The Hidden Music City: The Role of Music Tourism Imaginaries in the Regeneration of Detroit

In this chapter, the potential for as well as the hindrances to a future for Detroit as music tourism city are explored through the conceptual lens of music city mythologies: globally circulating imaginaries that connect music to place. The case of Detroit offers interesting venues for analysis as an ethnically diverse city, with music heritage and music scenes relating to different roots: which stories are being told, who makes these choices, and how does it shape the story of the city? A discussion of the function of mythologies in music tourism development is complemented with an analysis of the role of music in Detroit’s current regeneration and applied to two case studies: the efforts to preserve the Grande Ballroom, where legends such as Iggy Pop and Pink Floyd performed, and the success of Movement festival, a yearly techno music festival. The case studies are based on media analysis and ethnographic fieldwork involving observations and interviews. By comparing policy developments in the city with these case studies, this chapter shows how music heritage and live music scenes shape the stories of the city, offering routes to both division and belonging for the local communities involved. Providing nuance to the current academic debate on the music cities framework, it is argued that who and what drives music tourism development, what policy instruments are effective, and what strategy is best (bottom up or top down), is influenced by the imaginaries and mythologies that shape the tourism geography of the contemporary music city.