Business students try to save music

The music industry stands at the crossroads of collapse and opportunity.

Problems like near-catastrophic revenue losses from free downloads and plummeting CD sales, as well as piracy battles, are roughly matched by the promise of new business models, exciting technology and near-universal access.

Students at McGill University have a chance to explore the question the industry and fans have been asking for the last 15 years or more: How can it stay viable?

"For me personally, it touched me to see how we can work together and see the perspectives, because it's really easy to be one-sided on the issue," said Charmaine Lam, an MBA student in McGill's Desautels Faculty of Management who took the course last winter...

Ms. Lam's team developed a workshop for teenagers that teaches them to use sampling software, with an emphasis on classical music.

We wanted to "basically integrate the old and the new and see if it would spark some new creativity and interest in the high school students," Ms. Lam said.

Read full article: The Globe and Mail, January 27, 2011