Electronic Music Gear Sales Booming, With Analog Instruments Leading The Way

Sales of electronic music gear are booming, with new analog gear leading the way, according to the 2016 NAMM Global Report.

According to the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM), companies releasing new analog gear have helped drive the analog synth market to a 19.9% growth in total retail sales over the last 5 years. The organization attributes the growth to new genaration of players that ‘favor working knobs, faders and other features, in lieu of digital displays and computer interfaces.’

“Players are realizing that an analog synth is much more of a real, honest-to-goodness musical instrument,” says Dave Smith, founder of San Francisco-based Dave Smith Instruments.

Tatsuya Takahashi, Korg Synthesis Chief Engineer and designer of the company’s minilogue synth, emphasizes the importance of usability and musicality. “Whenever I design a synth, I try to break down barriers between man and machine – the musician needs to be inspired physically and emotionally to create their own music.

“This thinking has resonated with current trends that turn away from difficult and complicated systems, often inside of computers,” adds Takahashi, ‘in favor of dedicated hardware that often do less functionally, but are great at what they do in a musical way.”

NAMM also attributes the increased interest in analog gear on the availability of gear at price points that are affordable to a wider range of musicians.

“The power-to-affordability ratio is also phenomenally-favorable to the synth enthusiast,” says James Sajeva, director of technology brands at Korg’s Melville, NY headquarters. “In the case of a reissue [synth] you can get ‘the’ sound and workflow for a fraction of what an original – in even remotely good condition – would fetch.”

On the whole, electronic music products were one of the strongest performing music product segments, posting near double-digit retail growth in 2015 at 9.9%. The electronic music products category, comprised of keyboard synthesizers, controller keyboards, electronic pianos, rhythm machines and electronic drums, had a retail value of $238.3 million in 2015. Digital pianos are also enjoying a renaissance and are up 24.38% in retail sales and 13.1% in units sold over the past 10 years.

The NAMM 2016 Global Report is designed to identify music products industry trends and opportunities for businesses. The report is compiled from independent data sources from around the world. This year’s Global Report compiled data from 24 countries, including Argentina, Australia, Austria,

The organization notes that Dave Smith Instruments, Yamaha, Roland, Korg USA, Inc. Moog., Verbos Electronics and Make Noise will be among the more than 75 exhibitors presenting 260 different synthesizers and related equipment at the 2017 NAMM Show, being held in Anaheim, California, January 19-22. Moog plans a special booth this year, using their space to honor Pauline Oliveros, Keith Emerson, Bernie Worrell, Jean Jacques Perrey, Isao Tomita, Don Buchla and others that the synth community lost in 2016.

13 thoughts on “Electronic Music Gear Sales Booming, With Analog Instruments Leading The Way”

  1. > The electronic music products category, comprised of
    > keyboard synthesizers, controller keyboards, electronic
    > pianos, rhythm machines and electronic drums, had a
    > retail value of $238.3 million in 2015.

    hmm.. i find that number low.

    1. It is a very real number. While sales are up, synths are still a small fraction of the big markets like guitar effects, guitars, drums or band and orchestra gear. That number includes electric pianos, controllers and e-drums which are the majority of that 238 million. The synth market is probably about 17-21 million of that.

  2. Nostalgia sells in times of distress and uncertainty. But this might be the peak of the synth hype. Better sell your Junos before the hipsters rediscover Sonic Youth. Or start buying early 90’s stomp boxes while you still can.

    1. Oh great and wise Revok, thank you for emerging from your cave to offer us your prophecies. What more does your unflinching gaze foresee?

  4. ‘…a 19.9% growth in total retail sales over the last 5 years…’

    this is less than 4% per year. very modest growth. and a large share of this is just inflation.

    1. 4% is not “modest” economic growth at all.

      Inflation has averaged 1.28% over the last 5 years.

      Consumer electronics sales are up only 0.3% over the past 5 years.

      Sales of desktop and notebook computers are way down over 5 years.

      1. I agree. 4% is very good for this industry and this market. It is hard to compare it against other markets though. Consumer electronic and computer sales are likely down because they have saturated the market and really have no must have features to sell (contrary to what the sales department says, most people could care less if their computer is 25% faster. The one they have is fast enough for email and surfing).

  5. Fantastic news and not surprising at all since there’s been a lot of cool designs recently.

    Of course to increase sales by a further factor of 10x all that is required is full keyboard microtonal support so that the other 90% of the world can play music according to their own musical systems. Implementing a basic full keyboard MTS sysex implementation only takes a couple hours and a handful of additional code, yet increases your customer base by an order of magnitude. It’s just simple common sense to do so.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *