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The direct and indirect costs of the escalating US-China trade war are starting to add up. Among them: The world could miss out on the next Yo-Yo Maor Wynton Marsalis. Ma and Marsalis’s rises to stardom began in school music programs, and US tariffs on Chinese goods will have particularly dramatic effects for student/beginner-level brass and stringed instruments and the school music programs that depend on them.
While the Trump administration has declared a temporary ceasefire on the vast majority of “reciprocal” tariffs announced on April 2 , the US-China trade war has only intensified. As of April 11, the United States and China are imposing average tariffs of 134.7 percent and 147.6 percent ,[2] respectively, on each other’s exports. The World Trade Organization has forecast merchandise trade between the two countries—at $582.4 billion , the single largest bilateral trading relationship in the world—will fall by up to 80 percent in 2025 as a result.
Musical instruments account for only about 1/10 of 1 percent of that trade, but the cultural and economic footprint of the downstream industries they enable—the concert industry , the music industry , the podcast industry , and yes, even the military-industrial complex —is enormous. And these are just the economic benefits. The social benefits, ranging from better performance in schools , cross-cultural understanding , and the incalculable joy music brings to audiences [3] are perhaps even bigger. And for musicians, instruments are not like appliances or fast fashion. They are conduits for the sonic expression of the human spirit. The loss of opportunity to live a life enriched by musicianship is incalculable.
The big picture
In 2024, China accounted for $560 million (35.7 percent) in US musical instrument and parts imports (HS 92), more than the next three exporting countries (Indonesia, Japan, and Mexico) combined (figure 1). These imports faced an average 11 percent duty.[4] As of April 12, these products are subject to a 145 percent duty—a 1,218 percent increase. Obviously, these tariffs will increase costs, not just of imported goods but the domestic products that compete with them . But which sectors of the musical instrument trade are likely to be hardest hit?
Where will tariffs hit hardest?
The short answer is beginner/student-level instruments, particularly orchestral strings (violins, violas, cellos, and upright basses) and brasswinds (trumpets, trombones, French horns—and yes, the beloved tuba), but also electronic keyboards and electric guitars and basses. The longer answer is all-of-the-above, given the role Chinese-manufactured parts and materials play in supply chains for even US-made musical instruments, microphones, and speakers.
Figure 2 plots US musical instrument imports from China at the Harmonized System (HS) six-digit level according to the Chinese share of total US imports (x-axis) and the total customs value (y-axis) for 2024. Chinese imports accounted for more than 80 percent of US imports for music boxes and bowed string instruments. US import dependence on China is highest for music boxes (94 percent of imports), which most people would not consider musical instruments per se.[5] Bowed stringed instruments, for which China accounts for 83 percent of US imports, are a completely different story.
Millions of Americans play or have played a violin, viola, cello, or upright bass, even if they didn’t progress far beyond “Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star .” The vast majority of these players first encountered strings in a school music program, which are not usually flush with cash. The average US-made violin costs in the vicinity of $6,000 to $8,000, with larger instruments like violas, cellos, and basses even more expensive. These instruments and their prices reflect the quality and craftsmanship of US luthiers and target intermediate-to-advanced players. For this reason, school music programs are heavily dependent on lower-cost Chinese imports , which can be found for $100 to $500. Of course, a player will never graduate to intermediate-to-advanced status without having started as a beginner (presumably with a less expensive instrument).
Strings are not the only instruments that will be affected. The same story holds for brass instruments like trumpets, trombones, and saxophones, the instruments that are at the heart of marching bands but also jazz, the quintessential American musical art form . Forty-five percent of brass wind instrument imports come from China, again slanted heavily toward the beginner/student population. Trumpet virtuoso Wynton Marsalis may favor a $15,000+, custom, Oregon-made Monette PRANA 3 STC , but school horn sections have more modest budgets and tastes. The next Wynton Marsalis is probably practicing on a Chinese-made student trumpet right now. And asking a master horn maker like David Monette to produce student instruments would make as much sense as asking Max Verstappen to leave Formula 1 and drive the local school bus. As discussed in a previous post , China is also where a large share of entry-level electric guitars, basses, and keyboards are made. The same logic applies regardless of the instrument in question, and the effects are worst for those individuals and families—lower-income Americans—who are most reliant on subsidized music education programs for access to instruments .
What’s missing from the picture?
The effects for these imported final goods—that is, the instrument as a whole, ready for use—are likely to be large. But Chinese parts and materials are often found in USA-made instruments and musical equipment. My Ludwig Classic Maple drums were proudly made in Monroe, North Carolina. But many of the metal bits, like the lugs that attach the playing surfaces (heads) to the drum shells, were sourced from China. This situation obtains across virtually all types of instruments and producers.
Jazz cats like George Benson and progressive metal artists and producers like Periphery’s Adam Getgood are both fans of neodymium-magnet guitar speakers, which are lighter than conventional speakers but still provide great tones from subtle grit to wall-of-sound distortion. China produces nearly 80 percent of the world’s neodymium magnets . Because these magnets have significant dual-use capabilities, Chinese neodymium magnets are now subject to stringent retaliatory export controls . George Benson’s signature Fender Twin Reverb may be USA-made, but its speakers are manufactured in Italy using neodymium magnets almost surely sourced from China.[6]. At an even more fundamental level, both “reciprocal” and Section 232 tariffs on inputs like steel and aluminum will raise prices on parts across the supply chains.
Tariffs on Chinese musical instruments and components may seem minor in the context of a rapidly crumbling $582 billion trade relationship, but their effects are far-reaching. They raise costs for students, schools, and instrument makers, limiting access and disrupting supply chains. These policies risk making music education—formal or informal—less accessible, with minimal if any benefits for US instrument manufacturers focused on higher-value products for the US and global markets. Indeed, as their input costs increase, high-end US manufacturers may find themselves facing pricing pressures on the global market.
A first-best solution would be for the United States and China to de-escalate trade tensions generally. This is not the direction of travel. To avoid collateral damage to cultural and educational sectors, both China and the United States should prioritize targeted exemptions and trade diplomacy in areas like musical instruments where strategic significance and dual-use concerns are insignificant but the societal value—for musicians and music fans alike—is enormous.
Notes
1. The tariffs are flatly not reciprocal.
2. These average rates do not account for the recently announced exemption of various electronic exports, including laptops, smartphones, and tablets. These consumer electronics are incredibly important to musicians in the digital age but are beyond the scope of this blog post.
3. This video features an Australian band (AC/DC) performing in Argentina and featuring American-made Gibson and Gretsch guitars and German-made Sonor drums. How’s that for globalization?
4. Author’s calculations based on US Census Trade Data: $560,329,553 customs value of imports, $61,502,790 calculated duty.
5. This doesn’t mean they are unimportant. A recent-ish (2020) survey of one US five-year-old (the author’s daughter) finds that when a wind-up ballerina music box stops working, the harms are real (and expressed loudly).
6. Ninety-eight percent of all neodymium and other rare earth-based permanent magnets in European Union are sourced from China.
Data Disclosure
This publication does not include a replication package.
