So you've booked the venue, sold out the tickets and are chomping at the bit, ready to play the hell out of that show. The only thing left to do: craft the perfect set list. Seems simple.
Whether you're a local favorite cultivating a following or at headlining status a la Beyoncé, there's a method to the madness, especially as it relates to how much new material to add to a set list. It takes a little work to find the right mix of brand-new tracks and those top hits and deep cuts fans always want to hear.
"For the most part, there's a routine to how concerts flow. You open with a catchy single, quickly play an old favorite, move to some new songs, throw in a couple deep cuts to break up the flow, end with your lead single, then maybe encore with a couple fan favorites from earlier in your career," writes Senior Editor David Sackllah for Consequence of Sound's latest installment of Producer's Chair. "The problem is figuring out how many new songs you can get away with playing without losing the audience. There are a lot of factors that go into making this decision."
To help artists craft a winning set list, Producer's Chair outlines five points to consider, including how new their latest album is, how popular it is, the size of a music catalog, touring frequency, and the type of venue.
After due consideration, an artist should arrive at a magic number of new songs to pepper into a set list for maximum fan enjoyment, constituting a win-win for the artist and the audience.
"Maybe the right answer is, in fact, 10, or maybe it's just two [songs]," says Sackllah. "It'll be different for every artist."
