To better understand the growing popularity of live music, this study analyses consumers’ motivations for live music attendance. In addition to existing literature, a generic approach to audience motivations contributes to our knowledge of the growing live music industry, where venues and festivals vie for the same artists and audience. Based on a survey among visitors of live music events (n = 1131), a principal component analysis was conducted to extract six motivations for visiting live music, the Live Music Motivation Scale (LMMS). Within this scale, for all motivations, a significant difference was found between visiting concerts and festivals. People predominantly visit festivals for social and personal reasons and predominantly visit concerts for artistic reasons and the uniqueness of the live experience. This study adds to the existing literature a more generic insight in motivations for visiting live music events and a clear comparison between motivations for visiting concerts and music festivals.