Concert Photography: Part 2—Journalism vs. PR in the Pit

What happens at a concert isn’t always on the stage. Sometimes it’s bigger, louder and messier than the music itself—and that’s just one of the reasons that concert photography is journalism, not PR.

In a single instant, a show can turn into news. A fan collapses. Security breaks down. A protest erupts from the stage. A crowd surge sends people to the hospital. Or a record-setting turnout makes front-page headlines the next morning. None of this is hypothetical — it’s history, and more often than not it’s first captured through a photographer’s lens.