As the music season drew to a close and the baseball season opened, the tradesheet Billboard proudly front-paged some comparative figures. In 1953, reported Billboard, 35 million attended professional musical performances (almost as many as the 37 million who went to major-and minor-league baseball games). At the box offices in 2,100 communities, music lovers spent $50 million, while the whole of organized baseball took in only $40 million. With the classical record market taking 30% of record-sale dollars, it looked, thought Billboard, as if the U.S. might be going longhair.
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