INTERNATIONAL STRATEGIES

‘Artists never know where their fans might come from’

In the digital world, an international strategy is of primary importance in growing and expanding an artist’s career, and Midem has launched several initiatives aimed at creating international trade links. Gary Smith reports

TuneCore’s Faryal Khan-Thompson

Faryal Khan-

Thompson: “We are living in a borderless, internetdriven world”

Horus Brasil’s David McLoughlin

IN JULY 2021 Midem launched Midem Africa, the first pan-African digital music platform dedicated to the continent’s most vibrant music markets, with Kenya as Country Of Honour. Midem also teamed up with with Latin American entertainment company, Bizarro Live, to create a unique 2021 digital programme, including a spotlight on the Latin American music industry, bringing together movers and shakers of the region and their global peers. For most of his career, exporting and importing music to and from his home in Brazil has been Horus Brasil manager David McLoughlin’s passion. “I saw how insular the Brazilian music market was, with 80% of sales being domestic music, and I really wanted to show the world how much amazing music is being created here — and also to push out beyond the established world-music fan base, because there’s so much great heavy metal, funk, hip-hop and electronic music,” he says. “So I put together a list of around 1,200 radio stations, music supervisors, festival programmers and journalists and sent out tracks under the name Brazil Calling. And we’re seeing some great results. Karol Conká got an LP release in the UK and Kiko Dinucci, who makes samba punk, also had an LP released in the UK. We have also made some very valuable links with a group of Nigerian producers who are remixing some baile funk and trap tracks from Brazil.” According to Faryal Khan-Thompson, vice-president, international at New York–based independent digital music distribution and publishing company TuneCore, the importance of a comprehensive international strategy is huge: “Whether you’re an artist or a music company supporting artists, it’s extremely important because we are living in a borderless, internet-driven world,” Khan-Thompson says. “Artists never know where their fans might come from. With the explosion of music streaming, you could discover fans in corners of the world you never imagined. For example, LatAm is a very fast-growing music market with many genres and sub-genres of music — it’s an exciting region to watch. Africa as well, is booming in terms of the music market and specifically the music talent coming out of the continent with afropop, afrobeats and gospel as extremely popular genres. Additionally, African genres continue to influence the world stage — with international artists and listeners and fans all being influenced by music from the continent. This is not new, but I feel like the industry at large is just waking up to this and starting to acknowledge it and I’m personally humbled and honoured to be a part be a part of this amazing team looking to bring this to the fore even more.” n

‘There are so many women who rock today’

In a post #MeToo era, initiatives led by those looking to build a more inclusive and diverse music business are changing the narrative and mindsets, allowing more female executives to reach higher levels of responsibility and artists and producers to get the traction they deserve. Juliana Koranteng spoke to some of the people involved

YouTube’s Addy Awofisayo Warner Chappell Music’s Ayla Owen WIM Nigeria’s Eony Ugorji

Mach1 Spatial’s Jacqueline Bošnjak

Westcott Multimedia’s Kristin Grant Music Traveler’s Julia Rhee Hidden Bands’ Nicole Sorochan

THE CONCENSUS among high-ranking women executives in the music industry — and elsewhere — is that there is still a long way to go in terms of progress. However, they also agree that today there is more research data to support the need for improvement, just as there are also more accessible DIY digital tools for female creators to do their own thing. “When I look around the room now, I see more women,” YouTube’s head of music, Sub-Saharan Africa, Addy Awofisayo, says. “The several years of discussions that highlighted there was a problem we should fix is paying off. But we need to keep having those discussions and initiatives that support, promote and empower women.” She also reasons that the DIY tech tools like YouTube and other digital platforms that enable artists to manage and control their creative careers have improved opportunities for women creators. “The DIY tools and the tech ecosystem have broken down

the barriers put up by the traditional gatekeepers,” Awofisayo says. “You can upload your songs to YouTube or any other platform out there or social media. It is the fans who are speaking now; fans are now the gatekeepers.” Ayla Owen, vice-president, Europe, sync at Warner Chappell Music, agrees. “The sustained, industry-wide effort to empower female music business executives has certainly opened doors for women in previously male-dominated areas, but progress is fragile.” The gender-equality debate in music is growing internationally. WIM, which operates chapters in several US cities and oversees in key markets including the UK, Japan and India, has launched a new chapter in Nigeria. “Fewer women are being recognised for their hard work, talent and dedication,” says singer-songwriter Eony Ugorji, who is also a qualified lawyer as well as chair/founder of Lagos-headquartered WIM Nigeria. “This new WIM chapter, with its committee of six powerful women, is important as it will help outline the difficulties faced by women in the industry. We also aim to do this through education, support, empowerment and recognition. We will be holding seminars, online virtual classes, meetings and events.” Africa’s biggest economy has a booming music industry that has propelled several local male artists, for example Davido, Wizkid and Burna Boy, to global-superstar status. And Ugorji says it is about time Nigerian female artists equally gain similar opportunities. “The numbers still show there are a lot more men than women in the Nigerian music industry. For every four male artists signed to a label, you have one female.” The importance of research data is raised when Warner Chappell Music’s Owen points out surveys showing that, during the COVID-19 pandemic quarantines, “female parents are overwhelmingly bearing the brunt of household, childcare and home-schooling responsibilities. More proactive support for female executives within organisations — and from government — will be crucial if we want to ensure the industry’s hard-fought gains on gender equality continue to grow.” The education to be gained from regularly publishing related data can only boost the gender-equity conversation, according to Kristin Grant, president of Westcott Multimedia, which produces automated programmatic ad campaigns for the music industry. “I think research data informing topics such as the percentage of women in executive roles or the percentage of female-founded companies backed by venture-capital investment, are necessary benchmarks

in order to track industry progress as we continue to ensure equality.” Additionally, a new generation of female executives feels galvanised by the mutual support they give each other. “Data and research help paint a picture to everyone about how big the problem is. But more important to me is the shared collective experience of women exposing the industry’s biggest problems with both authentic vulnerability and with incredible strength,” says Nicole Sorochan, co-founder/CEO of Hidden Bands, an Augmented Reality location-based music-discovery app. “Hidden Bands prioritises finding underrepresented emerging artists to put on our platform to help them create a direct fan experience that is unique. And it isn’t hard. There are so many women who rock today, with new exciting takes on music.” Growth in music tech is opening more career opportunities for women like Jacqueline Bošnjak, founder/CEO of Mach1 Spatial, a music-sound venture taking audio tech to a new level. “I look forward to bringing my full femininity into my role as a CEO of a sound-technology company,” Bošnjak says. “I want to lead with intuition, feeling, nurturing, receptivity, The Moonai app and interconnectedness. The world has not experienced what women can truly bring to the table as leaders.” “The challenge is enforcing companies to take action,” says Laura-June Clarke, co-founder/head of business at Moonai, a mobile app using science to alleviate period-related pain for women. “There are communities such as shesaid.so, which works towards encouraging companies to making actual change in the industry, and there are other organisations like Femnoise in Spain and MEWEM. But without these organisations, would companies actually be doing anything? There are still a lot of changes to be made; but why is that?” The music industry must also remember that gender-biased policies hurts more than their female executives and employees, Andreea Magdalina, founder of shesaid.so, the non-profit independent global community of women and gender minorities in the music sector. “The progress for women in executive roles is definitely noticeable; there is increased coverage in the media. But that hasn’t necessarily translated into considerable change in statistics and has yet to impact things on a structural level,” she states “Most companies don’t offer a comprehensive parental leave package, which is often the reason why more women don’t get the opportunity to climb the career ladder. If we manage to make

this a priority at a company and societal level, and ensure fathers are part of the solution, I believe the change will be accelerated.” The industry also needs to do its best to avoid adopting the wider society’s prejudices, says Julia Rhee, co-founder/CEO of Music Traveler, the marketplace offering musicians anything they need in any part of the world to perform. “For example, depending on what genre of music, ageism is a real thing,” she says. “If you were to be a jazz or classical musician, you probably can have a life-long career where you become more respected as you age. But, if you happen to incorporate your youth, beauty into your art, this will become tougher. Although there are many exceptions like Celine Dion, Beyonce and Adele, it is simply harder for the vast majority of the female artists than for male artists.” But with the progress made so far, no matter how limited, are there now more role models for aspiring female music-industry executives? “Today, diversity in managerial styles which allows for a broad church of female leadership is welcomed by organisations. Women no longer have to ‘be one of the lads’ or mirror their male colleagues in order to get to the C-suite,” Warner Chappell Music’s Owen says. YouTube’s Awofisayo says she is emboldened by the female bosses at the company — and other high achievers, for example Ethiopia Habtemariam, chair and CEO of Motown Records. “These are women I look up to and learn from.” Westcott Multimedia’s Grant is constantly optimistic. “Every month, I am seeing announcements of phenomenal women in music being promoted to executive positions of leadership or accomplishing major achievements in the companies they have founded. A recent example would include Golnar Khosrowshahi, of Reservoir Media, who recently became the first female founder and leader of a publicly traded music company in the US.” Or as Hidden Bands’ Sorochan puts it: “Hell, yes. Everywhere I look, I see women stepping into new positions, or creating and building new companies with fresh perspectives.” n

Jaqueline Bošnjak: “The world has not experienced what women can truly bring to the table as leaders”

There will be ‘no music on a dead planet’

MIDEM is addressing the issue of climate change head-on during a panel session called Acting For Climate – One Record At A Time, a timely debate taking place just as the United Nations Climate Change Conference, also known as COP26, took place in the UK city of Glasgow, 31 October to November 12. Organised with IMPALA, Europe’s biggest independent-music organisation, as part of the Global Indie Voices Programme, the Acting For Climate discussion delves into what needs to be done to eliminate industry practices contributing to the toxic carbon emissions feeding global warming. These include wasteful plastic in CD packaging, excess energy to stream content and unnecessary international business trips. “One of the most effective things we can do is to speak out about the climate emergency, wherever you can or wherever appropriate,” co-CEO of UK independent label Ninja Tune, Peter Quicke, says. He is also a member of IMPALA’s sustainability task force, which helps its music-company members access guidance, training schemes and to use IMPALA’s voluntary climate declaration. “A fully sustainable record business requires bigger supplies of renewable energy and a transport infrastructure that doesn’t run on fossil fuels, so that manufacturing and distribution can be closer to zero carbon. That will require government regulation, incentives and taxation and big energy and shipping companies to change, which they are now doing, which is great. But we all need faster action.” As well as publishing a climate charter outlining IMPALA’s commitment to climate change, the task force collaborates with non-profit organisations including Julie’s Bicycle, which mobilises the creative sectors to act against the climate crisis. It also works with Music Declares Emergency, which comprises artists and music companies jointly using their cultural and economic influence to propel changes that reduce the greenhouse gas emissions threatening to devastate our planet. “The climate crisis requires systemic change; we are all operating within structures that are beyond our control, so the changes have to come from the top and quickly. Use your vote and your voice,” UK-based Maddy Read Clarke, Music Declares Emergency’s co-founder/campaign director, says. “On a business level, look at the impact of your business, put a sustainability manager in place and start measuring your carbon emissions by using a carbon calculator.” One of its campaigns, No Music On A Dead Planet, invites artists worldwide to spread the message to their fans, including the young Gen Zero music consumers, who are insisting that businesses and politicians commit to a greener and safer planet. Sing The Change, another Music Declares Emergency initiative, is recording a version of the Louis Armstrong iconic classic What A Wonderful World with renowned British choral director Mark De-Lisser, UK gospel singers The Kingdom Choir and students from The Brit School performing-arts college in London. Additionally, hundreds of choirs and individuals have agreed to perform the song live all over the country. Read Clarke adds: “Our industry has a unique capacity to influence and mobilise audiences and it is our responsibility to make sure we have done everything we can to bring about urgent action because there is No Music On A Dead Planet.” Other Acting For Climate speakers at Midem include Horst Weidenmüller, founder of German independent !K7 and chair of IMPALA’s sustainability task force; and Hanna Grahn, sustainability lead at Spotify. n

The international music industry urgently needs to address how to minimise its contribution to the longterm damage being caused to the world’s climate. Midem delegates spoke with Juliana Koranteng about how the industry can act

Music Declares Emergency’s Maddy Read Clarke Ninja Tune’s Peter Quicke

Maddy Read Clarke: “The changes have to come from the top and quickly”

Industry organisations aim to help indies ‘adapt to the virtual world’

How are the independents faring as the industry continues to be disrupted by the various manifestations of digital technology? Gary Smith hears from four key figures who are helping the industry to navigate numerous issues facing the sector

Ger Hatton, strategic advisor to the European creative industries is also counsel to the IMPF, the Independent Music Publishers International Forum Didier Gosset, IMPALA’s communication and network director Merlin CEO Jeremy Sirota WIN general manager Noemi Planas

IN A Midem keynote session, Merlin CEO, Jeremy Sirota will discuss how independents are confronting the many challenges facing the industry and, in the process, creating more opportunities for this vibrant sector. Merlin’s members represent more than 20,000 labels and hundreds of thousands of artists. In its role as their independent digital music licensing partner, Merlin is focused on expanding its membership around the world, deepening existing partnerships — for example with Apple, Meta (Facebook), Spotify, TikTok, YouTube and others — and licensing more digital services. “Since January 2020, Merlin has welcomed 110 new members from 33 different countries who meet our unique qualifiers, including first-time direct members from Albania, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Pakistan, Peru, Singapore, Slovakia, Turkey and UAE,” Sirota says. “Our members gain access to best-in-class deals with nearly 40 digital partners, with another five partnerships to be completed by the end of the year. And those partners gain access to an incredible array of music in so many different genres and languages.” As a digital-only company, Merlin wasn’t as heavily impacted by COVID-19 as some in the industry, relying on its core operating pillars of trust, access, flexibility and transparency as a framework. “We put in place a number of practices to help build resilience, communication and culture, such as weekly all-hands calls for the global team, a mentorship programme for new employees and an internal rotational programme to gain better insight into other teams. This gave us the opportunity to expand service to our members, plus we grew our team around the world to better provide support. This allowed us to sign new deals and renew existing partnerships quicker, and to pay and report to our members faster,” Sirota adds Adapting to COVID-19 also forced the Worldwide Independent Network (WIN) to change path: “Partly it was about adapting to the virtual world,” WIN general manager, Noemi Planas, says. “We represent 33 associations around the world from Los Angeles to New Zealand and previously we had day-long, face-to-face group meetings, which, given the huge time zone differences between members, became impossible when we moved to virtual meetings. Plus, we were unable to develop new representation

in countries that don’t have any because all the conferences stopped. Midem Digital was key to our strategy in that it allowed us to map much of what’s going on around the world, which allowed us to extract best-practice ideas and reinforce the work of our regional members.” WIN launched the LATAM Network in January 2020 and is currently working on the APAC Alliance which will be launched at the end of October in order to establish regional groups around Asia. “The challenge there is that there is no common language, but major markets like South Korea and Japan are evolving rapidly, with a pronounced shift towards streaming in Japan where previously sound carriers dominated the market — and of course K-Pop proving to be a massive global success story. The challenge for us is seeing how the differences in Asian markets can be turned into a strength on the global market,” Planas says. European association IMPALA is focusing on two key issues over the coming year: the finalisation of the implementation of the EC Copyright Directive and fighting the infamous RAAP case. The EC is currently reviewing the consequences of a September 2020 decision of the European Court of Justice on thousands of recording artists and smaller labels in Europe, which would mean that European collecting societies for producers and performers would have to pay to countries who don’t provide for reciprocal rights for their own territory. For the US alone, the amount at stake exceeds €125m annually. At a time when revenues from broadcasting and public performance have fallen and performers have been unable to play live as a result of COVID-19, this would have a true impact on many European performers and labels. “IMPALA is looking to the EU to fix this situation urgently so that EU member states can continue to decide for themselves whether they want to apply this principle, as they have been able to do for decades,” IMPALA’s communication and network director, Didier Gosset, says. “Otherwise they‘re bleeding money into a non-reciprocal agreement. In terms of the EC Copyright Directive, we expect it to be fully implemented within six months. Currently we’re waiting for YouTube to complete Article 17 of the Directive and finalise its deals with collecting societies and more generally to solve the value gap created by digital platforms. These reforms really needed to happen, as the old legislation was drawn up in 2002, before the digital world took shape. Alongside those issues, we have just published our annual report on diversity and inclusion and we have teamed up with Julie’s Bicycle to raise awareness of sustainability issues through the Carbon Calculator, the first bespoke carbon calculator for the independent label sector.” Ger Hatton, strategic advisor to the European creative industries is also counsel to the IMPF, the Independent Music Publishers International Forum. And like IMPALA’s Gosset, she also is watching the adoption of the EC Copyright Directive with interest: “Looking at the situation from a broader perspective, we have to recognise that what happens in Europe eventually impacts the rest of the world and, like all legal changes — especially those that have to be agreed by the EC’s 27 member states — they take time to implement.” Her other main areas of interest for the coming year include the Digital Services Act (DSA), payment rates for artists by streaming platforms, fairer payments to less well-known artists and copyright buyouts: “Some of the lobbying around the content of the DSA is attempting to make digital platforms less responsible for hosting illegal content by weakening their liability — and of course this is the opposite of the what the DSA is intended to do. We would also like to see fair payments to artists being addressed in a creative way by streaming platforms, ideally a payment per stream which is not the case for less well-known and emerging acts. Plus, alongside the NMPA [National Music Publishers’ Association], the US publishers’ association and the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB), we are also opposing the attempt by those platforms to lower streaming rates in 2023. We are also looking closely at how royalty-free music and buyouts distort the market and lead to composers not having the right to join collective rights management associations.” n

Didier Gosset: “The old legislation was drawn up in 2002, before the digital world took shape”

Avatars, NFTs, livestreaming… the lawyers have got work to do

This year’s Midem Legal Summit in association with the IAEL (International Association of Entertainment Lawyers) will examine clearing music rights on next-generation platforms. Juliana Koranteng reports

Gowling WLG’s Susan Abramovitch LaPolt Law’s Dina LaPolt IAEL’s Jeff Liebenson, of Liebenson Law MVVP’s Peter Marx

“THE USE and proper rights clearance of music in connection with emerging technologies such as gaming, NFTs, and metaverses” is a key area for those working in the legal and copyright sectors of the music industry, according to Midem participant Dina LaPolt, owner/founder of US-based LaPolt Law. NFTs — non-fungible tokens — are one-off monetisable collectible digitised items that, like rare works of art, have financial value that can go up and down. They can be used to create digital works of art, including recorded music or videos, that cannot be copied. And all transactions, usually involving cryptocurrency digital coins and ownership, are recorded on digital ledgers called the blockchain. Award-winning international acts, including US rock band Kings of Leon, Canadian singer-songwriter Grimes, DJs Steve Aoki and Deadmau5 and other hitmakers have made exclusive works available in the form of lucrative NFTs, some of which have sold for several million dollars. High-profile artists including Ariane Grande, superstar rapper Lil Nas X, rock band IDLES and protest-punk group Pussy Riot have performed in-game virtual concerts on such platforms as Fortnite, Roblox and Minecraft. Rapper Travis Scott’s virtual gig on Fortnite recorded about 46 million viewers in total. Roblox, which enables its estimated 43 million active daily users to create their own games, is also being described as a metaverse — a virtual but working universe populated by avatars of real people. That is the same metaverse that social-media goliath Meta (formerly known as Facebook) wants to dominate. These digital environments attract the attention of millions of young Millennial, Gen Z and Generation Alpha music fans. Roblox, for example, hosts Listening Parties where artists can debut new releases. This inevitably has raised new licensing issues that saw the US’ National Music Publishers’ Association seal a deal in September to settle previous copyright-infringement claims against Roblox.

Jeff Liebenson: “Artists can appear everywhere without hitting the road”

Livestreaming, which permitted several artists to continue to entertain fans in real time during the global pandemic lockdown when tours where cancelled, is a relatively new mass-market format. However, the way copyright is protected on that format must be addressed at a time when on-demand music streaming platforms, including Spotify and Apple Music, are being slated for not compensating rights owners adequately. “Livestreaming presents the opportunity for artists to appear everywhere without hitting the road,” Jeff Liebenson, IAEL president and principal at New York-based Liebenson Law, says. “This can generate new revenues that complement physical touring. Livestreaming is one of several new businesses that have brought to light the need to develop innovative new licensing models so rights holders can unleash these emerging opportunities for artists and others in the value chain.” In addition to various cases at the Court of Justice of the European Union, legal experts at Midem will explore “the implementation of the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market in the various Member States”, Peter Marx, a partner at Belgium-based MVVP, says. He is co-hosting the IAEL Legal Update Session at Midem with Susan Abramovich, head of entertainment & sports law at Canada’s Gowling WLG. Abramovich highlights current legal debates that include cases involving remixing, sampling, Taylor Swift’s rift with her former label Big Machine Records, and the fact that a major label like Universal Music Group is listed on the stock exchange. Then, there is the case that genuinely caught everyone by surprise, brought by the man pictured as a baby on the cover of Nevermind, the seminal album released by iconic grunge group Nirvana as far back as 1991. Tune into Midem Digital to learn much more. n