INDIE INSIDER
Music BC ’ s Phoenix Program & The Need for Music Business Education
By Michael Raine
There is no shortage of educational programs and events for musicians hosted or supported by the various provincial music industry associations ( MIAs ). Canada , it ’ s often noted , does a pretty good job of supporting musicians ’ career education and development . But what about those who work with musicians – the managers , agents , labels , and others who play crucial roles in the music industry ? These professionals , whose decisions can make or break a musician ’ s career , are often left out of this educational focus in our national music industry . That ’ s who Music BC wanted to empower with its intensive Phoenix Training & Professional Development Program .
Launched in 2017 , Music BC ’ s Phoenix program was created with support from Creative BC , FACTOR , and the Beedie School of Business at Simon Fraser University . It ’ s based on a very successful program that has run in Australia and New Zealand for about the last 10 years and accepts just a handful of promising mid-level music managers and indie label owners . Through two intensive workshops , plus one-on-one mentoring and group work , it gives them the skills and insights needed to maximize their artists ’ careers and their businesses ’ potential .
“ I look at the systems in Canada and obviously we ’ re all super supportive of artists , but if you don ’ t have the infrastructure in place to nurture those artists and be able to take them from one step to the other , we ’ re almost doing a disservice to them ,” says Music BC Executive Director Alex Grigg , a former concert promoter and artist agent and the co-founder of Source Events , a special event management firm .
10 • CANADIAN MUSICIAN
One of the music business advisors involved in the program is Terry McBride , the CEO and co-founder of Nettwerk Music Group , a Vancouver-based management firm , indie label , and publisher who works with Father John Misty , Mike Posner , fun ., Ria Mae , and others . Prior to the Phoenix program , McBride instructed at Control , the Australian program it ’ s modelled after . “ After coming out of [ Control ], after four days , I ’ m like , ‘ Holy fuck !’ and now I understand why the Australian music business , as a business , is far more successful than the Canadian business ,” he says . “ Canada should be more successful being that we ’ re right next door to the biggest marketplace in the world and I went , ‘ We don ’ t have the infrastructure . We don ’ t have this community of managers and label owners who all know each other , communicate with each other , and have this young group of people who have gone through this training to give them the tools to run a successful business .’ It became obvious watching this process , just how everyone there was working in their business and probably 90 per cent of them by the end of the course were working on their business , not in it . They weren ’ t lost in the weeds or lost in the fact that they must do everything for the artist . They changed their perspective to build a sustainable business … with business principles and with tools and things to help them succeed .”
Though it ’ s said so often it ’ s now cliché that “ Canada punches above its weight ,” in terms of creating commercially successful musical talent ,
McBride doesn ’ t buy it , at least not when you look beyond the artists themselves . “ I do think we hit above our weight because we ’ re right next to the U . S . But I also look at how many Canadian artists are not managed by Canadian businesses and aren ’ t signed to Canadian labels , but are viewed as being Canadian and , as such , come into that metric of us hitting above our weight . Take those out and I don ’ t think we hit above our weight .”
The missing piece , McBride and Grigg say , is that there is a significant lack of specialized training for music business owners in Canada . McBride says he sees firsthand with his Nettwerk roster the difference the Australian and New Zealand program has made compared to Canada . “ I have a number of Australian artists on our roster who do really well from a worldwide point of view . I mean , that alone can be much , much better than what our Canadian roster does because there are artists on our Canadian [ label ] roster that we don ’ t manage , so the expertise in how to manage just isn ’ t there . The strategies just aren ’ t there ,” says McBride . “ A really good example from last year is the one that was in Australia . The managers for