Career reconstruction: mid-career transformations in the Australian music industries

This article reviews current paradigms of music industry careers in order to theorise how career breaks and interruptions may be understood by music industry workers. While the career trajectories of young, independent and early-career musicians have been examined extensively, the lives of workers who are experiencing life course transformations (such as parenthood, ageing and health issues) and those who have taken a break from the music industries, are still largely under analysed. We begin with an overview of literature on this topic to highlight the ways that career transformations and ruptures have been omitted from conventional expectations about how to develop a successful music career. Then, we examine how these points of career change and interruption can be understood in an industry where the normalisation of the DIY/independent career model has itself disrupted common narratives for understanding career progression. From here, we develop the concept of music industry workers' 'imagined biographies' to explore how social identity and the material circumstances of workers shape career development. We conclude by examining how 'mid-care er' transformations might be conceptualised in a way that is sensitive to social inequalities, identifying its relevance for understanding music industry workers' career development in the Australian music industries.