listen to different musical genres that
have artistic collusion, but that never meet at the same time, in front of the
same audience. I mean, today, the person who wants to listen to electronic
music will go to an electronic music festival; the person who wants to listen to
pop music, he goes somewhere else, etc. Everything is very signposted in fact.
And even the venues that have a concert season with many musical genres,
they have specific evenings for each. So there are ticketholders who will see
different things, but overall, everything remains very, very signposted.11
By booking both genres together, the common artistic features are no longer con-
cealed by the mise-en-scène and means of symbolic production of their standard
venues. While the combined presentation of electronic and contemporary classi-
cal music rests on the “avant-garde” rhetoric suggesting that “no one has done this
yet,” it also draws on the pure/impure binary in novel ways. It casts the separation
between genres “that ‘official culture’ compartmentalizes in spite of common sense”
(De Plas 2016) as a social rather than musical one. In other words, it suggests these
are impure justifications for artistic selection.
11
Interview with a booker organizing contemporary classical music events in popular music venues,
November 14, 2014, Paris, translation by author.
These “rule-breaking” endeavors are facilitated by the Gaîté Lyrique’s recent

entry into and unusual position in the Parisian scene. When the venue opened in
2010, it was dedicated to digital cultures and supported by a delegation of service
contract for the City Hall. The building occupies the former site of the Théâtre de
la Gaîté and retains its historic façade, entrance, and foyer. Inside the venue, the
wooden floors and grand mirrors suggest the prestige of traditional classicism, but
the large concert hall, which can accommodate 760 people standing, adopts the
black box aesthetic. The four walls of the concert hall can be transformed into large
screens for digital art exhibitions and VJs. The booker of an electronic music club
describes the venue in these terms:
It’s quite bare. […] Artists often tell me, there are no lights, it’s naked, it’s
neutral…it is cold. And so the audience is also very cold at the Gaîté Lyrique,
but really extremely cold, and it’s violent sometimes, because there’s no warm,
spectacular side. But on the contrary, I thought it was great to see some artists,
without anything, just the screens and no lights at the Gaîté, because it corre-
sponded well. And it looked classy, it looked chic.12
During the event combining electronic and contemporary music, audiences go back
and forth between the luxuriously furnished foyer, where many purchase refresh-
ments, and the black box concert hall. I will describe one specific piece on the pro-
gram, “In C” by Terry Riley,13 to show how the booker’s handling of the mise-en-
scène and means of symbolic production transformed the reception of contemporary
music and thus repositioned the venue by slightly changing the scene’s “rules of the
game.”
The concert begins at 8:00 p.m. with the Magnetic Ensemble taking the stage.
Although the event is sold out, the room is not as full as it becomes later that even-
ing for the headliners. Unlike at most classical music concerts, where refreshments
are not allowed in the concert hall and photographs are forbidden, here audience
members drink beer and place their sandwiches on the edge of the stage to take pic-
tures. Some lean against the stage and look up at the musicians. Others talk, laugh,
and kiss, but they do not dance—yet. The musicians, who are dressed in yellow
overalls and illuminated by spotlights, are spread out on the stage and on the balco-
nies on either side.
Ten or fifteen minutes after the beginning of the music, the sound increases, both
in terms of rhythm and volume, resembling a build-up or climax in electronic music.
Audience members have started to move: some are nodding or dancing, arms raised.
Whistles and cries of “woohoo” are heard. The musicians, who are similar in age
to the audience members, look at each other, smile, and are physically involved in
their music. They sway in their chairs and twitch their legs, more in the style of a
12
Interview with the booker of a big club, April 16, 2014, Paris, translation by author.
13
The concert took place on November 29, 2014 during the Marathon Impulse festival and included
works or performances by Terry Riley, Nathan Fake, Carl Craig (who canceled at the last minute), Col-
lectif Warning, Magnetic Ensemble, Cabaret Contemporain, Steve Reich, Ligeti, Benjamin de la Fuente,
Giani Caserotto, César Carcopino, HeptaTonia, and Atom Heart.
304 M. Picaud
brass band than a philharmonic orchestra. Their enjoyment is expressed openly and
in marked contrast to the ascetic and austere demeanor musicians adopt during con-
temporary music concerts in more traditional Parisian venues. As the piece reaches
its conclusion, the music trails off. Several minutes pass before the audience realizes
that the performance has ended, bursting into applause—shouts and whistles that
last for over two minutes.
As they leave the room, several groups comment on what they have just heard.
One man exclaims, “That rocked!” and his friend replies, “It was great!” A young
woman explains to a friend, “I was scared at first when it was a little cacopho-
nous, but actually… [I enjoyed it afterwards].” Although most audience members
seemed unfamiliar with the work, there was a strong connection between audiences
and musicians, made visible by exchanges of glances and smiles, and participants
expressing the feeling that they had experienced something exceptional and rare.
This special atmosphere seems to testify both to psychological identification
and to cultural extension between artists and audiences. The recognition of musical
styles more familiar to this audience prompted lively behaviors (such as shouting,
whistling, dancing, and drinking) typically found in clubs. By drawing on listening
practices considered “impure” within classical music venues, the mise-en-scène and
means of symbolic production contributed to the collective production of meaning
even though few in the audience knew the music and struggled at first to situate and
interpret it. These are important considerations for the booker who organizes these
events. Rather than dismiss these practices as “impure,” he saw them as central to
the performance:
80% of the people at the head of [classical] music institutions in Paris are
musicologists. That says it all. It means that the only thing that interests them
is what happens onstage. The problem is that what’s onstage is only part of the
job. […] In those [classical music] venues, they consider that they aren’t soda
merchants. The problem is that they have a really lousy bar, you get kicked out
of the venue ten minutes after the concert ends, nothing happens. I mean, you
could pay people, young people, they wouldn’t even come! […] Because those
[managers of classical music venues] aren’t rockers!14
By programming a contemporary classical music repertoire with affinities to elec-
tronic music, and by choosing artists who can be staged within popular music ven-
ues, this booker transforms the listening practices associated with contemporary
music.
It can be argued that the elements of performance were fused on this occasion,
successfully enacting and transforming the “rules of the game” within the Paris-
ian music scene. This fusion encouraged music critics to label the Gaîté Lyrique
“avant-garde” when its position was unclear. This event was so successful that it has
been imitated by other venues such as the Centquatre and it was subsequently devel-
oped into an annual festival that regularly sells out. One critic praised the festival as
14
Interview with a booker organizing contemporary classical music events in popular music venues,
November 14, 2014, Paris, translation by author.
“eclectic, adventurous and sharp, where headliners with racy music share the stage
with minimalist and audacious performances of contemporary artists” (Branquart
2016). The venue’s position at the crossroads of different genres15 is also com-
mended by commentators who describe it as “on the edge of all genres and genera-
tions” where “the future of culture” lies (Brimson 2016). One fused performance is
unlikely to be enough to establish a venue’s position within a cultural field. How-
ever, it is through fusion that shared meaning is developed between artists, audi-
ences, cultural intermediaries, and critics about what the rules of the artistic game
should be, and how venues relate to them.
Conclusion
Exploring live music with a performance perspective sheds light on the centrality of
venues and listening contexts in structuring local music scenes. In Paris, the pure/
impure binary is used to hierarchize venues depending on their performance con-
texts, contributing to the definition of the scene’s “rules of the game.” In this situa-
tion, bookers who intend to position their venue as avant-garde by breaking the rules
must rework the way this binary is understood, drawing on and mixing both “pure”
and “impure” elements. Performances can be considered fused when cultural inter-
mediaries successfully (re)interpret the systems of collective representation through
arranging the mise-en-scène and means of production, when artists and audiences
engage with this reinterpretation, and when fellow intermediaries, such as critics,
recognize it as such. By engaging the strong program of cultural pragmatics with
field theory, I have suggested that fusion can be understood as a moment when the
scene’s (or field’s) “rules of the game” are enacted, perpetuated, or contested, as
is the case for the Gaîté Lyrique. While Alexander (2004) considers fusion to be a
fortuitous combination of elements of performance, this paper shows that contest-
ing the “rules of the game” requires more than fusion: bookers must also draw on
systems of collective representation in innovative ways that combine “pure” and
“impure” elements. The Gaîté Lyrique’s position within the scene favored subver-
sion because, in addition to having a high degree of symbolic capital, it had a mate-
rial layout and organization that allowed for diverse listening practices. In contrast,
the Philharmonie was too strongly tied to the traditional and institutionalized side.
This analysis opens fruitful paths for understanding the meso-level dynamics of
different activities (artistic, economic, political, etc.) which influence and mediate
between social performance and systems of collective representation. It also enabled
me to explore how, within a specific scene, performance allows the enactment and
transformation of the “rules of the game.” This offers a more dynamic analysis of
systems of collective representation and how they relate to continuity and field-level
changes. Studying cultural intermediaries such as critics and bookers illuminates
15
The Gaîté Lyrique currently presents itself as follows: “With the development of the Internet, the 21st
century has brought musical parochialism to a stop. A radical turn that we took from the very start.”
(Gaîté Lyrique 2020, p. 22), translated by author.
306 M. Picaud
their role in shaping performance. It also raises new questions: in other fields of
activity, such as politics, who occupies the role that bookers play in music? Does
performance fusion correspond more often with the perpetuation of existing “rules
of the game,” or with their contestation? Must the element of “social power” be
understood with regard to the position agents occupy within fields? These questions
call for more empirical exploration that also engages critically with both theoretical
perspectives. A mixed-method research design appears necessary for understanding
how the various levels—micro, meso, and macro—influence social performance, as
well as the interplay between them. Advancing theoretical debates in cultural sociol-
ogy ultimately demands that researchers diverge from well-beaten methodological
paths.
Appendix
Variables on the music venues
Venue materiality (3 variables)
Localization in Paris (13 active modalities): The localization is described using

the city’s institutional districts (arrondissements). When the number of venues
was insufficient, two districts were grouped, apart from the 3rd and 7th where ven-
ues appeared very isolated from the others and are, thus, illustrative modalities (in
italics).
Districts Number
Arr11 39
Arr17&18 24
Arr10 19
Arr20 18
Arr19 16
Arr8&16 15
Arr2 13
Arr5et6 13
Arr1 12
Arr13 12
Arr4&12 12
Arr14&15 11
Arr9 10
Arr3 2
Arr7 1
Venue seating capacity (7 active modalities): Because more than half of Parisian
venues have a seating capacity under 300, the very small venues are distinguished,
contrary to the fewer, larger, ones.
Seating Number
100 or less 58
101–200 37
201–300 30
301–600 42
601–1000 12
1001–1500 14
Seating > 1500 15
NR_Seating 9
Distinct premises (2 active modalities): Venues in buildings with a distinct his-

tory (linked to culture, music, or, for example, the refurbishment of an industrial
wasteland), visible in the architecture and emphasized by the venue’s public com-
munication, are distinguished.
Distinct premises Number
Distinct 82
NR_location 135
Economic organization and legal status (3 variables)
Legal status (4 active modalities): Because public institutions are also those receiv-
ing public subsidies, this modality is illustrative to avoid entering the same informa-
tion twice. Private companies are differentiated, as they do not function in the same
way.
Legal status Number
Not for profit organisations (Association loi 1901) 21

Other-stat 18
For-profit limited liability company (SARL) 104
For-profit simplified joint-stock company (SAS and SA) 44
Public organisation 15
NR_Status 15
Maximum ticket price (6 active modalities): Ticket prices are a decisive ele-
ment in the decision to go out. They also show how much audiences are will-
ing to pay, depending on the artists booked and the venue. When there were sev-
eral price categories, the most expensive ticket was retained rather than the mean
price, to show differences in audiences expected by the venues.
Maximum price Number
0-10€ 77
308 M. Picaud
Maximum price Number

11-20€ 57
21-30€ 35
31-50€ 13
>51€ 19
>100€ 12
NR_Price 4
Possibility of privatizing the venue (2 active modalities) for events organized

either by individual people or public and private firms.
Venue privatization Number
Privatization 133
No-privatization 76
NR_privatization 8
Audience reception (4 variables)
Daytime opening (2 active modalities): when the venue is open to the public
before 5:00 p.m., and therefore, hosts other activities, or whether it only opens at
night.
Daytime opening Number
Closed_day 132
Open_day 85
Nighttime opening hours (2 active modalities): the venue closes after the event,
or at the latest at 2:00 a.m. (standard closing hour in Paris); or it regularly closes
after 2:00 a.m. and is a real nighttime venue.
Nighttime opening Number
2H 145
5H 72
Seating specificities (3 active modalities): no or almost no seating possibilities

(Standing); a seated venue (Seated); mix of standing and seated (S/S).
Placement Number
Seated 69
Standing 46
S/S 102
Restaurant (2 active modalities) in the venue.
Restaurant Number
No-restaurant 114
Restaurant 103
Venue’s symbolic capital and visibility (5 variables)
Venue lifespan (8 active modalities) by date of creation of the organization man-

aging the venue. More venues opened after the 1990s, so the timespan division is
tightened in the recent period. 1981 has been kept as a time block because it is a
turning point in French cultural policies (Dubois 1999), with the broadening of
public subsidies beyond highbrow culture, especially in music.
Opening date Number
Before 1945 15
1946-1980 19
1981-1989 20
1990-1995 18
1996-2000 25
2001-2005 30
2006-2010 47
2011 + 35
NR_date 8
Public subsidies (2 active modalities): All types of public subsidies are

grouped, whatever the amount or level of government that distributes them.
Similar to private patronage, this variable is considered an indicator of symbolic
capital.
Public subsidies Number
Public_sub_no 169
Public_sub 44
NR_Public_sub 4
The patronage of the venue by private partners (2 active modalities).
Patronage Number
Patron_no 143
Patron 53
NR_patron 21
310 M. Picaud
Following on Facebook (4 active modalities): This variable concerns the venue’s pro-
motion strategies, its ability to use digital tools, and its reputation and renown, but also tes-
tifies to how gratifying it is for individuals to declare publicly that they “like” a venue. The
variable counts the number of “likes” on venues’ pages (on September 1, 2015).
Facebook “likes” Number
No_Facebook 25
0-10000 129
10001-30000 40
More than 30000 23
Use of Twitter, on September 1, 2015 (2 active modalities). This variable repre-

sents the venue’s digital strategy, which partly overlaps with its renown as well as
the type of audiences it targets (especially in 2015 France, with 2.3 million Twitter
users, whose mean age was 22 years old, 61% being less than 35 years old, 55%
male, 19% top executive managers, and 33% living in the Paris region).16
Twitter account Number
No_Twitter 121
Twitter 96
Variables on musical genres (supplementary)
The genre categories are those featured by the venues themselves in their communi-
cation about events or artists, and which appear in at least 5% of the venues. To com-
plete this variable (see Table 1), for each venue, I listed the events that were organ-
ized during one month (selected randomly, between 2014 and 2016) and examined
the artists that were booked. If at least one concert during the month was labeled
“rock,” the venue is listed as booking rock concerts. These genre categories remain
comparable to those used in French surveys on cultural practices (Donnat 2009).
Three other variables concern the venues’ artistic choices. First, whether the
venue organizes multidisciplinary events (booking theatre, dance, exhibitions, and
public meetings or debates): 0_multidisciplinary (n = 111); medium_multidiscipli-
nary, meaning that two out of the four artistic disciplines are presented (n = 76);
and strong_multidisciplinary, when three or four are presented (n = 30). The pres-
entation of amateur practices (including jam sessions): yes (n = 49); no (n = 168).
A final variable describes the internationalization of the venue’s events. Indeed,
16
Figures drawn from the blog du Modérateur, http://www.blogdumoderateur.com/chiffres-twitter,
accessed on May 10, 2016.
Table 1 Music genres in the Music genre Percentage of venues

Parisian venues featuring the genre (%)
Rock 49.8
Electronic music 49.8
World music 41.5
Francophone chanson 39.2
Jazz 34.1
Pop music 30.9
Hip-hop 30.4
Funk and soul 21.7
House music 15.7
Noise, punk, and metal 14.3
Classical music 13.8
French category for commercial/top charts 13.8
music (variétés)
Experimental music 13.4
Techno 13.4
Rap 13.4
Contemporary classical music 8.3
Lyrical music / opera 7.4
the opposition between foreign and national artists influences musical preferences
(Meuleman and Lubbers 2014). This variable has 4 modalities: 0 to 10% of artists
booked come from abroad (n = 111); 11 to 30% (n = 39); 31 to 50% (n = 29);
more than 50% (n = 25); unspecified (n = 10). This indicator counts the proportion
of artists who live abroad and tour in Paris (it does not count artists according to
their nationality)17 and is also calculated by looking at the events booked during the
month examined for music genres.
MCA contribution tables
See Tables 2 and 3.
17
An individual artist counts for 1, in the same way that a band counts for 1. For collective works (musi-
cals, operas, etc.), soloists, orchestras, and choirs are distinguished, counting also for 1.
312 M. Picaud
Table 2 Modalities contributing over average to the formation of Axis 1

Variables Total volume of capital − Total volume of capital ++ Variable’s
Axis 1+ Axis 1− total contri-
bution
Modality Contribution Modality Contribution
Seating 100 or less 8186 Seating > 1500 4096 17,497

1001-1500 2367
301-600 1827
Maximum price 0.10€ 8172 21.30 1787 14,763
> 100 1855
Privatization No-privatization 5375 Privatization 3075 8449
Patronage Patron_no 2595 Patron 5787 8381
Public subsidies Public_sub 4833 6026
Twitter No_Twitter 3524 Twitter 4442 7965
Facebook 0-10000 1956 More than 30000 4329 10,897
10001-30000 3337
Distinct premises NR_location 2171 Distinct 3574 5745
Opening date Before 1950 2822 5272
Legal status SAS and SA 2356 3928
District Arr11 1910 Arr8&16 1902 7601
Arr20 1647
Table 3 Modalities contributing over average to the formation of Axis 2

Variables Nighttime/standing Seated/daytime Variable’s
Axis 2+ Axis 2− total contri-
bution
Modality Contribution Modality Contribution
Nighttime opening 5H 12,131 2H 6024 18,155

Placement Standing 6566 Seated 7990 14,921
Public subsidies Public_sub_no 1833 Public_sub 6335 8168
Daytime opening Closed_day 3087 Open_day 4794 7881
Opening date 2011 + 2862 1990-1995 3168 15,421
1950-1980 2107 1981-1989 3034
Before 1950 1808
District Arr8&16 2414 Arr5&6 3452 13,563
Arr19 1993
Arr20 1709
Legal status SAS & SA 3131 Not for profit 2769 8750
organizations
Other-stat 1932
Patronage Patron 2984 3854
Seating 100 or less 1646 4301
Acknowledgements The author would like to thank Lisa McCormick, the anonymous reviewers, Willa
Sachs, Anne Marie Champagne, as well as Madeline Bedecarré and Mathieu Desan for their insightful
comments and help on the revision of this article. The figures for the MCA also benefited from Olivier
Godechot’s Excel Macro. The author, however, bears full responsibility for the paper.
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Myrtille Picaud’s research examines the links between music scenes, cultural intermediaries’ work, and
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Currently, she is exploring the development of digital policing practices and how this transforms lives in
European cities for her postdoctoral fellowship at the Grenoble Alpes University.

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American Journal of Cultural Sociology (2022) 10:285–315

Framing performance and fusion: how music venues’

Accepted: 24 November 2021 / Published online: 12 March 2022

Keywords Performance · Music · Genre · Cultural intermediaries · Fusion · Mixed-

influenced by a “production–consumption paradigm” (McCormick 2012) and until

Live music, performance fusion, and cultural fields

Looking for cultural intermediaries in the fusion of performance

Having established how fusion can be conceptualized within a field-oriented theory,

“Pure” versus “impure:” performance and material listening contexts

In what follows, I examine how systems of collective representation, and specifi-

Data and methods

Pure or impure? Collective representations structuring the Parisian

meanings, performances, audiences, or professionals in the United States, France,

Fig. 1 Axis 1 and 2, active variables

Fig. 2. Axis 1 and 2, supplementary variables

Fusing performance: the part bookers play

Fig. 3 Axis 1 and 2, music venues

graffiti-covered wastelands shown on film, which are reminiscent of Bowie’s years

music thus seems relegated to a secondary position, as already suggested by the

Gaîté Lyrique: repositioning a venue by playing on genre rules

These “rule-breaking” endeavors are facilitated by the Gaîté Lyrique’s recent

Variables on the music venues

Venue materiality (3 variables)

Localization in Paris (13 active modalities): The localization is described using

Distinct premises (2 active modalities): Venues in buildings with a distinct his-

Distinct premises Number

Economic organization and legal status (3 variables)

Legal status Number

Not for profit organisations (Association loi 1901) 21

Maximum price Number

Maximum price Number

Possibility of privatizing the venue (2 active modalities) for events organized

Venue privatization Number

Audience reception (4 variables)

Daytime opening Number

Nighttime opening Number

Seating specificities (3 active modalities): no or almost no seating possibilities

Restaurant (2 active modalities) in the venue.

Venue’s symbolic capital and visibility (5 variables)

Venue lifespan (8 active modalities) by date of creation of the organization man-

Opening date Number

Public subsidies (2 active modalities): All types of public subsidies are

Public subsidies Number

The patronage of the venue by private partners (2 active modalities).

Facebook “likes” Number

Use of Twitter, on September 1, 2015 (2 active modalities). This variable repre-

Twitter account Number

Variables on musical genres (supplementary)

Table 1 Music genres in the Music genre Percentage of venues

MCA contribution tables

See Tables 2 and 3.

Table 2 Modalities contributing over average to the formation of Axis 1

Seating 100 or less 8186 Seating > 1500 4096 17,497

Table 3 Modalities contributing over average to the formation of Axis 2

Nighttime opening 5H 12,131 2H 6024 18,155

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