Yesterday I was chatting to Andy East my good friend and colleague about the Music Industry and all the changes that we’ve seen. If you’ve followed any of my blogs you will have noticed that were both were part of the team lecturing on the MA Music Management & Artist Development Degree at London College of Music with great success. (In fact Andy set up the whole thing up)

In my Module, which was A&R, I tried as much as possible to keep it completely relevant to what was happening in the industry today. However, in Academic terms this was sometimes quite difficult because the Academic content agreed by the Degree Boards could not keep up with the rapid changes in the Music Industry. So basically an assignment that might have been cutting edge last year could be pretty old hat this year.

To keep it relevant in any sector of the industry whether it’s Publishing, Recording, Performance, Songwriting, the first question is always; where does the ‘power’ lie? Then, ‘follow the money’ and that basically tells you everything you need to know.

That formula works just as well in a historical context too. A few years ago in a paper I wrote, I looked at the question, “Did songwriters of one hundred years ago earn more than they do today?’

While I was investigating the subject I came a cross a Publisher, Songwriter and Entrepreneur called Lawrence Wright who set up the Melody Maker in 1926. The Melody Maker merged with the New Musical Express in 2000. When I heard about the NME stopping it’s printed edition last week Lawrence came to mind.

He was a really talented man, who knew how to play the Music Industry Game. He knew exactly who had the power at any one time and following the money was what he did best!

I found this old newspaper clipping of him.