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Billboard Canada and SOCAN will recognize the unsung heroes behind the country’s biggest songs.
The Billboard Canada Non-Performing Songwriter Award will pay tribute to the talented songwriters who create powerful music and exemplify the songwriter’s indispensable role in the music ecosystem.
This is the first award of its kind in Canada, for professional songwriters who make a major impact writing for other artists. Rarely do they get the spotlight, until now. The inaugural Billboard Canada Non-Performing Songwriter Award will be presented at Billboard Canada’s Power Players event in Toronto on Sunday, June 2.
The award is presented by SOCAN, which collects and distributes royalties for musicians and rights-holders in Canada. The crucial rights organization is a champion of music industry professionals, with more than 190,000 members – songwriters, composers and music publishers – ensuring that they are properly recognized and compensated for their work.
“Fierce champions of songwriting, SOCAN is proud to present the Billboard Canada Non-Performing Songwriter Award, shining a light on the architects behind the anthems,” says Jennifer Brown, SOCAN CEO. “A first in Canada, this award celebrates the impact of professional songwriters, who, from behind the scenes, create songs that resonate internationally, and we’re thrilled to partner with Billboard to give them the recognition they so richly deserve.”
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On the nomination form, submit three songs that the nominee wrote for another performer in 2023. Songs must have been released between January 1, 2023 and December 31, 2023. The three songs should represent and show their creative success during that period. There are also optional fields for number of sales, streams and spins.
Nominations for the award open today, May 7, and will close on May 17 at 11:59 PM EST.
Find more information here.
deadmau5 Will Be Inducted Into Canadian Music Week Hall of Fame in 2024
After 25 years in the music industry, deadmau5 will enter the Canadian Music Week (CMW) Hall of Fame.
He’ll be inducted on Tuesday, June 4 at the Live Music Industry Awards, which takes place at Toronto’s Westin Harbour Castle in the Frontenac Room.
Before that, though, deadmau5 will take part in a Fireside Chat at the CMW Music Summit Conference that will be hosted by Billboard. He’ll speak with Billboard Canada editor Richard Trapunski in a conversation that will delve deep into his colourful two-and-a-half-decade career on some of music’s biggest stages.
“deadmau5 is a legend,” says Andrew Valle, General Manager and Festival Director of CMW. “His unparalleled creativity has not only reshaped the sonic dance landscape but has also inspired countless artists and producers worldwide.”
Born Joel Zimmerman, deadmau5 arose at a time when electronic dance music was becoming one of the most popular genres in North America. One of the defining superstars of the late 2000s and early 2010s EDM boon, he’s headlined the biggest stages and major festivals electronic music has to offer. Recognizable for his signature LED stage helmet, also known as his mau5head, he’s become known for his big-stage spectacle and earth-shattering productions.
He remains one of electronic music’s most bankable stars. As of 2023, his catalogue has clocked more than 1.5 billion streams. In 2022, he teamed with his longtime collaborator Kaskade to form Kx5, a superduo that played a handful of festival dates. Now hitting the road with a rotating slate of famous friends, he’s embarked on his “retro5pective: 25yrs of Deadmau5” tour, which has already seen guest appearances from artists like Lights, Kiesza and Tommy Lee.
Security Guard Shot Outside Drake’s Toronto Mansion, Police Confirm
Toronto Police are investigating a shooting that took place early in the morning on May 7 outside Drake’s mansion.
According to reports from CBC and The Toronto Star, the entrance to the rapper’s house had been taped off after a reported shooting. The Star also reported police going in and out of the house as they investigate.
Toronto Police Operations posted on X that they were investigating the shooting that took place at 2:09 am at Bayview Avenue & Lawrence Avenue East, near the site of Drake’s Park Lane Circle mansion in the Bridle Path neighbourhood — one of the most expensive areas of Toronto.
According to the tweet, a man was transported to hospital with serious injuries and a suspect fled in a vehicle. The Toronto Star reports that it is unclear whether Drake was at home at the time.
Drake has been embroiled in an ongoing rap battle with Kendrick Lamar. The art for Kendrick Lamar’s Not Like Us features a Google Maps image of Drake’s Toronto house. The location of Drake’s estate is already well known in the city and the rapper filmed his 2020 music video for Toosie Slide inside.
The victim was identified as a “security guard” working at the residence. They were transported to the hospital and have since undergone surgery for injuries sustained during the event.
No suspects have been named, but Inspector Paul Krawczyk of the Integrated Gun and Gang Task Force confirmed the shooting and says the suspect’s vehicle was captured on video by surrounding security cameras.
The following day, on May 8, there was another incident at Drake’s house when a person attempted to gain access to the property.
“The person was apprehended under the mental health act, and they were taken to receive medical attention,” Toronto Police said in a statement.
The person reportedly did not enter the house, but was immediately confronted at the gate by security and arrested by police.
Last Week In Canada: Diljit Dosanjh Makes Punjabi Music History
Building a state-of-the-art Sphere venue is “not like building a McDonalds,” Sphere Entertainment Co. chairman and CEO James Dolan said during the company’s earnings call on Friday. “It’s complicated. It’s a very expensive project.”
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The lone Sphere venue in Las Vegas, which cost $2.3 billion to build through delays and cost overruns during the COVID-19 pandemic, generated revenue of $170.4 million in its fiscal third quarter ended March 31, the parent company, Sphere Entertainment Co, reported Friday. Revenue was slightly better than the $167.8 million in the prior quarter. Adjusted operating income was $12.9 million, slightly down from the prior quarter’s AOI of $14.1 million.
Dolan wants to build more Spheres and insists a second venue will materialize. The company is “in discussions with several markets” and has encountered “plenty of interest all around the world,” he said, “but not until we launched the product in September did people really get to see what it was and began to see how it could perform.”
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Sphere will reach an agreement with “at least one of those markets soon,” Dolan added. “How soon I’m not going to predict.”
Sphere, which wowed music fans through residencies by U2 and Phish, attracted nearly one million guests to more than 270 events in the quarter, said Dolan. In addition to concerts, Sphere offers a motion picture, Postcards from Earth, that CFO David Byrnes said generated $100 million in revenue in the quarter. In June, Sphere will host its first corporate event, a keynote address by Hewlett Packard Enterprise president and CEO Antonio Neri, and its first televised event, the NHL draft.
Demand from artists to perform at Sphere is “stronger than we can even accommodate at this point,” Dolan claimed. The company wants to have “a varied number of kinds of acts, not just legacy rock acts,” and “acts that have the biggest draws,” he added.
Dead & Co. begins its 24-date residency on May 16. A residency by the Eagles has not been officially announced but Dolan suggested during the earnings call the band will indeed perform at Sphere.
“Even if you’re not a Deadhead, you’re gonna love that show,” said Dolan when discussing the need to create “compelling” visuals to complement bands’ musical performances. “And I think the same will be true for The Eagles and for the next acts that we bring up.”
Sphere Entertainment Co. had an operating loss of $40.4 million on revenue of $321.3 million. The company’s other segment, MSG Networks, had AOI of $48.6 million, down 17%, on revenue of $151 million, down 6% from the prior-year quarter. The company explained that those figures decreased from the prior-year quarter “primarily due to a 12.5% decrease in subscribers inclusive of the impact of MSG+,” the network’s streaming platform.
Sony Music Publishing swept Billboard’s Publishers Quarterly rankings for the first three months of 2024 — its fifth consecutive quarter atop the Top Radio Airplay and Hot 100 Songs lists.
Sony also had a piece of the song that ruled both charts — Jack Harlow’s “Lovin on Me.” The other top 10 publishers with a stake in the song: Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG), Warner Chappell Music and Kobalt.
The first quarter’s top songwriter on the Hot 100 Songs ranking was Noah Kahan. He landed at the peak due to two songs, including the No. 10 track on the chart, “Stick Season.” Not surprisingly, on Top Radio Airplay, Taylor Swift was the No. 1 songwriter thanks to the success of three songs on that list, including “Is It Over Now (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)” at No. 5.
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Returning to Sony, the publisher finished the quarter with a 29.19% slice of market share on the strength of shares in 66 songs — an improvement over the 64 songs and 27.69% the company claimed in the prior quarter. For the first quarter’s Hot 100 Songs chart, Sony ended up with a 28.60% share with 58 songs — again, an improvement over the prior quarter’s 27.14% share, but one song less than the 59 tracks it snared in that quarter.
Sony’s showing marks the 12th quarter in a row that it ranked No. 1 among Top Radio Airplay publishers. Remarkably, it has held the top spot for 25 of the last 26 quarters. On the Hot 100 Songs chart, Sony ranked No. 1 for the fifth consecutive quarter.
Meanwhile, Warner Chappell Music continued its surge, finishing in second place for a second consecutive quarter on both publisher rankings. The publisher increased its quarter-to-quarter market share in both rankings — from 19.12% to 21.93% on Top Radio Airplay and 20.65% to 22.05% on Hot 100 Songs. Warner Chappell’s Top Radio Airplay song count also grew from 54 to 63 quarter to quarter, and its Hot 100 song count ballooned from 44 to 58. It was also No. 1 on the Country Airplay publisher rankings.
UMPG came in third on both charts, posting a stronger showing on the Hot 100 Songs ranking, with a 17.42% share and 43 songs. That’s up from the prior quarter’s 15.78% and 41 songs. Its top track on both charts was Harlow’s “Lovin on Me.” On Top Radio Airplay, UMPG posted a 14.65% share with a stake in 44 songs, down from the prior quarter’s 18.47% and 48 songs.
Kobalt and BMG, respectively, came in at No. 4 and No. 5, their usual spots on both publisher rankings. Kobalt upped its game in the Top Radio Airplay category, amassing a 9.65% share of the market with stakes in 31 songs — an improvement over the fourth quarter, when it had an 8.81% share and 30 songs. Kobalt performed even better on the Hot 100 Songs chart with a 10.19% market share, but that was still down from the 10.83% share it had in the fourth quarter of 2023.
BMG’s market share declined on both charts. Its Top Radio Airplay share fell from 6.77% to 5.86% quarter to quarter and from 5.95% to 5.47% on Hot 100 Songs, while its song counts fell from 18 to 14, and from 16 to 14, respectively. Its top song on both charts was Doja Cat’s “Paint The Town Red,” which ranked No. 7 on the Top Radio Airplay chart and No. 12 on the Hot 100 chart.
The publishers that ranked sixth through ninth on Top Radio Airplay were Concord, Hipgnosis Songs Group, Tracy Chapman’s Purple Rabbit Music and Pulse in that order. Concord held steady at No. 6 for its second consecutive quarter, albeit down slightly from 3.71% in the fourth quarter to 3.38%. Its song count also fell from 14 to 10. On the other hand, Hipgnosis rose from No. 9 last quarter to No. 7, growing its market share from 1.48% to 2.29%, even though its song placement on the chart stayed the same — six —in both quarters. The wattage of Luke Combs’ cover of “Fast Car” finally seems to be fading as Purple Rabbit’s market share decreased from 2.07% to 1.67%, despite holding on to its No. 8 berth for a second quarter. Pulse traded places with Hipgnosis, falling from No. 7 in the fourth quarter with a 2.66% share to No. 9 in the first with 1.52%.
On the Hot 100 publisher ranking, Purple Rabbit fared better, rising from No. 7 to No. 6 quarter-to-quarter thanks to a slight uptick in market share from 1.99% to 2.06%. Likewise, Pulse rose from No. 10 to No. 8 over the same period, its market share growing from 1.31% to 1.96%. And Hipgnosis returned to the Hot 100 chart after being absent since the fourth quarter of 2022. Its 1.59% share put it in ninth place. Big Machine took Top Radio Airplay’s tenth slot, returning to that ranking for the first time sinced the fourth quarter of 2022. And Empire Publishing made its Billboard Publishers Quarterly debut at No. 10 on the Hot 100 list, with a 0.97% share, based on the strength of three song placements: Justin Timberlake’s “Selfish,” 310babii’s “Soak City (Do It)” and Morgan Wallen’s “Spin You Around.”
Last Quarter: Taylor Swift and Doja Cat Score Top Songs
It’s time for another spindle around the Executive Turntable, Billboard’s comprehensive(ish) compendium of promotions, hirings, exits and firings — and all things in between — across music. On Thursday we revealed this year’s Country Power Players list, where Big Loud partner and CEO Seth England was named top executive and WME’s Jay Williams earned the peer-voted Power Players’ Choice Award.
BMG‘s new head of global corporate communications is Kristal McKanders Dube, who joins the music company following a six-year tenure leading media strategy for Warner Chappell Music. McKanders Dube will stay in Los Angeles but report to BMG’s Berlin-based chief executive Thomas Coesfeld; her main role will be to spearhead both internal and external communications effort while also connecting the dots between BMG and its parent company Bertelsmann. Prior to joining Warner, where she held the position of svp of communications and marketing, McKanders Dube worked in the consumer brand and luxury hospitality space with IHG Hotels & Resorts, and agencies MSL Group and Jackson Spalding. She succeeds Steve Redmond as BMG’s communicator-in-chief.
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“It’s an exciting time at BMG with the company uniquely positioned for growth in a rapidly evolving music landscape, and we’re happy to have Kristal join us at such a pivotal moment and bring a fresh perspective to our business,” said Coesfeld. “Kristal’s innate storytelling ability, coupled with her expertise in corporate and music publishing communications, makes her an invaluable addition to our team.”
Meanwhile…
Arista Records upped their co-heads of urban music, Kendell “Sav” Freeman and Khris Riddick-Tynes, to senior vp of A&R. The NYC-based Freeman and LA-er Riddick-Tynes will continue reporting to Arista president David Massey. Since first being named co-heads of urban music in 2021, the pair have added heat to Arista’s roster in the form of rising artists Lola Brooke, Hurry Hazan and Skylar Blatt, while Riddick-Tynes has been instrumental in developing Paul “Lil Boo Thang” Russell. “We are excited for Sav and Khris to begin this next chapter in further elevating our artists around the world,” said Massey. “They have played an integral part in helping build and develop an impressive roster here at Arista … and we look forward to their continued leadership.”
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NASHVILLE NOTES: Academy Award nominated singer-songwriter Allison Moorer (pictured in 2019) and Rolling Stone magazine veteran Jon Freeman joined the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum staff as writer-editors, responsible for wordsmithing across exhibitions, publications, social media and more. The Hall also promoted Brad Henton to senior director of culinary, event and museum sales; Paige Maillet to director of guest experiences; and Kayleigh Shoemaker to director of public programs … Julien’s Auctions hired Cristy Barber as vp of pop culture and business development for its new Nashville office. She was most recently with legacy firm Iconoclast as vp of global marketing and brand partnerships.
Cliff Chenfeld joined Jonny Shipes’ GoodTalk as partner and advisor at the full-service entertainment company. Chenfeld co-founded Razor & Tie, and for years served as co-CEO of the indie label and publisher. If you’re a parent, you can also (hiss/cheer) at him for developing — along with his R&T co-founder Craig Balsam — the ridonculously popular Kidz Bop compilation series, which the pair sold along with Razor & Tie to Concord in 2018. “I’ve known Jonny for 15 years and have been amazed at his ability to identify special artists, to stay on the tip of cultural developments and to expand his vision of himself and his business,” said Chenfeld. “In addition, he is a hell of a lot of fun and a good friend. I have been very selective with how I spend my time since selling Razor + Tie and Kidz Bop and working with Jonny was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up.”
Sarah Mitchell is now head of BMG‘s rights and royalties operations across both music publishing and recordings in the UK and across Europe. Mitchell joined BMG in 2022 as svp of neighboring rights and in her tenure has already inked deals with Coldplay, Pete Townshend and Christine & The Queens, among others. In her new capacity as svp of rights and royalties, the London-based exec will handle rights and royalty management for most non-U.S. dealings, and she’ll work with clients on copyright administration, analytics and accounting across recordings and publishing. She reports to Sebastian Hentzschel and sits on the BMG UK board. Prior to joining BMG, Mitchell was director of membership & communications at UK neighboring rights society PPL. “Over the past two years Sarah Mitchell has proven to be a significant addition to BMG’s London-based leadership with an incredible network in the artist and business communities and an impressive ability to think differently and make things happen,” said Alistair Norbury, president of BMG UK.
Italian rock label Frontiers landed Tom Lipsky as its new head of A&R of North America. Lipsky is the former head of several rock and heavy metal labels, including Loud & Proud Records, Sanctuary Records and CMC International Records, which he co-founded, and the indie Carry On Music. Napoli-based Frontiers is the Italian home of a bevy of rock greats including Def Leppard, Winger, Night Ranger, Mr. Big, Blue Oyster Cult, YES and Electric Light Orchestra, among others. Lipsky’s remit is all about translating the label’s bellissima vision for North America. In a statement, Lipsky said he and Frontiers founder Serafino Perugino “share a common vision regarding the continuing relevance and value of veteran artists,” adding, “I look forward to working with him and his team to make Frontiers the label home of choice for the artist community.”
Tixr, the primary ticketing platform based in Santa Monica, Calif., hired industry veteran Steve Oberman as the new vp of partnerships. In his new role, Oberman is tasked with growing the fast-expanding company across music and other industries both in North America and internationally. He joins Tixr from See Tickets, where he was evp and head of music. Prior to entering the ticketing game, Oberman worked in day-to-day management of artists — Stone Temple Pilots and Velvet Revolver come to mind — at Frontline and Azoff Music Management. Other recent US-based hires at Tixr include Ravi Durga, also formerly of See Tickets, as director of partnerships; Amir Mozafari, ex-DICE, as nightlife partnerships specialist; and Matt Stallknecht, formerly of NASCAR, as partnerships executive. “Tixr’s platform is the future of modern ticketing and e-commerce,” said Oberman. “The team’s speed to innovate and ship products, eye for design, and unique approach to problem-solving is second to none.”
Label, publisher and distributor Empire Nashville promoted Heather Vassar to senior vp of operations and Sarah Beth Gerlecz to director of business and legal affairs. In addition, Hannah Galluzzi has been hired as director of A&R, having previously worked in A&R at Universal Music Group Nashville for six years. Empire artists Shaboozey, Reyna Roberts and Willie Jones were featured on Beyonce’s album Cowboy Carter, while Shaboozey has the current Billboard Hot 100 No. 3 song “A Bar Song (Tipsy).” The label has teamed with Magnolia Music Group to take “Bar Song” to country radio. –Jessica Nicholson
Four industry veterans launched Fixated, described as a one-stop shop for creators, fans and brands with a goal of “reshaping the digital entertainment landscape.” Co-founders of the company include CEO Zach Katz (ex-president and COO of FaZe Clan, president of BMG North America), president Jason Wilhelm (co-founder Talent X/Sway House and Content Labs), chief studio officer Dean Johnson (co-founder Content Labs), and chief content officer Luc Boulch (content creator). The leadership team of Fixated is rounded out by Phil Ranta and Ali Adab, as chief operating officer and chief growth officer, respectively. “We are this generation’s fans who went on to become creators,” said Boulch. “In doing so, we made virality our religion. And now, whether it’s talent, content or gaming, we have a science for driving traffic to our ecosystem like no one else.”
Music marketing veteran Joe Aboud officially launched consultancy firm 444 Sounds, with a roster including Sony Music, UnitedMasters, Major Recordings and artists such as Jung Kook and Enrique Iglesias. Aboud was most recently vp of marketing and streaming at HITCO, and prior to that worked as a marketing manager at Atlantic Records.
Music Venue Trust hired Sophie Brownlee as external affairs manager and Kimberley Goddard as fundraising manager. The UK charity with a laser-focus on protecting grassroots venues also said it promoted Sophie Asquith to venue support team manager. “These new appointments will bring real experience and energy to Music Venue Trust,” said Beverly Whitrick, COO of MVT. “It is vital that, at a time when the challenges facing the grassroots music sector continue to mount, we can offer support, expertise and guidance to the venues we work with.”
SAVOR, the hospitality arm of ASM Global, added Jason Dowd as senior vp of culinary and innovation, and Craig Condra as regional vp of food and beverage. Combined, the pair have roughly 46 years of experience in the culinary and hospitality business. “At SAVOR we take the force of decades of international experience and implement a hyper-local approach, offering our clients unique culinary innovations of the highest levels while also carefully tailoring services at each venue according to the region it operates,” said Shaun Beard, svp of SAVOR. “With Jason at the helm of the company’s culinary innovation program and Craig managing the facilities at the regional level, we are fully equipped to continue delivering this signature service and unparalleled experience to all of our clients.”
LIVE, a trade group advocating for 16 live music industry associations, appointed Ross Patel to lead sustainability issues as the org’s first-ever Green Impact Consultant. Patel has many hats on already as co-founder and CEO for Whole Entertainment and chief strategy officer at UMA Entertainment Group. Plus, in June 2021 Ross joined the Music Manager Forum as a board member to help them advocate for climate action.
ICYMI:
Lu Mota
Pete Ganbarg is stepping aside as Atlantic Records’ president of A&R to launch Pure Tone Records, a joint venture with the label … Delia Orjuela is the new head of creative Mexican music/música mexicana at Warner Chappell Music … Luis “Lu” Mota left Columbia to join Atlantic as executive vp of A&R.
Last Week’s Turntable: Island Def Jamming With New VP
iHeartMedia shares fell 36.1% on Thursday after the company’s first-quarter earnings showed continued uncertainty in broadcast advertising mixed with improvements in its digital business.
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iHeartMedia’s loss of 12 cents per share bested analysts’ estimate of a loss of 55 cents per share, according to MarketWatch, and its revenue ($799 million) and adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization ($105 million) both fell within the guidance it provided.
CEO Bob Pittman and COO and CFO Rich Bressler reminded listeners to Thursdays’ earnings call that the first quarter is historically the slowest period of the year. They also reiterated the company’s optimism about 2024 and the expected benefits of political advertising in the second half of the year.
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“Although the marketplace continues to be dynamic, with a changing outlook on interest rates, inflation trends and global and domestic uncertainty, we remain confident that this is a recovery year highlighted by the strong momentum and our podcast business and the sequential improvement of our multi platform groups year over year adjusted EBITDA performance,” said Pittman.
The current quarter may be an improvement over the first quarter, but iHeartMedia doesn’t expect much improvement over 2023. Thursday’s guidance for Q2 revenue as “approximately flat” compared to the prior-year quarter’s revenue of $920 million was slightly below analysts’ consensus of $935 million, according to Zacks Equity Research. April revenue is expected to be down 0.4%, Bressler said, and the multi-platform group’s gross revenue is expected to be down “mid-single digits” in the second quarter.
iHeartMedia shares dropped to $1.38 on Thursday, bringing their year-to-date loss to 48.3%. Thursday’s closing price was 70.8% below the stock’s 52-week high of $4.73 established on July 31, 2023.
Another blemish was the first quarter’s free cash flow (FCF) was negative $88 million, although it was improvement from negative $133 million in the prior-year quarter. First-quarter FCF did not include the $101 million iHeartMedia received from the sale of BMI to New Mountain Capital in February.
Total revenue of $799 million was down 1.5% from the prior-year period. The multi-platform group, which includes iHeartMedia’s broadcast radio networks and events business, suffered the biggest declines: revenue fell 6.7% to $493 million and adjusted EBITDA dropped 11% to $77 million.
Led by growth in podcasts, digital audio group revenue rose 7.0% to $239 million and adjusted EBITDA jumped 25.9% to $68.1 million. In the audio and media services division, revenue improved 12.7% to $69.2 million and adjusted EBITDA soared 54.4% to $23.7 million.
Prescription Songs and Emily Warren‘s Under Warrenty have signed singer-songwriter bülow to a global publishing deal. Fresh off the release of her two co-writes “Texas Hold ‘Em” by Beyonce and “Yuck” by Charli XCX, bülow says of her deal, “I’m very excited to start this journey with Emily and Prescription. So many serendipitous moments led us here organically, and I have the utmost admiration for this team.”
Kobalt has signed songwriter Imani “Mocha” Lewis. News of her signing comes after the whirlwind success of Tyla‘s Grammy-winning track “Water,” which was co-written by Lewis, along with eight other tracks on the South African artist’s debut album.
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Position Music has signed Golden to a worldwide publishing deal as part of a joint venture with Global 7 Publishing. A Colombian writer, musician and Grammy-nominated producer, Golden has worked on tracks for Coco Jones, ¿Téo? and Shenseea.
peermusic has signed award-winning Chilean producer and songwriter Vladi Cachai (Don Omar, Gloria Trevi, Bryant Myers, J Quiles) to an exclusive worldwide publishing deal. The deal was signed jointly by peermusic Spain and peermusic Chile and will encompass both Cachai’s existing song catalog and his future works.
Budde Music has signed songwriter Billy Mann to a go-forward “creative and administrative” publishing agreement. A hitmaker with thirty years of expertise, Mann has worked with stars like P!nk, Backstreet Boys, David Guetta, John Legend, Céline Dion, Carole King, Burt Bacharach and more.
Warner Chappell Music and The Core Entertainment have signed a joint global publishing deal with Hannah McFarland. A rising singer-songwriter and opener for artists like Kelsea Ballerini, Old Dominion, and Travis Tritt, McFarland was recently invited to sing “I Remember Everything” alongside Zach Bryan at a show in Alabama, introducing her talent to a stadium of new listeners. “We are so excited to work with Hannah McFarland and represent her unique talent,” says Bryce Sherlow, A&R manager at WCM Nashville.
Sony Music Publishing Nashville has announced the signing of country songwriter Brian Fuller to a global publishing deal. Fuller is a fast-rising songwriter in Nashville, and news of his SMP deal follows the release of his first-ever major label cut “I Could Be That Rain,” from Randall King’s 2024 album Into The Neon.
Nashville-based rights management company Muserk is expanding its royalty and administration services in Asia. This includes the signing of a series of new clients with impressive cultural impact in their home markets, including Thai neo-soul artist Phum Viphurit and Japanese label and publishing company Midi Inc/Yano Music Publishing. In the coming months, the company says it also plans to bring in more Chinese and Indonesian clients.
For much of the last decade, the Spanish collective management organization SGAE was part of one of the weirdest stories in the music business. Over the years, the collective management organization combined larger-than-life misbehavior (“Going to brothels after dinner was normal,” former senior executive Pedro Farré told El País in 2017) with an only-in-the-entertainment-business royalty accounting scheme called “la rueda” (the wheel) in which television companies played music to which they controlled the rights on late-night shows at barely audible levels in order to get back some of the money they paid SGAE in royalties.
Such songs became known as “witches’ music,” since they were played during “the witching hour,” often on astrology programs that could last for hours, and some were barely changed arrangements of public domain classical compositions registered to television executives and their relatives. In 2017, police raided SGAE headquarters.
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How much of this was amusing, as opposed to outrageous, varied directly with whether any of the money belonged to your company or creators with whom you worked, and in May 2019 the collecting society trade association CISAC took the unusual step of ejecting SGAE. Within months, hundreds of creators notified SGAE that they intended to withdraw their rights and alternatives began to emerge, including the Barcelona-based UNISON. That seemed to put more urgency behind the reforms that were already taking place, and two years later SGAE rejoined CISAC and began to rebuild the trust of creators, publishers and other CMOs.
Since then, SGAE has stabilized and turned itself around, a process that solidified and gained ground under new CEO Cristina Perpiñá-Robert, who was appointed a little more than a year ago. Last year, the organization took in €349.1 million ($377.7 million, using the average 2023 conversion rate) and distributed €354.1 million ($383.1 million), according to its 2023 financial results, which will be announced on May 10. (Distributions are higher than revenue in 2023 because of special payments from broadcasters that SGAE received in 2022 and disbursed in 2023.) Those numbers represent a 24.9% gain in revenue and a 26.6% increase in distributions, and they arguably understate SGAE’s biggest achievement: Giving publishers and creators confidence that they’re distributing royalties in a fair way.
Over that same period, the number of SGAE members with authors rights grew from 36,956 to 83,148 as it celebrates its 125th anniversary. Perpiñá-Robert has also helped make SGAE something of a hub for digital rights for Latin American repertoire. SGAE is also benefitting from the global popularity of Spanish-language music, especially a new wave of Spanish urbano musicians like Quevedo and Bad Gyal.
“For them to see SGAE as something that’s not old and bureaucratic, that’s been really good,” says Perpiñá-Robert, who previously worked at SGAE, then left for CISAC and returned last year. The Spanish CMO never had the scale of SACEM (the French CMO) or PRS (in the U.K.), and that may not change – the Spanish economy is much smaller than those of France and the U.K. But it could become a kind of specialist hub. “Everywhere is, in Europe, local music is doing better,” Perpiñá-Robert says. But only a couple of countries manage to export that local music around the world.
Since the European Commission opened up competition among CMOs to manage rights online, two major hubs have emerged to license music for online use in Europe and some other territories: SACEM and ICE, the latter of which is a joint venture of PRS, GEMA (Germany) and STIM (Sweden). (Each society still collects for offline uses of music in its home country.) They compete to represent rights from creators, publishers and even other societies, and the conventional wisdom is that most of the smaller societies will become dependent on these, while those in the middle will get squeezed. But the rise of Latin music offers SGAE another path forward.
“We’re trying to become a pan-European hub for digital for Latin American music,” says Perpiñá-Robert. SGAE collects online royalties in Europe for all the Latin American societies except those in Mexico and Brazil. (Some international superstars from Latin America sign directly to ASCAP or BMI, which make their own international deals.) With CMOs, scale leads to scale – smaller societies that lack the resources to handle the amount of data now needed to manage royalties accurately tend to get smaller, while bigger ones tend to invest, grow and then invest and grow more. And there’s never been a better time to represent any kind of Latin music rights.
As SGAE improves its reputation, its past is also getting another look. Former SGAE president Teddy Bautista, who once faced possible jail time on charges of misappropriation of funds, was acquitted, along with others. And even “la rueda” was more of a failure of organizational governance than anything else: SGAE followed its own rules, but broadcasters gamed them.
SGAE still faces its share of challenges, including a UNISON lawsuit for anti-competitive behavior. But it has already made serious progress toward earning back trust, and it could go from a problem child to a serious player.
Music Business Association president Portia Sabin’s career has reached most of the corners of the music industry, including drumming under the stage name of P-Girl in all-female punk power-pop band The Hissyfits in the late 1990s.
After studying for a doctorate in anthropology and education at Columbia University in the early 2000s, she worked intermittently for the indie label Kill Rock Stars (and married its founder Slim Moon in 2004). Around that time, she also founded Shotclock Management and in 2006 took the reins of Kill Rock Stars when Moon left to work at Nonesuch Records. She led the label — home of Bikini Kill, The Decemberists, Sleater-Kinney and Elliott Smith — for 13 years while serving on the boards of directors for both U.S. label trade associations — the American Association of Independent Music and the RIAA — and the Recording Academy’s Pacific Northwest chapter. “I made a lot of connections across the industry through them and got a good sense of what part trade associations play in the ecosystem, as well as ideas about board management,” she says.
That experience has served Sabin well since she took over the Music Business Association, known colloquially as Music Biz, in 2019. Formerly called the National Association of Recording Merchandisers, the organization initially catered to retailers, wholesalers and labels’ sales divisions. But as the music industry limped through the Napster and digital download era and eventually reinvented itself around streaming, Music Biz took on a much broader mandate. It serves as a forum where all sectors of the industry can unite to discuss mutual problems and explore new opportunities.
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Despite that evolution, Sabin says, “I will always have a soft spot for retailers because I knew them from when I ran [Kill Rock Stars]. There were times when physical sales of Elliott Smith records were literally what kept my family with food on our table. It was very, very tough during those transition years of 2010 and 2011. There just wasn’t much money coming in, except for physical.”
Ahead of Music Biz’s annual conference, which will take place next week (May 13-16) in Nashville, Sabin spoke to Billboard about how it has grown and what attendees can expect.
How does this year’s convention compare with 2023?
We had about 2,100 people last year, and we are now more than 50% further along in terms of registrations than last year at this point. I’m anticipating about 2,300. Our board wanted us to grow international attendance, so we have folks from over 30 countries.
How many members does Music Biz have?
We currently have 369 member companies. When I came on board in 2019, we had individual memberships and student memberships. We’ve done away with both of those categories. When we’d have great high-level panels, there’d be a hundred students there, and it was not a good match; it just didn’t work. We still do have some individual members who are grandfathered in because there are folks who are very critical to the music industry, who’ve always been very knowledgeable and helpful. They do a lot of moderating but nowadays, members mainly participate through company memberships. I think that’s important because that’s what we’re in the business of doing — putting companies together at our meetings.
There seems to be a big international presence at this year’s conference compared to past gatherings.
That’s been really growing. That’s part of the mandate that our board gave us. They really want us to grow international attendance and we’ve been doing it. We have folks from over 30 countries, which is exciting.
Artificial intelligence is a big topic this year.
Yes. AI is the big one that everyone’s talking about. We have TuneCore sponsoring our AI track, and [TuneCore CEO Andreea Gleeson] is going to be doing a keynote with Meng Ru Kuok, the CEO and founder of BandLab, which is on the cutting edge of everything that everybody wants to talk about. The programming is crowdsourced. Our call for proposals or presentations goes out about September; and then everybody has until the middle of December to get in their proposals. And then in January, we review every single proposal, and get a real sense of what the industry is interested in finding out more about. We choose the ones that we think are the best. Every year is different. Two years ago, we probably had 30 proposals on [non-fungible tokens]. This year, we had zero.
I see the conference is still hosting a metadata track.
I always say it’s our least sexy but most popular track. Its stuff that people really need to know — critical knowledge. And there are a lot of advancements in that area, like combining the ISRC [International Standard Recording Code] and ISCW [International Standard Musical Work Code] at creation, with rapid matching. There’s definitely going to be a lot of new things to learn.
Any other programming you want to highlight?
I love that we got so many submissions on social impact — doing good stuff in the world. So, we now have a whole track for this area. We have a streaming track, of course. We have a track on fraud, and we still have a physical track. In all, we have 17 tracks.
The transformation from NARM to Music Biz occurred before you took the helm; and while the conference still has a big legacy physical business presence, overall the meeting’s scope is much larger.
When [NARM] became the Music Business Association, it kind of fell off my radar; and I didn’t find out about it again until about 2017 when I went to the conference, and I was blown away. It was everybody that you would want to talk to and just so many different pieces of the industry in one place. That’s what they did really well when they transitioned.
How are you growing the association and the conference?
We are pushing it even more; expanding [the organization and conference] and diversifying the types of companies that can be members. We still really focus on our core of retailers, labels and distributors. We want to celebrate them, support them and preserve them; and we do so with our physical programming, which happens at the conference but also throughout the year.
In the past, the conference was a hotbed of dealmaking and private meetings between companies up in the hotel suites. Will that ingredient still be prevalent this year?
The programming is important to the Music Biz conference, but networking is just as important. We believe that those deals still happen at Music Biz because when we look at attendance, it’s still like 27% C-suite attendees. A lot of decision-makers are at the conference, which makes a big difference. In order to accommodate private meetings, we created an hour and a half break in the middle of the day, where there’s no programming, and that is for people to have lunch and network. Also, we used to start programming earlier and go until six o’clock, but we decided that by five o’clock everybody’s ready to have a drink in the bar.
What is the relationship between your organization and the RIAA nowadays?
I think it’s great. I learned a lot from them when I was on their board for a couple of years. They are wonderful people and I love what they do, which is very different from what we do. They do so much advocacy work and we really don’t because we’re a Switzerland kind of trade association, with too many [members] with competing positions on the various issues. So, I try to do advocacy and collaboration and consensus building from the inside. For example, look at all of the efforts we’ve been making recently on fraud. That’s an issue where for a while it was very contentious and divisive in our industry. People were pointing fingers and saying, “oh, it’s not my problem; it’s your problem.” And now, I think people are sort of saying, “you know, we’ve got to figure this out, because fraudsters are going make life hard for everybody.” It’s been really, really cool to see the industry coming together around this issue.
The conference goes to Atlanta next year.
Yes, it’s going to be fun. We bought out the whole hotel. It’ll just be the music folks. I hope it feels like going to a sleepaway summer camp.
Pete Ganbarg is stepping aside as Atlantic Records’ president of A&R, a role he has held since 2018, to launch Pure Tone Records, a joint venture with the label. The first artist signed to Pure Tone Records is platinum Canadian singer/songwriter Forest Blakk, whom Ganbarg originally signed to Atlantic.
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Ganbarg, who has worked at Atlantic for almost 16 years, will continue to A&R several acts on the Atlantic Music Group roster, including twenty one pilots, Shinedown, Gayle, Halestorm, and others.
“The launch of Pure Tone Records as a standalone label is an exciting moment for me,” Ganbarg said in a statement. “It’s the best of both worlds – a golden opportunity to run my own shop, while at the same time having the backing of the outstanding Atlantic team who I’ve worked with so closely over the past 15-plus years.”
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“For the past 16 years, Pete has brilliantly led our A&R mission – discovering, signing, and championing a genre-crossing array of hit artists, while also boosting our theatrical presence with a string of award-winning cast albums,” Atlantic Music Group Chairman & CEO Julie Greenwald and Atlantic Records Chairman & CEO Craig Kallman said in a statement. “At the same time, he’s mentored and built a fantastic A&R team who are expert at nurturing baby acts and superstars alike. The formation of Pure Tone is an important event for Pete and Atlantic, as he brings his decades of experience, his impeccable taste, and great ears to steering his own ship, and we’re thrilled to be his partners on this exciting next phase of his musical journey.”
If the name Pure Tone sounds familiar, Ganbarg has been using the moniker for nearly two decades. He formed Pure Tone Music prior to joining Atlantic as an A&R consultancy, whose clients included Kelly Clarkson, Chaka Khan, Santana, Aaron Neville, Donna Summer, and others. He also operates a pair of publishing joint ventures with WMG’s Warner Chappell Music under that name. Its writers have achieved multiple gold and platinum certifications, including the 2024 Grammy-winning record of the year, Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers.”
“I’m looking forward to making Pure Tone [Records] a home for exceptional, original talent, and at the same time, I’m very happy to continue to work with my amazing Atlantic artist roster,” Ganbarg continued. “I want to thank Julie and Craig for their tremendous support over the years, and for having the faith to join me in this new adventure.”
The New York-based Ganbarg joined Atlantic in 2008 as executive vp of A&R. Through his tenure, he signed or shepherded recordings by twenty one pilots, Halestorm, Jason Mraz, Christina Perri, Melanie Martinez, Skillet, Brett Eldredge, Matchbox Twenty & Rob Thomas, among others.
He also led Atlantic’s tremendous success with Broadway cast albums, including co-signing and A&R’ing the Diamond-certified original Broadway cast recording of Hamilton. He won Grammy Awards as a producer of the original Broadway cast recordings of Dear Evan Hansen and Jagged Little Pill, and more recently oversaw the Broadway cast recordings for this season’s Tony-nominated shows, Suffs and The Notebook. He also worked on the soundtrack for The Greatest Showman and Daisy Jones & The Six.
Ganbarg began his A&R career in 1989 at SBK Records. In 1997, while at Arista Records, he conceived and A&R’d Santana’s 30x platinum worldwide, nine-time Grammy-winning Supernatural.
There is no word on Ganbarg’s successor as president of A&R.
The Maryland bill targeting speculative ticketing in the state was signed into law by Gov. Wes Moore today. The consumer protection bill focuses on the sale and resale of live event tickets and was supported by the Recording Academy, National Independent Venue Association (NIVA), National Independent Talent Organization (NITO), Eventbrite and more.
The bill bans speculative ticketing (the practice of listing tickets on secondary sites before a reseller owns a ticket), as well as require ticketers to present “all in” pricing for consumers, meaning the full price of the ticket — including all fees — must be present in the price first shown to fans. The law will go into effect on July 1.
“In addition to Senators [Dawn Danielle] Gile and [Pamela] Beidle and Delegate [C.T.] Wilson, we’re also grateful to Marylanders who spoke out and let their elected officials know that they want protection from parasitic scalpers who use acts of deception to gouge concert fans,” said Audrey Fix Schaefer, communications director of Merriweather Post Pavilion and I.M.P. in a statement. “Nearly 17,000 letters were sent by Marylanders to their state legislators, letting those in Annapolis know they want protection from the rampant deception and abuse that’s taking place now. We applaud the entire State legislature for this groundbreaking legislation, and we look forward to working with the Attorney General’s office to help ensure enforcement.”
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The bill requires resellers to provide the zone and seat number for non-general admission events, eliminating the common practice of resellers listing an unspecified seat and procuring a ticket — for a lesser price — once a consumer has purchased the “unspecified” seat from a secondary site. It also reduces resellers’ ability to list generic tickets on resale sites before on-sale for the actual event has occurred.
A standout of the bill for proponents like NIVA, NITO and others, is that the bill makes it illegal for secondary ticketing platforms to provide a marketplace for the sale or resale of tickets that violate the law. If a consumer purchases a ticket that is counterfeit, canceled by the reseller or fails to meet its original description, the secondary platform would be responsible for paying the consumer back for the total amount paid, including any fees. Platforms selling or offering to sell speculative tickets can be fined up to $10,000 for the first infraction and $25,000 for each subsequent infraction.
Additionally, the bill mandates “all-in” ticket pricing — where consumers see the full price of the ticket, including fees, from the beginning of their transaction — and require those fees to be itemized so fans know where their dollars are going. The passage of the bill also means Maryland’s attorney general’s office can conduct a review of how resellers are procuring their tickets, the price difference for fans on the primary versus secondary market, fraudulent tickets, the use of bots, what measures other states have enacted to protect consumers during the ticket buying process and more.
The AG’s study is scheduled to be completed by the end of the year.