AIM ANNOUNCES Music Connected 2015

20 February 2015 - Press release

The UK’s Largest Digital Music Conference, in association with CI

PledgeMusic, Sound Cloud, Vevo, Merlin, The Orchard, Spotify, AudioLock & Believe Digital amongst first digital participants announced

Thursday 9^th April 2015, Glaziers Hall, London SE1

 

Now in its thirteenth year, Music Connected 2015 - the UK's leading digital music conference - returns on Thursday 9th April, as leading labels and music companies descend on historic Glaziers Hall to meet the key players in UK digital music.

Music Connected 2015 (in association with CI) focuses on independent music companies operating in the digital market, offering a tightly targeted day of networking, deal-making, practical digital business advice and enlightening conference sessions. 

While the full conference programme will be announced next month, an initial line-up of speakers and sessions can now be revealed.

A panel entitled “Social Media Is Bullshit!” which considers the question: Are we placing too much importance on social media at the cost of other platforms and strategies? Motive Unknown’s Darren Hemmings challenges some of the independent music industry's finest minds to prove their social media strategies work and ask some to outline alternatives they feel are being missed amid the focus on Facebook, Twitter et al. 

A session entitled “Has Streaming Created a New Set of Curators for Music Discovery?” will consider how with streaming becoming the dominant form of music consumption, playlists and their curators are now powerful gatekeepers in music discovery. A new artist on the right playlist can generate hundreds of thousands of streams, but how do you identify the playlists that matter and who are the key players in the content curation world? How do you work with key YouTube channels, blogs and Spotify playlisters to get your artists featured?  How do you build a successful playlist of your own? Speakers include Jason Reed (Domino), Chris Stoneman (Spotify) and Karim Fanous (Music Ally).

A presentation from MIDiA Research’s Mark Mulligan entitled “Super Fan or Mondeo Man? Where Next For Streaming?” offers an analysis of the digital market in 2015 and beyond.  How sustainable is a market built around the high spending music aficionados while the mass market turn to free streaming?   

More sessions and speakers to be announced in coming weeks.  In addition to the packed conference programme, the Digital Market Place will offer stands hosted by a raft of top digital music companies.

Always a sell-out event, Music Connected has become the key date in the digital music industry calendar. 

Digital companies already confirmed to participate include:

Absolute Marketing & Distribution, AudioLock, AWAL, Believe Digital, BPI Anti Piracy Unit, CI, DDEX, Ditto Music, Finetunes, IMD Fastrax, Imi Mobile, MIDIA Research, Merlin, MixRadio, Motive Unknown, Music Ally, Phonofile, Plastic Head Media, PledgeMusic, PPL, Radar, Sentric Music, Sound Cloud, Spotify, The Orchard, The state51 Conspiracy, Synchtank,  TuneTeams, Vevo.  Many more to be added in coming weeks…

Last year’s sell-out event drew over 400 delegates from over 130 UK labels including:

Sunday Best Recordings, Secretly Group, Proper Records, 4AD AEI Media, Modular, Union Square Music, [PIAS] Recordings, Hospital Records, Red Bull Records, Warp Records, Brownswood Music, Rough Trade, Because Music, Dramatico, Domino, Jagjaguwar, Buzzin’ Fly, Nuclear Blast, Wichita, Cooking Vinyl, Anjunabeats, Kartel Ltd, Cherry Red Records, Stolen Recordings, CR2 Records, Skint, One Little Indian, Champion Records, Silva Screen Records, Visible Noise, Fabric, World Circuit, Snapper Music, Ninja Tune, !K7, The Leaf Label, Eleven Seven Music, Ministry of Sound and many more.

Tickets are now available. Book via the AIM website at: http://www.musicindie.com/musicconnected2015  

AIM is grateful for the support of event sponsor CI – for more details on their services visit www.ci-info.com.

Contact Lara Baker - lara@musicindie.com regarding exhibiting at this event.