National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) - The NEA provides insight into how Americans are spending their time with art and art-like activities. The Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA) is the nation's largest, most representative survey of adult patterns of arts participation in the United States. The NEA completes its survey on only an occasional basis with the last three years being 2012, 2017 and 2022.
Percentage of U.S. Adult Attending a Performing Arts Activity at Least Once in the Past 12-Months
Rate of Change
Music2012201720222012-20222017-2022
Outdoor Performing Arts Festival20.8%24.2%18.7%-2.1%-5.5%
Jazz8.1%8.6%6.3%-1.8%-2.3%
Classical Music8.8%8.6%4.6%-4.2%-4.0%
Latin Music5.1%5.9%3.9%-1.2%-2.0%
Opera2.1%2.2%0.7%-1.4%-1.5%
Rate of Change
Plays2012201720222012-20222017-2022
Musical Plays15.2%16.5%10.3%-4.9%-6.2%
Non-Musical Plays8.3%9.4%4.5%-3.8%-4.9%
Rate of Change
Dance2012201720222012-20222017-2022
Other Dance5.6%6.3%3.3%-2.3%-3.0%
Ballet2.7%3.1%2.0%-0.7%-1.1%
Following a minimal increase in almost all arts attendance that occurred from 2012-2017, participation rates decreased from 2017-2022.
Changes in the U.S. demographic composition appear to have contributed to attendance in performing arts attendance. Still, various subgroups of Americans have decreased attendance rates for individual art forms. Covid-19 played its role in the decrease in participation as well.
The most popular site to attend in-person arts events was an open-air facility (parks, pavilions, amphitheaters) at 17.1%. The next venue is restaurants, bars, nightclubs and coffee shops (10.3%) with the remainder fairly equal including schools, churches and community centers and libraries.
Those who attended learned about the event most frequently through social media (17.0%) then through friends (14.7%) with traditional media next (11.3%).
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