Island Def Jam executive Steve Gawley gave an insider’s account of the changing strategy of record companies to a packed lecture hall at Harvard Law School (HLS) Friday.

Gawley, an HLS graduate, focused his talk on the highly publicized all-in-one contracts of big-name stars such as Madonna and Jay-Z.

He said that despite the threat of music piracy to CD sales, the music industry continues to thrive with profitable tours and merchandising.

“Music has never been more popular,” said Gawley, adding that he is not convinced by claims of the record industry’s imminent demise. “The music industry will survive, but in what form?”

As consumer spending shifts from albums to live shows, Gawley said, celebrities like Jay-Z have left their record labels in favor of all-inclusive contracts with concert promoters such as LiveNation.

These promoters purchase the rights to an artist’s entire profitable output­—CDs, tours, T-shirts, and even collectible bobblehead dolls—for one lump sum.

Gawley predicts that record companies will ultimately embrace these so-called “360 deals” and will be best equipped for these contracts because of their experience in brand management.

Friday’s talk was hosted by the Harvard Law School Recording Artists Project (RAP), which provides legal services to local artists and hosts lectures on legal issues in the music industry.

According to RAP co-director Ethan B. Schiffres, lawyers will play an important role in the negotiations of these emerging 360 deals.

“Artists’ attorneys will continue to fight to allow more creative and financial control for their clients and will continue to play a role in the creative process of scouting and shopping acts,” Schiffres said.

Written by By MARK A. VANMIDDLESWORTH
Contributing Writer

Article Source: http://www.thecrimson.com

For more education on careers in the music industry, check out: www.Music-Career-Guide.com

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In the past couple of years the internet has opened up a new world of marketing opportunities for both the independent musician and major record labels and their sponsors. Most of the major music festivals and organized band events are sponsored by large corporations who set out to put their brand across to young music fans. Many of them still seem to be missing the link for getting these events shown to a much larger audience by using the services provided by WebVideo4U. There is also the scope for creating more online live and archived events and performances. The current way of online broadcasting of events is for a company to pay for the venues and ticketing, recording and web casting on their own website. This requires a bit too much involvement for most companies who would otherwise love their brands to be seen by a targeted audience.

Those who work in the healthcare industry have irregular work schedule; they often work at nights and they also have long shifts (12 hours or longer). Consequently, traditional classroom style education is not the best option to them, if they want to farther their education. However, they have a very viable option now, online education; online education allows them to study wherever they want and whenever they want, which is a great fit to nurses and doctors.

The current obstacle for the non-broadcasted events is that most bands and musicians do not have the required funds or promotional know how to finance these services. It will be up to companies who are willing to sponsor live shows to invite independent bands to perform. The bands would let there fans know when the event is being broadcast. The advertising content can be included on the set of the gigs making it easy to utilize the bands website as a place for the fans to view the broadcast with minimal coding and web design work. If a company sets up the sponsorship right, they could invite many different bands from all over the world to supply pre-recorded live shows that can be rebroadcast online. Their products and branding would be seen on many different websites by a focused audience without much financial outlay. For this to happen though, requires a third party to connect the bands with the companies. Most bands would jump at the chance of having their music broadcast over the internet even if the opening splash screen was sponsored by a brand of beer they didn’t drink.

It’s common for bands to have a strong following in their local community or their country of origin which adds even more power to a successful focused advertising campaign. By providing the link between the sponsors and the bands, webvideo4u opens up a whole new area of online marketing and band promotion. The band can keep their fans happy, and hopefully sell some CDs along the way.

Written by Adi Gaskell

Article Source: http://www.panload.com

For more education on careers in the music industry, check out: www.Music-Career-Guide.com

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