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Edited Text
Chiara Michieletto Sanchez-Pedreño
CE Outcome Paper
1
Contents Page
Midem Artist Accelerator Program………………………….3
Mission…………………………………………....…………...8
Tasks and Outcomes…....…………………………………...9
Task 1: Benchmarking Accelerator Landscape.…………………….....9
Task 2: Sourcing of Artists……....…………………………..………..12
Task 3: Reviewing and Selecting talent………………………..………13
Task 4: The Event………………………………......……………………14
Conclusion…………………….……………………………..16
Appendices…………………………….…………………….18
Bibliography………………………………………………….27
2
Midem Artist Accelerator Program
Introduction
My participation to the Midem Artist Accelerator program was a unique and interesting
opportunity, that has helped me develop various skills and acquire knowledge that took
me one step closer to realising my future professional career goals.
I decided to apply to this internship position as, coming into the GEMB one of my goals
was to develop more my skills on the A&R and Live sides. The Midem Artist Accelerator
Program allowed me to develop both. I managed to gain A&R skills by participating in
the selection of 11 artists out of a pool of over 600 and developed my Live
organisational skills by getting insight into how such a big event is organised and carried
out.
The Program
In 2015 Midem launched the 1st Business career booster for emerging artists called the
Midem Artist Accelerator Program, designed to support managers, publishers, agents
and labels as they look to grow their artists’ profiles globally. It is a unique opportunity
for 11 upcoming international talents to be selected, recognised and mentored by an
elite Artistic committee composed of top-notch industry players; as well as play live at
Midem and benefit from curated networking, learning and coaching sessions offered by
leaders of the international music industry. This program has been awarded the Reed
Midem “Innovation Award” in 2015.
This year we had 622 submissions coming from every continent. Only 11 were finally
chosen.
3
The Artistic Committee was composed by top notch industry players and two
high-profile ambassadors: Daddy Yankee and Wyclef Jean.
The Accelerator Program consisted of varying activities, workshops and mentoring
sessions.
Workshop Topics for this year
“How to best position your music for sync and brand partnerships” and “How to optimise
your musical production”, in collaboration with Metropolis Studios.
“Stage Design and Production -- How to optimise your show” in collaboration with Live
Nation
4
“Digital Strategy and Social Media Management” in collaboration with Red Essential
“Smart Touring Panel -- How to break the US market” in collaboration with Epic
Proportion Tour
We then carried out Meetings and Networking sessions, where I had been tasked with
coordinating timetables and schedules for this.
Purpose
The reason why I chose to apply to this program for my CE project, started with me
wanting to develop my critical A&R skills, as my career objective was to work in that
department for a record label. I also wanted to experience and learn what goes into the
organisation of such a high level program and hoped to be able to meet and network
with high profile industry people and musicians.
Offerings
The main assets I brought to the accelerator program had to do primarily with my music
knowledge and event organisational skills. With a fellow Berklee student I had
co-founded Sofar Sounds Valencia for which we organised one concert every month
during our stay in Valencia. We had to select and reach out to artists and organise and
coordinate each event, liaise with venues and carry out all the marketing. This previous
experience had given me small scale level tools to build upon during the Midem Artist
Accelerator Program, as well as a highly curated and exclusive network of contacts all
around the world, through the Sofar Sounds community.
5
Demand from the client/Objectives
Extract from the application form:
Position
Department: Entertainment Service: Midem Live Music
Midem Live Music Director: Delphine Grospiron
Job description
The student will be fully integrated in the Midem Live team and will
play an active role in the 1st business career booster for emerging
talent powered by Midem.
Put yourself in the shoes of an A&R,
programmer or project manager and learn how to detect and support
the tomorrow's stars.
The client was in need of organizational support for the particular program in case. The
Midem Artist Accelerator Program brings together musicians and bands and allows
them to have one to one sessions, participate to workshops and seminars with key
music industry players. The program, being carried out by Delphine Grospiron herself,
needed extra organization and coordination support, which was my main task during the
course of this externship.
Attendance to the conference was also required and needed.
During the event I was to liaise with artists, be in charge of timetables and schedules
getting respected and followed, generally coordinate and make sure everyone was at
the right place at the right time.
6
There was a part of research in the project as well, where it was needed to carry out
some competitive analysis of other similar conferences and programs in order to
position and assess the validity of Midem’s and in order to acquire more ideas,
inspiration and generally benchmark with other conferences. In addition, the up and
coming musical landscape had to be evaluated, all the emerging acts from many other
conferences and shows had to be put under scrutiny and examination in order to assess
and in some cases eventually pursue the possible fit these artists may have with the
accelerator program. In fact, one of the ones we decided to contact Be Charlotte
actually made it to the finalists’ list.
Schedule
As shown in my proposal, this was an initial division of tasks with deadlines and
duration.
I managed to abide to this chart well, completing all the tasks within the planned
required time frame. The tasks that required the most time and effort were the selection
of the most promising projects, the review of the submissions and sourcing of new
7
talent, where I had to build a roster and contact sheet and review various lineups from
similar type of events.
At Midem, my schedule required me to be at every event of the accelerator program.
Schedule can be seen in Appendix 1.
Mission
Accelerator Team
The team this year was composed centrally of Delphine Grospiron who is the Midem
Live Music Director and project manager of the Midem Artist Accelerator Program. We
also had another member in the team, Cyril Bahsief who works for a festival/touring
company called Projet Öctopus.
Coordinating with the team was definitely a challenge as it worked at a distance.
However, we kept in regular contact by email and had some Skype meetings for
important tasks and updates.
Job Position
My job position was mostly about supporting the main tasks that the whole team was
carrying out collectively. We all put our input in our choices and reviews of the artists
and provided organisational support at the event.
8
Tasks and Outcomes
Task 1: Benchmarking Accelerator Landscape
Expectation
As part of my initial tasks working for the Midem Artist Accelerator Program, I had to
conduct some benchmarking research where I had to look and analyse competitors of
the Artist Accelerator Program.
I was putting under examination 3 projects that had to be similar to ours, so accelerator
programs, music academies, competitions etc.
The areas of content these had to cover or relate to were creative industries and
entertainment (film, design, fashion, sport) with some possible relation to tech and
digital. At least one of them had to be related to the music industry.
Deliverables
For this task I gave in a powerpoint presentation to Delphine describing briefly the three
projects that I was putting under examination and the takeaways we could conclude
from this research and potentially implement for next years’ Accelerator Program.
Description of Work
Research
The project I covered were:
SXSW Pitch Event
At this event companies would go and pitch and have a Q&A with a panel of judges.
This year there were 50 interactive technology companies from 10 different categories.
Past SXSW Accelerator Pitch Event finalists from 2009 to 2016 achieved the following:
9
•353 companies = 71% funding
•14% were acquired
•Total through 2016= $3.10 billion
Does not include certain undisclosed funding. This data is as of June 1, 2016.1
This event seemed to be perhaps more fit for comparison with the Midem Lab rather
than the Accelerator Program. However I included it in my research because I thought
that there were some marketing aspects of it that could be taken as inspiration for our
program. In fact, I thought that mentioning the success of past winners of the program
was a great idea for the Midem Accelerator Program, successes of previous editions’
winners should be more advertised and shared.
Sprockit
Sprockit showcases today’s media and entertainment entrepreneurs to the industry’s
iconic companies.
They showcase at the NABshow, the world’s largest media and entertainment event.
Again, it is an accelerator program but for startups in the entertainment industry, they
also advertise and emphasize the successes of their “alumni”. 2
1
2
https://www.sxsw.com/awards/sxsw-accelerator/
http://sprockitglory.com/
10
The World Music Expo
The WOMEX Showcase, Conference and Film program is created based on an annual
call for proposals inviting artists, speakers and filmmakers to apply to take part.
There are four categories:
Showcases: apply to play at showcases in front of international bookers labels etc.
DJ-cases: womex DJ summit organises club nights, proposals are examined to perform
at these.
Films: present new releases on a platform to connect them directly to the world music
community.
Conferences: to speak/present at the conferences. 3
Conclusion
I have not been able to find an accelerator program tailored to musicians that does the
same we do. However, the main ideas we can take and I think would be useful to apply
to the MAA are:
We should be advertising the success of past winners of the MAA, after they attended
the MAA. What doors did that open for them? What did they learn? What benefits did
they get from it?
We could, as the MAA grows, divide it into different genres/events like they do at
Womex. I have received a lot of questions on whether electronic music/DJs are
accepted in the program, for some reason that is not very clear. Perhaps there could be
a section of the MAA that focuses on electronic music and its development and
organise a club night where they can perform.
3
https://www.womex.com/
11
Challenges
The main challenge of this task was finding an actual suitable comparison to the Midem
Accelerator Program. In the startup world there are similar conference events and labs,
but not related to music and to the development of musicians in the same way the MAA
does.
Task 2: Sourcing of Artists
Expectation
To start with, the first piece of this task was to use all my personal and professional
contacts to help relay the message of the Accelerator program, for example to the Sofar
Sounds roster. I sent an email to all the organizers of Sofar Sounds around the world
(354 cities around the world), who then in turn passed on the message to artists they
were in contact with.
Secondly, I had the task of detecting and attracting the most ready to export projects as
possible.
Description of Work
I went through the lineups of many of the biggest festival/conferences in Europe and the
US, listening to and researching most of their artists. These were: Reeperbahn, SXSW,
Eurosonic and The Great Escape. I also looked at other sources of up and coming
artists’ names such as: Sofar Sounds Best Videos on YouTube, The Guardian,
Stereogum and Pidgeons and Planes. I finalised a list of 108 potential artists to contact.
I then also investigated a list of 14 companies (booking agencies, management
companies, record labels etc.)
I then contacted all of them, sending more than 175 emails to booking agents, labels
managers etc.
12
We received quite a few submissions resulting from this task, one of them, Be Charlotte
even made it in the final list of artists.
Task 3: Reviewing and Selecting Talent
Expectation
This task was the main one of this externship. We reviewed 622 submissions. This
included researching the bands socials, reading through their application and listening
to their music.
Description of work
For this task, Delphine, Cyril and I each would have a google sheet where we would
rate artists based on their social media presence and popularity, online buzz,
exportability and just plainly whether we liked the music or not. We created a shortlist on
Excel and subsequently a powerpoint presentation (see Appendix 2) for the Artistic
Committee to judge and choose the final list of artists that were going to make it in the
program. We created here artists sheets that included a brief description of the artist,
links to socials and music, a live video and a music video.
This particular task was overall very time consuming but also one of the most enjoyable
ones of this job. There were so many different styles and genres, also, I feel that thanks
to this part of the externship I have been able to develop my critical sense and
judgement of artists and their music. I now know what factors are important for record
labels in the selection of their artists and what type of KPIs are used to measure
success in the music industry.
13
Task 4: The Event
Preparation before the event
Before the event the main task included creating a planner for artists and members of
the accelerator program, which included descriptions and profiles of the people
attending as well as a summary of the workshops and other sessions etc. For extract,
see Appendix 3.
The event was supposed to be from the 6th to the 9th of June, however in order to
prepare for it thoroughly I arrived on the 5th of June.
Expectation
At the event I expected to be busy, however I did expect less responsibilities than those
that were actually given to me, which helped make this experience even greater.
Description of the work
I was put in charge of all artist liaison, which entailed reminding, taking and making sure
that all artists were where they were supposed to be at all times. I was given a phone by
Midem that I would use to send a text message to their managers 10-15 minutes before
each scheduled event, panel or workshop, organised meeting points and would take
them where they needed to be.
I was also given the task of organising all tickets for the Midem by Night festival. This
entailed me managing the person at the desk at tourist office, letting her know where
she needed to be and when and providing her with the list of invitees/guests for each
night. I compiled this list by receiving various requests from artists and Midem staff.
I was also put in charge of all social media accounts for the Midem festival. I would post
a general post first thing in the morning and then throughout the day would prepare
14
individual posts for each artist with specific artwork for each. At the end of the program
on the last day, the 9th of June, I participated to a feedback session for which I made
sure the feedback from the artists was recorded.
Challenges
The main challenge I faced during the event was definitely keeping track of where each
artist was all the time, as many of them had scheduled individual meetings and radio
interviews, so many of them had to miss many of the sessions. Some artists like Acid
Arab even arrived only on the last days, and Shakka for example left one day before he
was supposed to. Keeping track of all of them (11 of them and their teams) was
definitely challenging, but I compiled a schedule with all this information and managed
to organise myself to know where all of them were at every moment. Another challenge
was definitely creating the schedule for the one to one sessions. I had to match the
schedules of each of the mentors of the committee to each of the artists’ and up to the
last minute there were some unexpected changes.
Conclusion of Event
All in all the part I enjoyed the most of this internship was definitely the live event. The
artists and their teams were all lovely and it was great to work with the Midem team, all
of whom were incredibly nice and helpful. There was a lot of running around and quite a
few stressful moments but the adrenaline kept me going and with a little bit of planning
and organisation the challenges could definitely be attenuated. The concerts were also
all amazing, it was a great opportunity to have been part of such a wonderful event.
15
Conclusion
The whole experience at my Internship at Midem was enriching. I enjoyed very much
both the active part at the actual event as well as my participation in the selection and
organisation process beforehand. I definitely feel that I have developed my A&R skills,
something I wanted to acquire from this position, and one of the reasons why I decided
to apply to it in the first place.
I not only managed to develop skills but also feel that I made valuable contacts with
artists and their teams, something I will try to leverage and use in the future, and am
already using at my current job at Music Ally.
I believe it also had a significant impact on my recruitment, as first of all, the skills I
acquired in terms of organisational skills are being put to use almost everyday at my
new job, but also because working for such an institution in the music industry like
Midem is definitely something respected and sought out for in a potential job candidate.
It definitely made an impact in my application and enriched my overall profile to my now
employers.
My final thoughts on the whole internship experience is that in terms of organisation and
communication there were no problems, and I definitely benefitted arriving one day
early at the conference so I could be briefed on all that was going to happen.
My only strategic insight and advice I could give to Midem Festival in order to potentially
generate more revenue from the activity is to charge a small symbolic price for tickets to
the Midem by Night shows for the public. The tickets were being requested in very large
amounts and I believe it is the part that many people enjoyed the most out of the whole
16
Midem experience. I believe the public would definitely be willing to pay a small amount
of money in order to attend the concert, especially since the venue and the lineups were
particularly great. Finally, I believe there should be more concerts organised by Midem,
and more emphasis should be given to the live part, taking inspiration from other
conferences/festivals (eg. Great Escape, Sonar, Primavera Sound etc.) where the live
part of the conference is one of the big sources of revenue and brand awareness.
17
Appendices
Appendix 1
18
Appendix 2
19
Appendix 3
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
Bibliography
Eurosonic: https://www.eurosonic-noorderslag.nl/en/festival/line-up-archive/
Midem Artist Accelerator program:
http://www.midem.com/conferences-events/artist-accelerator/
Reeperbahn artists:
https://www.reeperbahnfestival.com/en/festival/programme
South by Southwest:
http://schedule.sxsw.com/2017/artists
South by Southwest Pitch event:
https://www.sxsw.com/awards/sxsw-accelerator/
Sprockit:
http://sprockitglory.com/
The Great Escape:
http://greatescapefestival.com/line-up/
WOMEX:
https://www.womex.com/
27
CE Outcome Paper
1
Contents Page
Midem Artist Accelerator Program………………………….3
Mission…………………………………………....…………...8
Tasks and Outcomes…....…………………………………...9
Task 1: Benchmarking Accelerator Landscape.…………………….....9
Task 2: Sourcing of Artists……....…………………………..………..12
Task 3: Reviewing and Selecting talent………………………..………13
Task 4: The Event………………………………......……………………14
Conclusion…………………….……………………………..16
Appendices…………………………….…………………….18
Bibliography………………………………………………….27
2
Midem Artist Accelerator Program
Introduction
My participation to the Midem Artist Accelerator program was a unique and interesting
opportunity, that has helped me develop various skills and acquire knowledge that took
me one step closer to realising my future professional career goals.
I decided to apply to this internship position as, coming into the GEMB one of my goals
was to develop more my skills on the A&R and Live sides. The Midem Artist Accelerator
Program allowed me to develop both. I managed to gain A&R skills by participating in
the selection of 11 artists out of a pool of over 600 and developed my Live
organisational skills by getting insight into how such a big event is organised and carried
out.
The Program
In 2015 Midem launched the 1st Business career booster for emerging artists called the
Midem Artist Accelerator Program, designed to support managers, publishers, agents
and labels as they look to grow their artists’ profiles globally. It is a unique opportunity
for 11 upcoming international talents to be selected, recognised and mentored by an
elite Artistic committee composed of top-notch industry players; as well as play live at
Midem and benefit from curated networking, learning and coaching sessions offered by
leaders of the international music industry. This program has been awarded the Reed
Midem “Innovation Award” in 2015.
This year we had 622 submissions coming from every continent. Only 11 were finally
chosen.
3
The Artistic Committee was composed by top notch industry players and two
high-profile ambassadors: Daddy Yankee and Wyclef Jean.
The Accelerator Program consisted of varying activities, workshops and mentoring
sessions.
Workshop Topics for this year
“How to best position your music for sync and brand partnerships” and “How to optimise
your musical production”, in collaboration with Metropolis Studios.
“Stage Design and Production -- How to optimise your show” in collaboration with Live
Nation
4
“Digital Strategy and Social Media Management” in collaboration with Red Essential
“Smart Touring Panel -- How to break the US market” in collaboration with Epic
Proportion Tour
We then carried out Meetings and Networking sessions, where I had been tasked with
coordinating timetables and schedules for this.
Purpose
The reason why I chose to apply to this program for my CE project, started with me
wanting to develop my critical A&R skills, as my career objective was to work in that
department for a record label. I also wanted to experience and learn what goes into the
organisation of such a high level program and hoped to be able to meet and network
with high profile industry people and musicians.
Offerings
The main assets I brought to the accelerator program had to do primarily with my music
knowledge and event organisational skills. With a fellow Berklee student I had
co-founded Sofar Sounds Valencia for which we organised one concert every month
during our stay in Valencia. We had to select and reach out to artists and organise and
coordinate each event, liaise with venues and carry out all the marketing. This previous
experience had given me small scale level tools to build upon during the Midem Artist
Accelerator Program, as well as a highly curated and exclusive network of contacts all
around the world, through the Sofar Sounds community.
5
Demand from the client/Objectives
Extract from the application form:
Position
Department: Entertainment Service: Midem Live Music
Midem Live Music Director: Delphine Grospiron
Job description
The student will be fully integrated in the Midem Live team and will
play an active role in the 1st business career booster for emerging
talent powered by Midem.
Put yourself in the shoes of an A&R,
programmer or project manager and learn how to detect and support
the tomorrow's stars.
The client was in need of organizational support for the particular program in case. The
Midem Artist Accelerator Program brings together musicians and bands and allows
them to have one to one sessions, participate to workshops and seminars with key
music industry players. The program, being carried out by Delphine Grospiron herself,
needed extra organization and coordination support, which was my main task during the
course of this externship.
Attendance to the conference was also required and needed.
During the event I was to liaise with artists, be in charge of timetables and schedules
getting respected and followed, generally coordinate and make sure everyone was at
the right place at the right time.
6
There was a part of research in the project as well, where it was needed to carry out
some competitive analysis of other similar conferences and programs in order to
position and assess the validity of Midem’s and in order to acquire more ideas,
inspiration and generally benchmark with other conferences. In addition, the up and
coming musical landscape had to be evaluated, all the emerging acts from many other
conferences and shows had to be put under scrutiny and examination in order to assess
and in some cases eventually pursue the possible fit these artists may have with the
accelerator program. In fact, one of the ones we decided to contact Be Charlotte
actually made it to the finalists’ list.
Schedule
As shown in my proposal, this was an initial division of tasks with deadlines and
duration.
I managed to abide to this chart well, completing all the tasks within the planned
required time frame. The tasks that required the most time and effort were the selection
of the most promising projects, the review of the submissions and sourcing of new
7
talent, where I had to build a roster and contact sheet and review various lineups from
similar type of events.
At Midem, my schedule required me to be at every event of the accelerator program.
Schedule can be seen in Appendix 1.
Mission
Accelerator Team
The team this year was composed centrally of Delphine Grospiron who is the Midem
Live Music Director and project manager of the Midem Artist Accelerator Program. We
also had another member in the team, Cyril Bahsief who works for a festival/touring
company called Projet Öctopus.
Coordinating with the team was definitely a challenge as it worked at a distance.
However, we kept in regular contact by email and had some Skype meetings for
important tasks and updates.
Job Position
My job position was mostly about supporting the main tasks that the whole team was
carrying out collectively. We all put our input in our choices and reviews of the artists
and provided organisational support at the event.
8
Tasks and Outcomes
Task 1: Benchmarking Accelerator Landscape
Expectation
As part of my initial tasks working for the Midem Artist Accelerator Program, I had to
conduct some benchmarking research where I had to look and analyse competitors of
the Artist Accelerator Program.
I was putting under examination 3 projects that had to be similar to ours, so accelerator
programs, music academies, competitions etc.
The areas of content these had to cover or relate to were creative industries and
entertainment (film, design, fashion, sport) with some possible relation to tech and
digital. At least one of them had to be related to the music industry.
Deliverables
For this task I gave in a powerpoint presentation to Delphine describing briefly the three
projects that I was putting under examination and the takeaways we could conclude
from this research and potentially implement for next years’ Accelerator Program.
Description of Work
Research
The project I covered were:
SXSW Pitch Event
At this event companies would go and pitch and have a Q&A with a panel of judges.
This year there were 50 interactive technology companies from 10 different categories.
Past SXSW Accelerator Pitch Event finalists from 2009 to 2016 achieved the following:
9
•353 companies = 71% funding
•14% were acquired
•Total through 2016= $3.10 billion
Does not include certain undisclosed funding. This data is as of June 1, 2016.1
This event seemed to be perhaps more fit for comparison with the Midem Lab rather
than the Accelerator Program. However I included it in my research because I thought
that there were some marketing aspects of it that could be taken as inspiration for our
program. In fact, I thought that mentioning the success of past winners of the program
was a great idea for the Midem Accelerator Program, successes of previous editions’
winners should be more advertised and shared.
Sprockit
Sprockit showcases today’s media and entertainment entrepreneurs to the industry’s
iconic companies.
They showcase at the NABshow, the world’s largest media and entertainment event.
Again, it is an accelerator program but for startups in the entertainment industry, they
also advertise and emphasize the successes of their “alumni”. 2
1
2
https://www.sxsw.com/awards/sxsw-accelerator/
http://sprockitglory.com/
10
The World Music Expo
The WOMEX Showcase, Conference and Film program is created based on an annual
call for proposals inviting artists, speakers and filmmakers to apply to take part.
There are four categories:
Showcases: apply to play at showcases in front of international bookers labels etc.
DJ-cases: womex DJ summit organises club nights, proposals are examined to perform
at these.
Films: present new releases on a platform to connect them directly to the world music
community.
Conferences: to speak/present at the conferences. 3
Conclusion
I have not been able to find an accelerator program tailored to musicians that does the
same we do. However, the main ideas we can take and I think would be useful to apply
to the MAA are:
We should be advertising the success of past winners of the MAA, after they attended
the MAA. What doors did that open for them? What did they learn? What benefits did
they get from it?
We could, as the MAA grows, divide it into different genres/events like they do at
Womex. I have received a lot of questions on whether electronic music/DJs are
accepted in the program, for some reason that is not very clear. Perhaps there could be
a section of the MAA that focuses on electronic music and its development and
organise a club night where they can perform.
3
https://www.womex.com/
11
Challenges
The main challenge of this task was finding an actual suitable comparison to the Midem
Accelerator Program. In the startup world there are similar conference events and labs,
but not related to music and to the development of musicians in the same way the MAA
does.
Task 2: Sourcing of Artists
Expectation
To start with, the first piece of this task was to use all my personal and professional
contacts to help relay the message of the Accelerator program, for example to the Sofar
Sounds roster. I sent an email to all the organizers of Sofar Sounds around the world
(354 cities around the world), who then in turn passed on the message to artists they
were in contact with.
Secondly, I had the task of detecting and attracting the most ready to export projects as
possible.
Description of Work
I went through the lineups of many of the biggest festival/conferences in Europe and the
US, listening to and researching most of their artists. These were: Reeperbahn, SXSW,
Eurosonic and The Great Escape. I also looked at other sources of up and coming
artists’ names such as: Sofar Sounds Best Videos on YouTube, The Guardian,
Stereogum and Pidgeons and Planes. I finalised a list of 108 potential artists to contact.
I then also investigated a list of 14 companies (booking agencies, management
companies, record labels etc.)
I then contacted all of them, sending more than 175 emails to booking agents, labels
managers etc.
12
We received quite a few submissions resulting from this task, one of them, Be Charlotte
even made it in the final list of artists.
Task 3: Reviewing and Selecting Talent
Expectation
This task was the main one of this externship. We reviewed 622 submissions. This
included researching the bands socials, reading through their application and listening
to their music.
Description of work
For this task, Delphine, Cyril and I each would have a google sheet where we would
rate artists based on their social media presence and popularity, online buzz,
exportability and just plainly whether we liked the music or not. We created a shortlist on
Excel and subsequently a powerpoint presentation (see Appendix 2) for the Artistic
Committee to judge and choose the final list of artists that were going to make it in the
program. We created here artists sheets that included a brief description of the artist,
links to socials and music, a live video and a music video.
This particular task was overall very time consuming but also one of the most enjoyable
ones of this job. There were so many different styles and genres, also, I feel that thanks
to this part of the externship I have been able to develop my critical sense and
judgement of artists and their music. I now know what factors are important for record
labels in the selection of their artists and what type of KPIs are used to measure
success in the music industry.
13
Task 4: The Event
Preparation before the event
Before the event the main task included creating a planner for artists and members of
the accelerator program, which included descriptions and profiles of the people
attending as well as a summary of the workshops and other sessions etc. For extract,
see Appendix 3.
The event was supposed to be from the 6th to the 9th of June, however in order to
prepare for it thoroughly I arrived on the 5th of June.
Expectation
At the event I expected to be busy, however I did expect less responsibilities than those
that were actually given to me, which helped make this experience even greater.
Description of the work
I was put in charge of all artist liaison, which entailed reminding, taking and making sure
that all artists were where they were supposed to be at all times. I was given a phone by
Midem that I would use to send a text message to their managers 10-15 minutes before
each scheduled event, panel or workshop, organised meeting points and would take
them where they needed to be.
I was also given the task of organising all tickets for the Midem by Night festival. This
entailed me managing the person at the desk at tourist office, letting her know where
she needed to be and when and providing her with the list of invitees/guests for each
night. I compiled this list by receiving various requests from artists and Midem staff.
I was also put in charge of all social media accounts for the Midem festival. I would post
a general post first thing in the morning and then throughout the day would prepare
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individual posts for each artist with specific artwork for each. At the end of the program
on the last day, the 9th of June, I participated to a feedback session for which I made
sure the feedback from the artists was recorded.
Challenges
The main challenge I faced during the event was definitely keeping track of where each
artist was all the time, as many of them had scheduled individual meetings and radio
interviews, so many of them had to miss many of the sessions. Some artists like Acid
Arab even arrived only on the last days, and Shakka for example left one day before he
was supposed to. Keeping track of all of them (11 of them and their teams) was
definitely challenging, but I compiled a schedule with all this information and managed
to organise myself to know where all of them were at every moment. Another challenge
was definitely creating the schedule for the one to one sessions. I had to match the
schedules of each of the mentors of the committee to each of the artists’ and up to the
last minute there were some unexpected changes.
Conclusion of Event
All in all the part I enjoyed the most of this internship was definitely the live event. The
artists and their teams were all lovely and it was great to work with the Midem team, all
of whom were incredibly nice and helpful. There was a lot of running around and quite a
few stressful moments but the adrenaline kept me going and with a little bit of planning
and organisation the challenges could definitely be attenuated. The concerts were also
all amazing, it was a great opportunity to have been part of such a wonderful event.
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Conclusion
The whole experience at my Internship at Midem was enriching. I enjoyed very much
both the active part at the actual event as well as my participation in the selection and
organisation process beforehand. I definitely feel that I have developed my A&R skills,
something I wanted to acquire from this position, and one of the reasons why I decided
to apply to it in the first place.
I not only managed to develop skills but also feel that I made valuable contacts with
artists and their teams, something I will try to leverage and use in the future, and am
already using at my current job at Music Ally.
I believe it also had a significant impact on my recruitment, as first of all, the skills I
acquired in terms of organisational skills are being put to use almost everyday at my
new job, but also because working for such an institution in the music industry like
Midem is definitely something respected and sought out for in a potential job candidate.
It definitely made an impact in my application and enriched my overall profile to my now
employers.
My final thoughts on the whole internship experience is that in terms of organisation and
communication there were no problems, and I definitely benefitted arriving one day
early at the conference so I could be briefed on all that was going to happen.
My only strategic insight and advice I could give to Midem Festival in order to potentially
generate more revenue from the activity is to charge a small symbolic price for tickets to
the Midem by Night shows for the public. The tickets were being requested in very large
amounts and I believe it is the part that many people enjoyed the most out of the whole
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Midem experience. I believe the public would definitely be willing to pay a small amount
of money in order to attend the concert, especially since the venue and the lineups were
particularly great. Finally, I believe there should be more concerts organised by Midem,
and more emphasis should be given to the live part, taking inspiration from other
conferences/festivals (eg. Great Escape, Sonar, Primavera Sound etc.) where the live
part of the conference is one of the big sources of revenue and brand awareness.
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Appendices
Appendix 1
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Appendix 2
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Appendix 3
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21
22
23
24
25
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Bibliography
Eurosonic: https://www.eurosonic-noorderslag.nl/en/festival/line-up-archive/
Midem Artist Accelerator program:
http://www.midem.com/conferences-events/artist-accelerator/
Reeperbahn artists:
https://www.reeperbahnfestival.com/en/festival/programme
South by Southwest:
http://schedule.sxsw.com/2017/artists
South by Southwest Pitch event:
https://www.sxsw.com/awards/sxsw-accelerator/
Sprockit:
http://sprockitglory.com/
The Great Escape:
http://greatescapefestival.com/line-up/
WOMEX:
https://www.womex.com/
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Media of
