How can I get the value returned from the row() function in the database

[eluser]Namsu[/eluser]
This is basically from a row output on a database using CodeIgniter.
$total = $this->ticketquery->countArtistTotal();

I have used print_r to tell me the structure of the object:
stdClass Object ( [COUNT(artevtid)] => 13 )

I tried several ways of accessing it like an array [] and an object -> but can't find any luck.