Academy Recordings Launched
Academy Recordings select The Orchard.
Major Artists Pledge Support for Unique Artist Driven and Digital Only Label - The Orchard Provides Worldwide Marketing and Distribution.
The Orchard (NASDAQ: ORCD), a global leader in digital music and entertainment, and Academy Recordings Limited, the new label set up by the British Academy of Composers and Songwriters, signed an exclusive worldwide digital license agreement on the 27th January 08 at Midem. Academy Recordings, described by board member, and the Academy chairman David Ferguson, as "a record company with no A&R department", is an artist-driven digital only label, that enables hte Academy's members to release recordings they control via the label's global marketing and distribution deal with The Orchard.
Commenting on the deal, David Ferguson, said, “We have set up Academy Recordings as a support service to all those of our 1000 professional members who want to make the music they own available to a wider audience, online. The Orchard is one of the world’s leading music distributors and marketers and we are delighted to have signed this agreement with them today. Academy Recordings is a not for profit venture, which means that our members will get a very good deal indeed. As a cross genre organisation, we anticipate that we shall be putting up a wide range of music for public download, much of which is unlikely to be available in any other form and a good deal of which promises to be of genuine interest to the serious music fan".
Academy Recordings first release, scheduled for the second quarter, will be a compilation of newly recorded tracks and previously unreleased archive recordings from Ivor Novello Award winning BACS members Peter Gabriel, Chrissie Hynde, David Arnold, Peter Maxwell Davies, John Dankworth, Iain Archer and Will Gregory.
Also commenting on the venture Bee Gee Robin Gibb, a Fellow of the Academy, told reporters: "This is a landmark opportunity for artists and writers. Unfettered by the demands of the traditional album cycle and label system, I can release any musical idea I choose, in a dialogue with my fans, and actually get paid. This is a serious contender for paving the way of an entirely new approach towards making, marketing and selling music".
“Increasingly, innovators and entrepreneurs are developing radically new and exciting ways of doing something that has been around as long as humans: communicating emotions and ideas through song. Academy Recordings and the world-class array of artists that support it promises an exciting new path for artists to find audiences to hear their message,” said Greg Scholl, president and chief executive of The Orchard.
About The Orchard®
The Orchard (NASDAQ: ORCD) controls and globally distributes more than one million songs and over 4,000 hours of video programming through hundreds of digital stores (e.g. iTunes, eMusic, Google, Netflix) and mobile carriers (e.g. Verizon, Vodafone, Bell Canada, Moderati, 3). With operations in 28 countries, The Orchard drives sales for its label, retailer, brand, and agency clients through innovative marketing and promotional campaigns; brand entertainment programs; and film, advertising, gaming and television licensing. A pioneer in digital music and entertainment since 1997, The Orchard fosters creativity and independence.
