1. The UK music industry

In this post, I will be looking at the industry context behind the music industry in the UK.  This is key in order for me to understand the wider, national context of the industry that my artist will be getting involved with.

The three major labels in the UK music industry are Sony Music UK, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group:

SONY MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT & SONY MUSIC UK:

• Jason Iley is the CEO and Chairman of Sony Music UK.
• Sony Music UK is a subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment (SME), the American music conglomerate.  In the wider scheme of things, SME comes underneath the Japanese conglomerate Sony.  As this implies, Sony is a vertically integrated conglomerate.
• SME also owns 50% of SYCO Entertainment, which operates some of the very successful reality TV shows such as Got Talent and The X Factor; these competitions have also been known to produce musical talent both in America and in the UK.
• Sony Music UK has been highly successful, winning multiple BRIT  awards for the likes of Paloma Faith, Pharrell Williams and One Direction.
• The intention of Sony Music UK is to promote the musicians under the label within the UK.

UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP:

• Universal Music Group is an American global music corporation; this is a subsidiary to the French media conglomerate Vivendi.
• Universal Music UK houses artists such as Sam Smith, Florence + The Machine, Mumford & Sons and The Rolling Stones.
• Universal Music UK has multiple labels beneath it, such as UMC and Virgin Emi Records.
• Universal see that they have a degree of social responsibility "to nurture music and foster artistry and self-expression."

WARNER MUSIC GROUP:

• Warner Music Group is a record label conglomerate; the CEO is Stephen Cooper.
• WMG was founded in 1958 and as of 2011 it was announced that it would be privatized and sold to Access Industries.
• Warner Music UK aspires to provide some of the most "influential and innovative" artists of our time with leading in-house expertise.
• Underneath Warner is a is their primary publishing business, Warner Chappell Music.  This is one of the world's leading music publishers with more than one million songs from more than 65,000 writers.
• Pop musicians such as Ed Sheeran, Anne-Marie and JLS are all examples of UK artists signed by Warner Music Group.

Sony Music UK is one of the three most influential record labels of our time and when one considers its size, it becomes apparent that the label pushes mainstream visions.  This means that I will have to assimilate my ideas in pre-production in order to fit the brand image of Sony Music, (so it does not come across as niche).  This is also a requirement of the brief, so it is essential that I follow through with this.  To conclude, researching the big three record labels and the UK music industry has increased my awareness of the industry that my production will need to fit into.  Moving forward, I need to apply this context to pre-production, to ensure that the video meets the necessary requirements.  As an artist on the record label, it is important that I take into consideration the various other artists on the label, the brand identity and subsidiary labels that I will be a part of; in terms of production, it is important to understand the overall image that the label (in this case Sony Music UK) so I can tailor my video to match the style that they put forward.