Andrew Lloyd Webber Stars Licensing Business to Rival Rogers & Hammerstein
Concord Bicycle Music has partnered with acclaimed composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and his Really Useful Group to for the Musical Company: an all-inclusive infrastructure of services for creators in the musical theater world. The business will offer a combination of theatrical expertise, publishing infrastructure, and label. The company will act as the exclusive agent to manage performance licensing for professional and amateur productions of Webber and Tim Rice’s solo and combines works, such as Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Phantom of the Opera, Cats, and Starlight Express. They will also manage everything under Concord Bicycle’s interest in Marvin Hamlisch’s works and handle publishing rights and distribution for Webber’s song portfolio, exclusively managing the grand rights performance licensing for second tier professional and amateur productions of Webber’s solo and collaborative works. “Grand rights licensing” are works that combine music and plot, as in a Broadway play). (Billboard)
New Short Documentary Chronicles Jamaica’s Vinyl Record History
A new short documentary from the Vinyl factory and music journalist Vivien Goldman takes a look at Jamaica’s nearly forgotten vinyl record industry. Called Pressing Matters in Jamaica, the documentary chronicles the history of the country’s once thriving vinyl industry, taking the opportunity to take a unique look-back through the history of reggae, dub, and dancehall through the vantage point of the record industry in the process. The doc also explores a few key locations in Jamaica’s music history, including Bob Marley’s Tuff Gong pressing plant that plans to reopen this year in an effort to capitalize on the recent resurge in vinyl record popularity. Goldman uses DJs, curators, collectors, and even legend Earl “Chinna” Smith to tell the story of the industry that once produced some of the island’s most globally impactful facets of its culture. (Billboard)
-Taylor Wallace
