Measure of Music 2024 Closing Remarks
Measure of Music is a three-day music & data conference & workshop/hackathon. The third annual event took place from February 23–25, 2024 with 2300+ viewers, participants & contributors.
Read more & rewatch on measureofmusic.com. Below are the closing remarks I delivered at the end of this year’s event.
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What a year! This has been really fun.
I think something I loved so much this year was seeing people absolutely light up when they saw themselves represented on stage. The pride I saw in the chat from South Africa, Nigeria, Southeast Asia, etc. absolutely delighted me and it’s why I do this.
Measure of Music started in 2020 for so many reasons. Yes, we had a global pandemic that kept us locked in the house, but we also had a global uprising that sparked a lot of talk about change.
Four years later, the cynic in me says what happened to all of that change but the optimist very VERY deep down inside of me, can see it and it thrills me.
I’m sure you’ve heard me say it before and I’ll continue to say it because it’s what makes me proudest about Measure of Music. Every year, including this year, our speakers, participants & attendees have been majority-minority in gender & race. This year like every other year, we’ve had panels & talks that were made up entirely of underrepresented groups and none of those talks were called “Women in Music” or “Diversity in Music” because we are so much more than your diversity hire.
It’s never hard for me to make my conference reflect what the world looks like because my network, which now includes all of you incredible people watching this and tuning in all weekend looks like what the world looks like. That’s why this conference has remained virtual. I couldn’t have had an analytics workshop about Afrobeats, our first-ever speaker from Uganda and a research talk with two incredible women from India without keeping this event virtual. When you make it possible for the global majority to show up, I promise you, the global majority does show up.
As more superstars continue to emerge outside of the Western world, the current & future music executives from Mumbai, Seoul, Mexico City, and Jo’burg will become as important as executives from LA, NY, Nashville and London.
And now would also be a good time to note that not every artist from Korea makes K-Pop, not every artist from Nigeria makes afrobeats, and not every Black singer creates R&B. As a Nigerian American immigrant in London who loves Stormzy, Paramore, Burna Boy, and Kasey Musgraves, who has also had the privilege to work on all those artists’ projects & campaigns we are not alone defined or limited by our race, nationality, or ethnicity. We have a cast capacity for diverse creation and consumption, and that extends to the projects we can work on.
And speaking of showing up, this year we have a fantastic conversation about the future of events that included conversations about accessibility. That’s also why this conference remains virtual. In 2020, we went through a global pandemic, and for a lot of people, the pandemic is not over. If there’s one thing COVID did, it shined a light on a lot of issues that often went overlooked, including the accessibility of live events & community. Online spaces and SAFE, and I mean safe in every way possible, in-person events are and remain incredibly valuable and essential to ensure inclusivity in this industry. In addition, requirements for 5 days a week in the office while simultaneously attempting to champion work/life balance and employee wellness is farcical at best, especially in countries like the US where the “standard” 10 days of vacation is a luxury, not a right.
Earlier I talked about the pride people felt being represented on stage, and I’ll add to that I saw just how those with disability (visible or not) felt to have their experience validated and the allyship we saw in the conversation keeps that little bit of optimism inside of me growing.
Speaking of representation, something I was thrilled to see shift this year is who my hackathon judges are.
I purposely ensure that a large portion of my speakers are at the early to mid-level stages in their career to provide a diverse range of perspectives from people still very much hands-on doing the day-to-day work. However, for my judges, I try to have exclusively senior executives as they are the key decision-makers and arbiters of the industry.
If you’ve been paying attention, I’m sure you’ve already clocked where the problem lies with that.
The music industry does not promote women, people of color, queer individuals, or people with disabilities at the same rate they promote cis, white, heterosexual, able-bodied men.
So, every year, I’m forced to make a tough decision as to how to both ensure my judges represent senior executives within music & tech while simultaneously not having a set of judges that quite frankly, looks like the speakers at many music conferences I’ve attended over the years.
This year felt like a shift.
I had 2 dozen wonderfully diverse applications for judges and was able to look to my network for even more.
It does feel like people from underrepresented groups hold more senior titles in the music industry than ever before.
In the recently released “A Seat at the Table” Report from UK organization Women in CTRL, minority gender representation in UK trade association boards has surpassed 50% for the first time. While not an exhaustive look at the industry as a whole, it’s one stat that shows progress actually is being made.
In addition, many people have opted out of the traditional music industry pipeline and gone it on their own, continuing to do incredible work after starting up their own agencies, companies & startups. This is a reminder to support small, support local, support women, support Black, support underrepresented groups, and most importantly, support people who are looking to make the music industry better because Lord knows there’s a whole lot of people still out there making it worse.
When thinking about starting things on your own, I think about the artist career fair I started last year to supplement the traditional career.
I’m always a little bummed when I check out the networking and see how few people are at the artist tables because people always say to me, Christine, I want to be an artist manager or a music marketer, and my response is always “Well you better go find an artist and manage them” and that’s exactly what I hope to facilitate with the artist career fair. It feels like so often people are waiting for the music industry to give them permission and the industry will almost never do that. Besides my unwavering love of pop punk, there’s a reason why my personal newsletter is called “High Hopes & Misery Business”. I got my start in the industry running street teams for local bands, booking shows in church basements, and convincing label execs (including Jenny Reader that you heard from yesterday!) to give me interviews with their bands for the magazine I ran. Go out and do the thing you want to do. Even if it’s temporary, I promise the gatekeepers you seek validation from are much more likely to let you walk through that door if you already opened it for yourself.
As Temi Adeniji said in our fireside chat yesterday:
“The thing you want is more important than your discomfort”.
Fortune favors the bold and though there’s little fortune so does the music industry.
And to end things off, I want to have a conversation about artists. This year when creating the programming, I was very intentionally looking to recenter the artists in the conversation about music. It’s impossible without them, yet they’re so often an afterthought — seen as interchangeable widgets to swap in and out into campaigns and brand deals. So, this year, I wanted to change that. We had panels that discussed artist development & investing in talent in more detail than ever, we had more artists speak than ever before, and of course, we introduced the artist project. So today you got to hear from 5 artists as they worked on packaging up what makes them unique, exciting & innovative with the support of other passionate current and aspiring music execs.
I put the artist track together because artists need help. I got my start in marketing, and on my good days, I like to say I’m a pretty good music marketer and strategist. I, however; could not produce a song if my life depended on it. Yet, everyday artists are expected to be accountants, fundraisers, lawyers, content creators, choreographers, and marketers while also simultaneously creating music. It’s too much to ask of them but to break through the noise and also have a successful career is what is required of them. So, I wanted to figure out a way to help them help themselves without asking for anything in return. So, a huge virtual round of applause to the artists that were willing to be my first guinea pigs in this year’s artist track:
As my call to action for this year, I ask everyone to do more for artists. Share their music, buy tickets for their shows, and give them the love and support that you provide to other brands you love. For music companies, think about what you’re doing to actually invest in your artists in the long term both with time and money? What programs are in place to support their mental health? What programs ensure they have childcare available? What programs help them get instruments & equipment? What programs allow them to meet and collaborate with other artists? Companies invest so much in their employees (as they should!) but what can be done to support their artists also?
Never allow anyone to convince you that the arts don’t deserve support and investment. When the world came to a standstill, artists, and creatives were also essential workers enriching our lives as we turned to music and media more than ever.
Support for the arts should not be solely based on financial returns; it’s about recognizing and valuing the indispensable role of creativity and the people who create in our lives.
I know this is “just a virtual event” but I hope you felt the joy, laughter, community, camaraderie, enthusiasm, allyship and love throughout the weekend. Every year past participants become mentors, judges & speakers, people gain jobs & opportunities from their involvement, and incredible connections are made. I think this community is incredibly special and I hope you do too.
The industry can feel so isolating and bleak so it’s important to surround yourself with people that don’t suck. I’ve brought together 8,000 people over the course of 4 years in what secretly is a grand selfish effort to surround myself with people that don’t suck. I’ve also managed to Robin Hood away a combined total of over $100K these past 4 years thanks to our incredible sponsors to ensure that our speakers and support staff who as mentioned every year are primarily from underrepresented groups are paid for their time.
So, with that, I want to give a huge thank you to our sponsors for continuously seeing the value in Measure of Music and making all of this possible:
Our presenting sponsor is Audiense, a consumer segmentation and cultural understanding platform that helps companies identify relevant audiences and discover amazing actionable insights to inform strategy.
We also had additional support from:
- music streaming & social data platform, Chartmetric
- executive management firm, jump.global
- concert discovery & marketing platform, Songkick
- distributor and artist & label services company, The Orchard
- global entertainment/music data & analytics provider, Luminate
- distribution, marketing solutions and label services company, ONErpm
- music creator tech tools & services company, BandLab Technologies ,
- and non-profit organization that distributes audio mechanical royalties, The Mechanical Licensing Collective (MLC)
Our career fair was sponsored by music industry jobs board, Jobs by ROSTR.
Our project location sponsors are Drexel University’s Westphal College of Media Arts & Design and music industry data operations provider, BMAT Music Innovators .
And we have media & promotional support from networking and educational platform, Gig Life Pro; educational platform for Latinos in creative & entertainment industries, The Industry in Spanglish; music industry gender equity and inclusion organizations Keychange and Keychange US and diversity in live entertainment organization, Live Out L!ve.
None of this is possible without them.
Well, there you have it! That was Measure of Music 2024.
On Wednesday we had 191 people registered to participate. By Thursday, we had 122, by Friday, we had 110, by Saturday we had 98, and today we had 91 people complete and present their projects. If you made it this far participants, you are absolute rockstars! We’re all winners here.
Every year, on the final day of Measure of Music, I wear a shirt that encompasses the tone of the year.
This year the shirt is from one of the boards I sit on, Indie Venue Week, an organization whose aim it is to elevate & celebrate independent venues culminating in an annual week of nation wide events in the US & UK. Independent music venues are closing in record numbers all over the world, including in the UK. Support your local music scene. Support your local artists. Global superstars are made in small rooms and on small stages.
And in a similar vein, support small executives, small changemakers, and small ideas. Big things happen when plans, people and ideas are nourished.
Huge thank you to our judges, mentors, weekend staff, sponsors, artists, and everyone else involved with making this year happen.
I hope you had the time of your life.
Thank you so much, everyone. Have a great night!
For more about Measure of Music 2024, you can check out the recap page.