Kiva‘s model of using the internet to microfinance small biz throughout the world has been a resounding success, with plaudits and encouragement rolling in from Bill Clinton and elsewhere. Boston-based Calabash Music has taken Kiva’s template and extended it to world music, in hopes of turning the hit-driven American Idol system on its lame head and engaging fans to fund artists directly .
So far, so good. Calabash has received plaudits and encouragement of their own from Elvis Costello and Jon Pareles, among others, and even offered their catalog to National Geographic to populate the latter’s online music store.
Meanwhile, they’ve assembled an array of artists from around theglobe working in a variety of genres who are looking to cast offconventional distribution and payments models to work directly withtheir fans.
Unlike SlicethePie and Sellaband, Calabash Music gives music to those who contribute, rather than a share in the upside.
Meet the new music economy, which, to mangle The Who, looks nothing like the old music economy.
