Monday 29th March – 17:00-18:00

“In Conversation with…Shaun Ryder” (interviewed by John Robb)

SHAUN RYDER

John Robb

Shaun Ryder is from Salford, Greater Manchester, where in 1980 he formed Happy Mondays. The band signed to Factory Records and their releases included the two classic albums ‘Bummed’ in 1988 followed by ‘Pills ‘n’ Thrills and Bellyaches’ in 1990. Later Shaun started Black Grape releasing the album ‘It’s Great When You’re Straight.. Yeah’. Following his achievements with both bands
he received the ‘Godlike Genius Award’ from NME in 2000.

Shaun also moved into TV taking part in the tenth series of the TV show ‘I’m a Celebrity.. Get Me Out Of Here!’ in 2010 where he was runner up. He wrote his autobiography ‘Twisting My Melon’ in 2011 and also went on to have his own TV programme ‘Shaun Ryder on UFOs’ on The History Channel in 2013 (repeated in 2018)

Shaun has recently been a guest on several TV shows including ‘Room 101’ with Frank Skinner, ‘Stars and Their Cars’ with Paddy McGuinness, ‘The Chase: Celebrity Special’ with Bradley Walsh, ‘Sam Delaney’s News Thing, ‘Big Star’s Little Star’, ITV show ‘100 Years Younger in 21 days’ and ‘Stand Up and Deliver’ comedy stand up for Stand Up for Cancer as well as being a regular on Celebrity Juice, This Morning, Loose Women, Good Morning Britain and most recently Celebrity Gogglebox.

Throughout 2021 Shaun will be touring and playing festivals with Happy Mondays and Black Grape along with his solo Q&A events taking place all over the UK.

John Robb is a many-faceted creature.

Bassist and singer for post-punk mainstays The Membranes, author, journalist, DJ, publisher and talking head, he’s all these things and more.

He grew up in Blackpool before punk rock came along and saved his life.

He was the first person to interview Nirvana, coined the expression Britpop and was instrumental in kick starting and documenting the Madchester scene with his writing. His music and culture website louderthanwar.com is currently one of the biggest music and culture sites in the UK and is also a nationally distributed magazine.

John Robb is a key face on TV and radio. He is one of the UK’s leading in conversation hosts and has written many books (best sellers like ‘Punk Rock – an Oral History’ and The Stone Roses and the Resurrection of British Pop’ – he is currently finishing writing a new book on Goth and post punk called ’The Art Of Darkness’ has just released a book about the leading Eco energy and green initiative boss Dale Vince called ‘Manifesto’. he is currently writing his autobiography.

He also runs a music and books festival called Louderthanwar and is a political campaigner who chairs committees in Parliament and is an in demand speaker with his own spoken word show.

Monday 29th March – 16:00-17:00

NFTs

Dennis Martin – Trend & Chaos

Stephen Dowler – Monstercat

Dennis Martin is a music producer, tech entrepreneur, and investor. He has spent over 20 years working between Tokyo and New York and works closely with Japanese rock icon, Tsuyoshi Nagabuchi. His works in Japan also include TV soundtracks, Playstation games, and Anime scores.

Dennis launched the digital creative agency, The Conspiracy with some music industry veterans, which has launched successful campaigns for XGames, Mercedes Benz, Sephora, and was the creative team behind album projects for Tori Amos, Stone Sour, The Avett Brothers, and many more.

Dennis is the founding investor in the cannabis tech startup, simLeaf, that developed a 3D Grow Simulator for learning to grow cannabis in a virtual environment. The app has thousands of users and has been in the Top 1000 Paid Games category on the App Store for 2 years and counting.

About a year ago Dennis launched the music discovery platform, management company, and indie label, Trend & Chaos. T&C features music of all genres, highlights up-and-coming talent, culturally significant content and NFTs. The platform is available in both English and Japanese.

A creative business development professional with some of the most experience China has to offer in electronic music and events. Skilled in creating mutually beneficial partnerships, management, music copyrights acquisition and distribution, as well as digital and O2O marketing. Steve has a business level of fluency in Mandarin Chinese and conversational Japanese with a degree in International Corporate Finance.

Info on NFT’s
https://niftygateway.com/collections/swanxmonstercat
https://niftygateway.com/collections/monstercatpack
https://www.google.com/amp/s/opensea.io/blog/guides/non-fungible-tokens/amp/

Terry Mardi – Terry Mardi Productions

Joe Conyers III – Crypto.com

Terry Mardi is a mindful futurist, digital nomad and serial entrepreneur. Founder of Terry Mardi Group (TMG), a cluster of sustainable and ethical businesses that galvanize altruistic impact, wellness and pan-cultural cohesion.

TMG has a rich 20 year history in expanding South Asian youth content to global mainstream markets. Specialising in music copyright, digital content distribution, edutainment, emerging technologies, enhancing wellness and equality within influential subcultures.

Interesting fact: Terry Mardi spent three years (1000+ nights) living in the wild as a nomadic monk to explore nature and Self.

Joe Conyers III is Executive Vice President and Global Head of NFT at Crypto.com. Joe is a Strategic advisor and former Chief Strategy Officer of Downtown Music Holdings a global music and technology holdings company where he spent a decade helping grow it to nearly 600 employees operating in 23 markets on 6 continents and an annual revenue figure in the region of $500MM. Joe is the Co-Founder of its subsidiary Songtrust. Joe was named a Digital Power Player by Billboard Magazine in 2016, 2017, 2018 and again in 2019.

At Downtown Joe works on global strategy across the portfolio, M&A, Downtown’s strategic venture capital investments and manages various innovation endeavors.

Joe advises and invests into music startups through Downtown’s portfolio, as a Techstars Music Mentor and in non-music companies personally. Joe is a professional member of the The Recording Academy, an art enthusiast, amateur aquascaper, and serves on the young alumni board of Pace University’s Seidenberg school of Computer Science and Information Systems. Prior to entering the music industry, Joe worked at a variety of startups, large technology, media, and finance companies in strategy, product and analysis roles.

Monday 29th March – 15:00-16:00

MAKING MONEY FROM YOUR MUSIC

Mel Cameron – PPL

Ben Wynter – AIM

Mel Cameron is an Operations Team Manager at PPL, a company that licenses the use of recorded music and collects royalties for performers and rightsholders. She helps its wide range of artist and recording rightsholder members by making sure their joining PPL is as smooth as possible, that they are maximising the royalty payments they receive and that their accounts are up to date and accurate.

Ben Wynter is a highly experienced  UK based music and media executive, including roles in A&R, delivering events in partnership with the Mayor of London and Downing Street as well as holding roles at the PRS Foundation where he created and launched the Hitmaker Fund and Power Up.

Most recently Wynter is the Entrepreneur and Outreach Manager at AIM where he helps music entrepreneurs and rights holders, to navigate the music and media ecosystem, maximising the potential in the rights that they own. Wynter is also founder of the talent management company & label Unstoppable Music Group.

Julia Rowan – Ivors Academy Senior Policy Officer

Julia is Senior Policy Officer at The Ivors Academy, where she looks after policy, public affairs and campaigning work. The Ivors Academy is the UK’s independent professional association for music creators. They represent, support and celebrate music creators. Their members include thousands of songwriters and composers across all genres at every stage of their career.

Monday 29th March – 14:00-15:00

FESTIVAL LINEUPS

Jamie Scahill – Highest Point Festival / Skiddle

Vick Bain – The F List

Jamie Scahill is the Head of Marketing at Skiddle & Highest Point Festival. He is also co-founder of Manchester Union Brewery & long standing Manchester club night, Funkademia.

Vick has worked in music for twenty-five years and is a consultant and campaigner for diversity & inclusion in the music industry.  She is currently the interim Director of Strategy at Attitude is Everything, a charity focused on disabled accessibility in music. She is the author of Counting the Music Industry, founder of The F-List directory of female musicians and a PhD researcher at Queen Mary University.  Vick was enrolled into the Music Week Women in Music Awards Roll Of Honour and Radio 4 Woman’s Hour Music Industry Powerlist.

Miri – Artist

Alex Trenchard – Standon Calling

MIRI’s music has garnered support from Clash Magazine, London In Stereo, and BBC Introducing. She has spoken to BBC Radio London and Fubar Radio about her music, mental health and LGBTQ+ issues. MIRI has performed her music in male prisons along with Q&A’s to bring LGBTQ+ awareness. She has performed at 100 Club for The Official Bob Marley Birthday Celebration, supported Frank Turner for an online gig during lockdown and hosted, performed and curated the acoustic segment for Raze Collective’s event at the Southbank Centre. MIRI co promoted monthly live music night Blue Monday at The Boogaloo for over eight years which led to collaborating with award winning music venue Green Note on ten sold out live music events called Girls To The Front. MIRI is an LGBTQ+ Ambassador for Women in CTRL, a Social Media Ambassador for The F-List and is on the BEAT Board for the Featured Artist Coalition.

Alex Trenchard Is the Founder and Festival Director of Standon Calling Festival, a 17,000 capacity festival in Hertfordshire. Alex sits on the Board of the Association of Independent Festivals.

Monday 29th March – 13:00-14:00

“In Conversation with…Adam Ficek” (interviewed by John Robb)

Adam Ficek – BabyShambles / Tonic Music

John Robb

Adam Ficek is a professional musician and UKCP psychotherapist. He combines his ongoing personal experience in the music industry (Babyshambles, RKC and DJing) with his therapeutic practice to enable both a clinical and personal perspective. He currently runs Music & Mind whilst completing his doctoral studies on musicians, trauma and the music industry.

John Robb is a many-faceted creature.

Bassist and singer for post-punk mainstays The Membranes, author, journalist, DJ, publisher and talking head, he’s all these things and more.

He grew up in Blackpool before punk rock came along and saved his life.

He was the first person to interview Nirvana, coined the expression Britpop and was instrumental in kick starting and documenting the Madchester scene with his writing. His music and culture website louderthanwar.com is currently one of the biggest music and culture sites in the UK and is also a nationally distributed magazine.

John Robb is a key face on TV and radio. He is one of the UK’s leading in conversation hosts and has written many books (best sellers like ‘Punk Rock – an Oral History’ and The Stone Roses and the Resurrection of British Pop’ – he is currently finishing writing a new book on Goth and post punk called ’The Art Of Darkness’ has just released a book about the leading Eco energy and green initiative boss Dale Vince called ‘Manifesto’. he is currently writing his autobiography.

He also runs a music and books festival called Louderthanwar and is a political campaigner who chairs committees in Parliament and is an in demand speaker with his own spoken word show.

Monday 29th March – 12:00-13:00

Fairwood Music Listening Session (ft. showcase acts)

Ross Gautreau – Fairwood Music A+R

Join The Din

Ross worked for ASCAP for 6 years where he built relationships with a wide variety of hit songwriters, producers and artists from both sides of the Atlantic and signed an array of talent to ASCAP including Calvin Harris, Bastille and Florence and the Machine.

Since then he has consulted to Fairwood Music Publishing who work with the prestigious David Bowie catalogue and house an array of well known copyrights, as well as Epic Records and Polydor Records where he worked in an A&R scouting capacity championing talents like The 1975 and James Bay amongst others.

Since then he has continued to consult to Universal in A&R capacity as well as working on top TV shows such as The Voice UK.

With a 5 piece double drum kit, duelling saxes and a pumping bass, Join The Din – formed in 2018 – is a contemporary ensemble that embodies the new vibrant East London live music scene. The line-up features Rich Muscat and Ronan Perrett on saxes, Charlie Cawood on bass, Riccardo Castellani and Emanuela Monni on drums. Explosive, deep and eccentric, the band catches an audience’s imagination through intense and eclectic performances.

Jelly Cleaver

Mark Hanslip

Jelly Cleaver is a guitarist, producer and singer-songwriter based in South London, and has been called ‘the next artist to make an impact on the London Jazz Scene’ by Supreme Standards. She’s received the Steve Reid award, been selected for Serious’ Take Five Scheme, and was nominated for an Ivor Composer Award. With an eclectic taste in music, Jelly is heavily involved in both the jazz and DIY/punk scenes in London. She’s also an activist, and a strain of political dissent runs through her music.

I’m a saxophonist and have been active on the jazz and improvised music scenes since 2002. I’ve appeared on many recordings, toured internationally and appeared many times on radio. My performing and recordings credits include Nostalgia 77, Twelves, Penny Rimbaud, Evan Parker, Outhouse, Gladys Knight, Guillemots and many others.  I am developing a solo practice in which I process my saxophone with electronics, often using artifical intelligence – I am a competent coder and am currently working on a PhD in creative musical applications of machine learning. In my track Yoga I process my saxophone and other sounds using SuperCollider audio software, create animated symbols using a generative adversarial network, and display them using the Pyglet game rendering engine.

Mock Deer

Mock Deer (Ricky Damiani) is a musician, singer and songwriter based in South East London. Although much of his life has been spent in Wales and the North of England, he has become an integral part of the independent music scene in London through his work representing and promoting artists in the city and beyond. He has toured extensively in Europe and has shared the stage with artists such as Brent Cobb, Sam Brookes, Simon Joyner, The Burning Hell, Nadine Khouri and Curtis Eller.

Mock Deer has released 2 EPs and composed original music for film and theatre. His full-length debut, The Art of Loneliness, was recorded with producer and long-time collaborator Scott Fitzgerald and was released in February 2020 to excellent reviews.

Tuesday 30th March – 17:00-18:00

“In Conversation with…Rumer” (interviewed by John Robb)

RUMER

John Robb

Since her first album Seasons Of My Soul landed in the Top 3 of the UK Albums Charts in 2010, achieved Platinum sales status and garnered her a MOJO Award for Best Breakthrough Act as well as two BRIT Award nominations, British singer-songwriter Rumer has gone on to forge an acclaimed career both as a highly regarded songwriter, penning global hits such as “Slow” and “Aretha,” and also a peerless interpreter of the work of others, as evidenced on her follow-up album Boys Don’t Cry – an album of classic covers from the 1970s – plus Rumer Sings Bacharach at Christmas and This Girl’s in Love: A Bacharach and David Songbook.

Rumer spent the past several years living in the American South, in northwest Arkansas, then central Georgia, where she embraced its community and culture and motherhood. Although she enjoyed her time out of the spotlight, her deep-seated desire for music discovery, which has been a constant throughout her career, eventually led her to Nashville in search of hidden gems to record. Once she heard the catalogue of Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame member Hugh Prestwood, a songwriter whose name is spoken with reverence by his colleagues and whose work has been recorded by transcendent singers like Alison Krauss, Trisha Yearwood, and Judy Collins, she was hooked. Her forthcoming album Nashville Tears collects fifteen of Prestwood’s finest songs, many never recorded until now, revealing truths of the heart, both intimate and universal, realistic and romantic.

John Robb is a many-faceted creature.

Bassist and singer for post-punk mainstays The Membranes, author, journalist, DJ, publisher and talking head, he’s all these things and more.

He grew up in Blackpool before punk rock came along and saved his life.

He was the first person to interview Nirvana, coined the expression Britpop and was instrumental in kick starting and documenting the Madchester scene with his writing. His music and culture website louderthanwar.com is currently one of the biggest music and culture sites in the UK and is also a nationally distributed magazine.

John Robb is a key face on TV and radio. He is one of the UK’s leading in conversation hosts and has written many books (best sellers like ‘Punk Rock – an Oral History’ and The Stone Roses and the Resurrection of British Pop’ – he is currently finishing writing a new book on Goth and post punk called ’The Art Of Darkness’ has just released a book about the leading Eco energy and green initiative boss Dale Vince called ‘Manifesto’. he is currently writing his autobiography.

He also runs a music and books festival called Louderthanwar and is a political campaigner who chairs committees in Parliament and is an in demand speaker with his own spoken word show.

Tuesday 30th March – 16:00-17:00

Music vs. Horse Racing: Let’s Keep the Conversation Going…

Meenal Odedra – The Music Assistant / shesaid.so

Michael Caulfield – Sports Psychologist

Meenal Odedra has worked in the music industry for the last 7 years, working at both major record labels and smaller music companies. An active member of the music industry, Meenal currently sits on the Equality & Justice Advisory Group (BPI) and UK Music Futures Committee (heading up the sub-committee of Mental Health & Wellbeing). She is passionate about positive change within the industry that she works in and loves, in particular around issues of mental health, wellness, and diversity. Meenal volunteers for shesaid.so London, and was part of their Mental Health and Wellness Committee (2018-present).

In 2019, Meenal launched The Music Assistant, a unique company which offers support tailored specifically to the music industry. Through this work, she became Head of Global Operations for shesaid.so- a global network of women and gender minorities that work in the music industry. Meenal was featured in Music Week’s Rising Star segment in 2019, and was named an honouree on the shesaid.so 2020 Alt Power List.

Michael is one of the leading and most experienced sport psychologists in the UK and has spent the past 30 years working with athletes, coaches and teams from racing to Premier League Football.  He is also a trustee of the Injured Jockeys Fund and cares about welfare across all areas of performance, not just the performance.  He lives by the phrased that all sportspeople are “living, breathing, emotional human beings, not just performance tools”

Sally Anne Gross – Can Music Make You Sick (Author)

Barry Ashworth – Dub Pistols

Sally Anne Gross is a music industry practitioner, an author and an academic. She is the co-author of ‘Can Music Make You Sick- Measuring the Price of Musical Ambition’. This research which was funded by the charity Help Musicians UK is the largest ever study into mental health in the music industry. In 1993 she was the first women to work in A & R at Mercury Records. In the same year she chaired the first ever panel on gender in the music industries at ‘In The City’ music conference in Manchester. Sally Anne has been working in the music industry for nearly three decades, as an artist manager, record label director and international business affairs consultant. In her current role at the University of Westminster, she is the course leader of the MA Music Business Management. In 2016 she founded ‘Let’s Change the Record’ a project that focuses on bridging the gender divide in music production. Sally Anne has four grown up children and although she always identifies as a ‘native’ Londoner, she actually lives in North Hertfordshire.

One of the hardest working bands in showbusiness, Barry Ashworth and his motley crew have added a much-needed swagger to the UK dance scene in recent years and new album ‘Crazy Diamonds’ finds the band at their uncontrollable, bass-driven best.

A rampant mix of dub, reggae, ska, punk, breaks, beats and drum ‘n’ bass, the album is a full-on dub-quaking extravaganza, built for big fields and summer sound systems. It also happens to feature some of the biggest names in the game including Dancehall dons Beenie Man and Cutty Ranks, reggae singer Earl Sixteen, hip-hop act Too Many T’s, seminal MCs Navigator and the Ragga Twins, and long-time collaborator Lindy Layton.

Tracks like killer new single ‘Crazy Diamonds’ (ft. Too Many T’s) or summer-anthem-in-making, ‘Rise Up’ (ft. Earl Sixteen and Navigator), prove that the Pistols are one of the best around at rockin’ the joint. This is futuristic skank, complete with blazing horns, brazen brass and epic drums and bass.

Proudly working class as a band, the Dub Pistols have been tearing up venues and festivals throughout their career. Inspired by the Second Summer of Love, the band were founded by ubiquitous Londoner Barry Ashworth in 1996and have been at the forefront of beats culture ever since.

Known for their rhythmical blend of bass, turntables and horns, their genre-mashing abilities has seen them work with some of their biggest heroes including The Specials, Horace Andy, Madness and Gregory Isaacs. They’ve also seen band members come and go, not to mention squander thousands on various capers that have now become legendary and that has taken them from the brink of multi-million-dollar international success to the edge of destruction and back again.

“The band’s reputation as an explosive live act has seen them turn into super-tight festival regulars, with the Dub Pistols headlining some of the biggest festivals in Europe including Glastonbury, Bestival and Beat-Herder. Their bass-driven live machine has seen them win numerous plaudits along the way and recent live guests have included vocalists Rodney P, The Specials’ Terry Hall and Neville Staple, rap wünderkid T.K., Sugardaddy horn-blower Tim Hutton& scratch maestro, DJ Stix.”

The Dub Pistols have also turned their hand to the world of remixing and have remixed the likes of Ian Brown, Moby, Limp Bizkit, Korn and Bono and worked with hiphop legend Busta Rhymes. The band’s music has been used by Playstation and major Hollywood films.

Ashworth is also a much sought-after DJ which has won him many fans around the globe over the last 15 years. Known for his eclectic sets, he was one of the first resident DJs at the influential club, Fabric, in London and has performed high-octane primetime sets internationally in such countries as Australia, Singapore, Serbia, Dubai, Thailand, Germany, Croatia, Italy and France, to name but a few. Additionally, he is founder of Westway Records, a London breakbeat and hip-hop label that’s put out releases from many currently-emerging artists from the UK dance music underground.

He is currently working on a warts’n’ all documentary about the band’s career; a mix of archive and new footage that charts the Dub Pistols’ strange journey from chancers to hot property to epic f**k-ups to unlikely triumph.

Steve Lowis – Mental Health Nurse / Tonic Rider

Steve is a registered mental health nurse, singer/songwriter and event organiser.

Over a 15-year period Steve has gained a wealth of knowledge and skills working as a Psychiatric Nurse for the NHS. He has worked in various acute, community and educational teams throughout this time.

Steve has been an active member of Southampton’s music scene. Organising events and performing as a singer songwriter over a 20 year period. This has led to him taking lead roles as Oxjam manager in 2013 and in his current role as Sofar Southampton leader.
He runs an events team – Sound Level Events who have organised corporate, council and public events in and around the city and leads a Southampton Networking Group SoNG, helping to establish a thriving music scene in the city.

In 2021 Steve started a new venture with Tonic Music for Mental Health as the Tonic Rider co-ordinator.

The Tonic Rider programme, launched in February, is an exciting new campaign that will offer Mental Health First Aid training, peer support sessions, mental health resources, specialist training courses and music performance anxiety workshops for those working and performing in the field of music.

Steve’s role in the Tonic Rider programme will support the charity’s mission to raise mental health awareness, challenge stigma and promote mental wellbeing through music and the arts.

Tuesday 30th March – 15:00-16:00

COVID and Brexit – What’s Next?

Annabella Coldrick – CEO, MMF

Jon Zeff – Independent Policies Advisor (Creative Industries)

Annabella joined the UK’s Music Managers Forum in January 2016.  MMF is the world’s largest professional community of music managers with over 1100 members based in the UK with global businesses. We want a fairer more transparent music industry which operates in the interest of artists and their fans. Annabella brings a wealth of experience to the role having had a career encompassing EU advocacy in Brussels, commercial and public affairs with Cadbury, government communications at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and, latterly, as Director of Policy and Research at the Design Council.

The MMF UK has published the respected Dissecting the Digital Dollar series of 5 reports (and now a book!) calling for the greater transparency in the music industry to ensure artists are fairly paid in the digital age.  They are also a founder and supporter of the FanFair Alliance campaign which successfully called for restriction of ticket touting (scalping) so that real fans can see their favourite artists.  Annabella is also a founder member of EMMA, the European Music Managers Alliance alongside 6 other MMFs across Europe.

Jon Zeff is an independent consultant specialising in policy, strategy and regulatory issues affecting the media, communications and creative industries.  He has advised clients across private and public sectors, including the Creative Industries Council for whom he played a leading role in the development of the Creative Industries Sector Deal. He is Chair of the Advisory Board for the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre, and of the Sports Broadcast Monitoring Committee. Previously,  Jon worked in Government and at the BBC, including over 10 years at DCMS leading policy initiatives and major projects across media, telecoms and the creative industries.

David Martin – CEO, FAC

Mark Sutherland – Journalist

David Martin joined the Featured Artists Coalition (FAC) in November 2019.  The FAC is the UK trade body representing the rights and interests of a diverse, global membership of music artists at all stages of their careers.

David has more than twenty years of experience in the music industry with a particular background in talent booking, relationship development and event brand development.  Most recently he was the lead booker and Director at Dimensions Festival, where he developed the globally recognised music programme from conception, developed the label, Dimensions Recordings and led the festival’s accompanying International Series.  David has a particular passion for identifying and supporting talent and has always championed the role of artists within the industry.

David’s music industry experience comes alongside more than fourteen years working in UK central government, developing policy, and supporting and influencing some of the most senior figures of the UK’s Health Service and Members of Parliament.

Mark Sutherland has been covering music and the music business for over 25 years. Starting out producing his own fanzine, which landed him a job on legendary pop magazine Smash Hits, he then helped chronicle the Britpop era via senior editorial roles at NME and Melody Maker and was part of the launch team for BBC Radio 6 Music. He’s also a music industry expert, having served as global editor of Billboard and, most recently, spent five successful years as editor of UK music industry ‘bible’, Music Week. He is currently a Variety writer and Audio Media International columnist, and has also written for the likes of Rolling Stone, Q, Kerrang!, The Face, The Times and The Telegraph, interviewing everyone from Oasis to Taylor Swift.

Mark Davyd – CEO, Music Venue Trust

Mark Davyd is the co-owner of Tunbridge Wells Forum, a venue he founded in a toilet 28 years ago. Since then, Mark has split his time between various music activities; he was CEO of the award-winning music charity Rhythmix for 20 years and has a commercial career as an artist manager, label owner and music supervisor.

Mark founded Music Venue Trust in 2014, a representative body for grassroots music venues which campaigns on their behalf and manages the Music Venues Alliance. In 2016, MVT changed UK law with a landmark amendment to the Town & Country Planning Act, and in 2018 the National Planning Policy Framework was changed to protect music venues. Music Venues Alliance boasts over 900 venue members.

Mark is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a regular speaker at international conferences (ILMC, SXSW, CMW, LAMC, Eurosonic, Primavera Sound). He was one of the h100 winners 2015, and won the CC Skills Music Award 2017.

Tuesday 30th March – 14:00-15:00

Business and Finance

Nick Lawrence – Big Star Management Founder/CEO

Oscar Reed – Big Star Management General Manager

Nick Lawrence is the anti-accountant. BigStar, the company he founded, is the anti-accountancy.

It offers services for creatives who shiver at the mere mention of the word. It’s the antithesis of dusty suits in dusty offices charging by the phone call while streaming WhaleSongs Vol 2 and re-alphabetising the filing cabinet. Not only does Nick not enjoy whalesong (or treating his roster as cash registers), he believes in engaging with his clients as artists; giving them the foundations on which to realise their potential. Put simply, BigStar provides the order so its talent can bring the chaos.

And it’s rooted in knowledge: Nick’s experienced (and rejected) the stultifying world of corporate finance. If he’d been a better DJ then he would have run off and done that. But, ever the entrepreneur (and between founding a record label and assorted music journalism) Nick came up with BigStar, an unholy lovechild of the two sides of his brain. Financial nous combined with a genuine obsession for music and the arts.

To date, the lovechild’s come very good indeed; the roster includes fresh talent such as Tom Grennan, The Hunna and Izzy Bizu, with legends like The Happy Mondays, Spiritualized and Killing Joke, as well as rightsholders, management companies, agents and promoters.

So maybe, just maybe, the days of the bean counters are numbered.*

* Irony intended.

Oscar’s journey started at Bournemouth University where he gained a degree in Accounting and Finance. During this time he undertook a placement year at CC Young & Co which lead to full time employment as a tax accountant post studies. He spent several years working in this capacity before moving into a tour accounting role. At the start of 2019 he moved to Big Star Business Management, quickly becoming a team leader. He currently works as a manager and assists his team with a portfolio of clients covering the whole eco-system of the music and entertainment industry. His current roster includes Gerry Cinnamon, Tom Grennan, Ashnikko, The Darkness, Spiritualized, Newton Faulkner and many other incredible artists and industry leaders in their respective fields.

Tuesday 30th March – 13:00-14:00

Wasn’t Born To Follow: A Female Journey Through Music…

Pamela McCormick – Urban Development

Indy Vidyalankara – Indypendent PR

“My vision is to develop and create opportunities for this country’s young, underprivileged, diverse talent to breakthrough and be empowered to find their voice. It is an authentic passion and love for the arts and young people that has allowed me to build Urban Development, so that it can positively impact individual talent, communities, wider society and our British music industry.”

Pamela grew up in Belfast in the 1970s through the era of pub bombings, barricades, daily murders and little integration. As her ethos and challenging of the origins of the troubles matured, Pamela realised that poverty and lack of opportunities and aspiration were at the heart of the problems. This insight has become the keystone upon which Pamela, has built her career as a leader and visionary  over two decades in music and the arts, as the Founder and Director of youth music organisation, talent incubator, educator and charity Urban Development.

Graduating from Edinburgh University with a degree in French, Pamela’s music career started with Assembly Theatre & Music:  the company that ran the Assembly Rooms programme during the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Leaving with two of the directors when they set up Assembly Direct, McCormick programmed and produced the Friday Night Jazz at the Queen’s Hall as well as a series of high profile UK tours (Silk Cut City Jazz and Teachers Jazz).  Touring highlights include Branford Marsalis Trio, Celia Cruz & Tito Puente, Jan Garbarek, Ornette Coleman, John McLaughlin with featured artist Katia Labèque.

Soon after she found herself living in Monte Carlo, working as an assistant to esteemed musician/ composer John McLaughlin and concert pianists Katia & Marielle Labeque.  Subsequently, she worked in Paris as assistant to international conductor, Semyon Bychkov, during his time as Musical Director of the Orchestre de Paris, Dresden Staatsoper and Chief Conductor of the WDR Symphony Orchestra, Cologne.

But it was her next move – to London – that led to her fulfilling those young-founded dreams to see something positive rising from the ashes.  Complementing an MA in Arts Management at City University and a range of freelance arts projects she built relationships and projects with a collection of artists including international turntablist and former UK DMC champion, DJ Pogo, programmer & producer Sparkii Ski; and dancer, rapper and choreographer Jonzi D. From these roots, Urban Development was born 17 years ago, in 2000.

“Our mission at the beginning was much the same as it is today. But the situation is becoming increasingly more important and significant. Urban Development’s purpose is to develop, champion and educate this country’s diverse, young musical talent and contribute to lasting change that will benefit the social mobility of underprivileged youth.”

16 years on, now a National Portfolio Organisation of Arts Council England, Urban Developlemt has music industry funding partners such as PRS Foundation, Youth Music, BRIT Trust, Vivendi Create Joy/Universal as well as Esmee Fairbairn Foundation.

With McCormick at the helm, Urban Development is unique amongst youth music charities through its pivotal role within British urban music, as well as the wider UK music industry. The organisation, with its core audience demographic of 14–25 year old BAME, has built a lasting legacy and reputation as a leader when it comes to producing high quality events and tours that showcase the talents of urban artists in the UK to young audiences.  In the last 2 years, the organisation has expanded to create a charitable arm Urban Development Music Foundation, which operates in the country’s poorest and most diverse boroughs as a charity for the delivery of an education and early talent programme and is chaired by Lord Victor Adebowale CBE, with songwriter Wayne Hector as patron.

There is also Urban Development Music, which operates like a record label, talent incubator, production house, recording studio and publisher, with a growing roster of artists including first signing Devlin. The core purpose is to add commercial value to the British music industry, via partnerships and joint ventures, including a recent deal with Believe and publishing company Bucks Music Group – who partnered respectively for Devlin’s Top 20 album chart success with ‘The Devil In’ at the start of 2017.

“Our work stands at the crossroads where the creativity of underground music meets the industry, combining business acumen with an understanding of youth culture. Urban Development will be the premier agency for spotting and supporting new UK urban music talent – recognised by the public sector for the social and cultural impact of its work, and respected and rewarded by the private sector for the value we add to the commercial music industry.

Indy Vidyalankara is the founder of Indypendent PR, a boutique music PR, comms and brand consultancy, with clients such as MOBO, Nitin Sawhney, Youth, Jules Buckley, Tomorrow’s Warriors, Girls I Rate, Gary Crosby OBE, Carla Marie Williams, Ayanna Witter-Johnson and more.  She is currently part-time Head of Communications at pioneering talent development organisation and charity Tomorrow’s Warriors. Prior to that she served for two years as Head Of Strategic Communications at leading music charity Help Musicians. Indy is an accomplished Communications executive with a diverse career spanning over two decades across music, media and third sector in high profile organisations such as Sony Music UK, Saatchi & Saatchi, with 11 years at the BBC in publicity across BBC Radio 1, Radio 1Xtra and BBC TV. As well as being a member of the BPI Equality and Justice Advisory Group, she is a member of the UK Music Diversity Taskforce. She is also a Trustee of charities: One World Media, Parents In Performing Arts and Midi Music Company. Indy was the first woman of colour in the role of Sony Music UK Director Of Communications, her second tenure at the major label following her three year stint at Columbia Records, where she started her career in music. In 2020, Indy became an honouree of the SheSaid.So Alternative Power 100 Music list.

Chantal Epp – Click n Clear

Andy Edwards – UK Music

Chantal is an award-winning entrepreneur and the founder of ClicknClear. She set up her first company Synergy Sounds, a music production company for Cheerleading, whilst at University. Following her time working in sync licensing, Chantal found herself in a unique position to merge her two passions, Cheerleading and Music, after a lawsuit between a major label and Cheerleading happened. This led to the creation of ClicknClear, to solve a global music licensing problem in performance sports worth $2.4Bn annually.  Chantal is still an active athlete and advocate for ParaCheer (disability inclusive Cheerleading) and is often found travelling around the world helping National Federations start teams as well as building ClicknClear into a global solution across multiple sports.

Andy Edwards is a talent manager and music business executive. He is currently Director of Research for UK Music and also manages 2x Grammy award winning producer Cameron Craig, in addition to acting as an artist advisor.

Andy’s career encompasses record label, artist management, tech start-ups, rights acquisition and touring. His expertise spans strategy, marketing, business development and commercial deal-making. Technology is a constant thread throughout.

He has conducted business globally with artists, executives and entrepreneurs across all genres of music, from global superstars to cutting edge names. This includes Genesis, Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens), James Morrison, Dido, Cher Lloyd, Katherine Jenkins, Feeder, Andreya Triana and many others.

Andy has served on the UK Music board in various capacities, was a board director of the Music Managers Forum (MMF) and has advised Imogen Heap and the board of the Featured Artists Coalition (FAC). On a policy level, Andy is a passionate and consistent champion of diversity and inclusion issues both within the music business and further afield.

Eunice Obianagha – Enspire Management

Eunice Obianagha is a Project Management and Event Consultant for her business ENSPIRE Management. Her expertise are from over 14 years of managing complex music, entertainment and cultural based projects in the UK and Nigeria

Eunice has worked with the MOBO Organisation since 2010. She is the Director of Events and Special Projects and works closely with the CEO to drive the high-profile event. The role has seen her lead the production for national broadcast on channels including BBC, ITV and Viacom and internationally on YouTube. In addition, she manages major partners and the delivery of the live event in world renowned arenas. This has included Liverpool, Glasgow and Leeds.
Eunice’s work with the diaspora and Nigeria has included project managing broadcasted and live music productions on location in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt and Calabar. The most notable project being the very first production in Nigeria of ITV’s ‘The Voice…’. Within this role, Eunice was the Project Management Consultant for the inception phase of the production.

Being adaptable to a number of scenarios, Eunice has also delivered in the advertising world. In 2020, she was contracted in a newly created EMEA Project Manager role at Catalyst, the advertising and content arm of NBC Universal. Within this role she steered the team in producing a multi-faceted, high net worth campaign for an international client.

Tuesday 30th March – 12:00-13:00

Emerging Technologies Powering Independent Artists

Terry Mardi – Terry Mardi Productions

Melodie Mousset – Patch XR

Terry Mardi is a mindful futurist, digital nomad and serial entrepreneur. Founder of Terry Mardi Group (TMG), a cluster of sustainable and ethical businesses that galvanize altruistic impact, wellness and pan-cultural cohesion.

TMG has a rich 20 year history in expanding South Asian youth content to global mainstream markets. Specialising in music copyright, digital content distribution, edutainment, emerging technologies, enhancing wellness and equality within influential subcultures.

Interesting fact: Terry Mardi spent three years (1000+ nights) living in the wild as a nomadic monk to explore nature and Self.

Mélodie Mousset is an award winning contemporary artist, a public speaker and an expert  in the field of VR. She co-founded, PatchXR, a creative studio specialized in interactive music driven experiences and embodied music tools for XR.

Her artistic work extends across media, including installation, performance, photography, sculpture, and new media like augmented and virtual reality. Her research draws upon personal biography to produce playful and psychologically charged narratives that investigate the interactions between the self and technology.

Mélodie Mousset studied at the EBAR (Rennes), ECAL (Lausanne), RCA (London) and completed her Masters of Fine Arts at CALARTS (Valencia CA). Her work is part of major collections and has been exhibited at institutions and galleries worldwide, including CCS (Paris), MOCA (Los Angeles), Bund Museum (Shanghai), The Metropolitan Art Society (Beirut), SALTS (Basel) and recently at Helmhaus (Zurich).

Joshua Jacobson – Feed

Joshua is a digital marketer, designer and developer. He is the co-founder of Feed, a brand new digital marketing platform built for artists and their teams. Before starting the company, he headed up digital and ran marketing campaigns at influential independent labels: Warp and Transgressive.