Sony Music’s The Orchard Signs Global Distribution Deal With Birmingham Label BE83 Music

14 July 2021 - Press release

Founded in 2006 in Birmingham as a content production company, BE83 is now a pioneering music group housing recordings, management, content creation and publishing. With this new deal the label plans to develop and release a wave of new and established cross-genre talent straight out of the midlands and beyond. By joining forces with The Orchard, Despa hopes to shine a light on this rich musical scene that is often overlooked by the buzz of London-centric artists.

“Birmingham is a city overflowing with talent that has often lacked music business infrastructure. Much like how Atlanta rose to international renown with the emergence of it’s powerhouse artists and labels, Birmingham has its own unique pace and sound that I believe will do the same here in the U.K. 

This new partnership between BE83 & The Orchard is enabling us to scale up our business and deliver on this vision to take the midland’s sound around the world. Beyond just signing talent from our home region, BE83 will be doing bits worldwide and I look forward to working alongside Tim and Ian on achieving some stellar success both domestically and internationally.”- Despa Robinson

Despa’s ambition for BE83 is global. He wants the company and artists' reach to extend past the UK borders and over time build real tangible footholds in other territories. With the extensive distribution channel afforded by partnering with The Orchard the opportunities are endlessly exciting. 

“We have worked with Despa for a number of years and have long admired his work ethic and talent. It was a very natural step to extend our relationship and support him and his team in their endeavours. Incredible artistic talent can exist anywhere, but the UK music Industry is very London biased, our partnership with BE83 allows us to broaden our reach and support an amazing music executive. I look forward to seeing both Despa and the label flourish.” - Ian Dutt, Managing Director, The Orchard 

“Aitch, Bugzy Malone, Jaykae, Slowthai, Young T & Bugsey, M1llionz, Pa Salieu the list goes on. The U.K. is producing high quality music and generation inspiring artists from all over, no longer is success defined by the M25 and no one gets that more than Despa. Despa has shown himself to be a highly skilled emerging music mogul, independently building a full service entertainment company, which we are now proud to have partnered with globally on the label side. Despa has huge aspirations -  “Birmingham is the UK’s answer to Atlanta” and I fully agree with him.” - Timothy Youdeowei, Strategy, The Orchard 

Alongside the distribution deal, BE83 will continue to extend its management arm of the company, representing new talent including creatives outside of music. This strategy will be supported by a new partnership with artist manager Jess Monroe who currently manages Morrison, and Bandokay of OFB.