Helping communities grow music without growing conflict.
Sound Music Cities works with communities to address entertainment-related sound challenges and to better understand and support local music ecosystems. Our work is grounded in lived experience, practical implementation, and a deep understanding of how cities actually function.
Sound Music Cities grew out of real city work.
Our founder led the City of Austin’s Music & Entertainment Division, the first city government office in the U.S. created solely to support a local music ecosystem. From the beginning, the mandate was clear: help music thrive and address the sound and noise conflicts that came with it.
By reframing sound as a shared community issue, Austin reduced entertainment-related noise complaints by more than 75 percent, without shutting venues down or silencing music.
That experience shaped everything we do.
Whether the challenge is entertainment-related sound or long-term music sustainability, our work begins with understanding lived experience.
Entertainment-Related Sound & Management
Listening first solutions that reduce conflict without silencing music.
We help cities modernize entertainment-related sound policy by focusing on trust, clarity, and shared responsibility.
Sound ordinance and policy review
Entertainment and event sound diagnostics
Licensing and permitting alignment
Music Census™
Lived-experience data that helps communities focus and act.
The Music Census captures what federal data misses by surveying the people who make up the local music ecosystem.
Musicians and creative workers
Venues and presenters
Optional local music audience component