Musical Chairs -- Week 13 2021

 GLOBAL

Alfonso Perez-Soto has been appointed President, Emerging Markets at Warner Recorded Music. His brief covers Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and North Africa, India and South Asia, the Eastern Mediterranean and Eastern Europe. Perez-Soto, who has been with Warner since 2005, was EVP, Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa since 2018. He reports to WMG's President, International Simon Robson.

USA

Bob Valentine, the CFO of US independent music company Concord, has been promoted to President of the company. Current Concord Music Publishing CFO Kent Hoskins will take over his position as CFO. Both executives report to Concord CEO Scott Pascucci. In his new role, Valentine will work closely with Pascucci to guide the company’s overall business strategy, and with the rest of the senior executive team, he will "lead Concord’s efforts to grow via additional acquisitions, further the interests of Concord’s recording artists, songwriters, composers, playwrights and creative partners and help to expand its reach into new markets and areas of business centered around music and music-related IP."

Gregg Goldman has been appointed as the new EVP, Business & Legal Affairs, Recorded Music, at independent music company Concord. He is reporting to General Counsel Amanda Molter and replaces Larry Blake who will retire at the end of May after 40 years in the industry, 25 of which working for Concord. While at Concord, Blake has guided numerous transformative acquisitions, including that of Fantasy, Telarc, Rounder, Vee Jay, Vanguard, Fearless, Razor & Tie / KIDZ BOP, Musart/Balboa, Savoy, Varèse Sarabande and Imagem. “It has been my great fortune to have been able to combine my legal education with my passion for music, to have been mentored by one of the deans of music lawyers, Lee Phillips, and to have gotten the opportunity to help build Concord from a small jazz label to the indie powerhouse it is today,” said Blake.

Mechanical rights society the Mechanical Licensing Collective, which started operating on January 1, 2021, has added three new members to its leadership team: Kristen Johns as Chief Legal Officer, Nathan Osher as Assistant General Counsel and Publisher Relations, and Andrew Mitchell as Head of Analytics and Automation. All three executives will be based in Nashville. Johns joins from law firm Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis in Nashville, where she was a partner; Osher recently served as Senior Vice President of Legal & Business Affairs for Warner Chappell Music; and Mitchell was Vice President of Analytics & Process Automation at Warner Music Group. 

Alison Finley has been appointed Executive Vice President, Chief Operating Officer at Motown Records. In this newly created role, Finley will oversee the day-to-day operations of the label and shared services with various teams across Motown’s parent company, Universal Music Group. Finley is based in Los Angeles and reports to Motown Chairman and CEO Ethiopia Habtemariam. Finley was SVP of Business and Legal Affairs at UMG.

Alfred C. Liggins, III, Chief Executive Officer of Urban One, and Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of TV One, and Craig Robinson, Executive Vice President and Chief Diversity Officer for NBCUniversal, have been appointed to the Board of Directors of US rights society Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI), effective April 1, 2021.

US composers Jon Batiste and Sharon Farber have been elected to the Board of Directors of US rights society American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) for a two-year term starting April 1st, 2021. “It is both a privilege and a great responsibility to serve on the ASCAP Board and I know I speak for the entire Board when I say that we welcome Jon’s and Sharon’s insights and expertise,” said President and Chairman of the Board Paul Williams.

Connie Bradley, who had been in charge of the Nashville operations of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) for 34 years, has died at the age of 75. "Connie Bradley was a trailblazing woman in the music industry and under her leadership, ASCAP’s community of songwriters and publishers in Nashville grew in strength and impact for more than three decades,” said ASCAP CEO Elizabeth Matthews.

EUROPE

Independent music company [PIAS] has re-branded its distribution business as Integral Distribution Services. [PIAS] Group Chief Digital Officer Adrian Pope will had to his remit the role of Managing Director of Integral. Pope will work alongside European regional Director Leo van Schaick to oversee the Integral business. Pope and van Schaick report to [PIAS] Group Managing Director Edwin Schröter. In addition, Felicia Flack has joined Integral as Head of Label and Artist Services from digital platform Amuse.


UK

Jacqueline Saturn and Matt Sawin, respectively President and GM of Universal Music Group's division Virgin Music Label and Artist Services in the UK, have promoted Adam Starr to SVP/Marketing. He was Head of Marketing for the Virgin Music/CMG label.

FRANCE

The Board of neighbouring rights society for musicians Spedidam has elected trumpet player Jean-Pierre Ramirez as President, replacing François Nowak, whose election in 2018, alongside that of seven other board members, has been nullified by a Paris court. The board has also appointed Fabrice Vecchione as the society's manager, succeeding Guillaume Damerval. Laurence Pons has been named Vice President and Maria De Rossi deputy treasurer. A new AGM will be held within a month to replace the eight board members whose election was canceled by the court.

F​rance's trade body representing online music services, ESML, which regroups such platforms as Deezer, Spotify and Qobuz, has named Sophie Goossens, a partner at law firm ReedSmith, as its legal counsel, replacing Gilles Bressand. In addition, ESML has welcomed two new companies to the organisation: livestream start-up Akius, and Bridge.audio, a platform for "storing, managing and sharing audio files dedicated to music professionals."

GERMANY

Berlin-based group of companies Guesstimate has confirmed the arrival of Jens-Markus Wegener, the former General Manager of Meisel Music and Managing Director of Imagem Music Germany, as Director of Publishing. Wegener will be working alongside joint Managing Directors Gian Köhler and Martin Heuser to develop the company music publishing activities, focusing on international signings. Wegener brings in to venture his own music publishing company AMV Publishing. Wegener said Guesstimate is "a true indie with an international outlook" with the ambition to "shake up the market."