Hi!

Thanks for reading and welcome to Making Places Better - my substack exploring how music, culture, creativity and entertainment can be used to improve cities and places around the world. This is a companion to my book (which is out NOW) with the aim of sharing examples and best practices into how culture impacts cities; not the influence cities have on music and culture, but the powerful impact music and culture can have on how cities are developed, built, managed and governed.

For those new to me, hello! I’m Shain. This is me…

I founded Sound Diplomacy, the world's leading economic consultancy working with cities, governments and the private sector on cultural, leisure, hospitality and entertainment policy, strategy and creative infrastructure. I now run the nonprofit Center for Music Ecosystems, which aims to be the global resource to define, prove and advance how music is a powerful catalyst for social good.

What will I write about?

I want to share what I’ve learned and who inspires me, while diving deep into policies, practices and experiments in cities that incorporate music, culture and entertainment into how and why we do what we do, and what that says about who we are. This will include examples all over the world and at all levels of government - with focuses on sustainability, climate action, economic development, politics, tourism, racial and social justice and education. Music and culture touch on all of this and I want to share a different perspective to how we engage with it - if we think of it as a planning, policy and development tool, it can be one of the most powerful tools we have to address the biggest problems we face. So this is what I will share, week in week out - through case studies, best practices, deep dives & highlighting people and initiatives I feel everyone should pay attention to.

Why Subscribe?

This is the first Substack that explores the concept of music and cultural ecosystems and how they relate to, reflect and influence the cities we live in. Music and culture are our universal languages. And we all live somewhere. But putting these two together to create positive change remains a niche topic in most places. I hope that after a few posts, you’ll realise we need to be better at creating places worth living for, rather than simply places to live - and music, culture and entertainment are terrific tools to do so.

This substack will always be free, but it would like to support the work, all subscriptions will be donated 100% to the Center for Music Ecosystems.

Thanks for coming. I hope you enjoy the posts and please comment, critique, question, ask & contribute. Places are about people. Let’s make them better together.