This year, we had a few professional music events we wanted to join. We should have been at MusicBiz in Nashville mid-May and at MIDEM next week. With all the cancelled or postponed events due to the sanitary crisis, what are the alternatives to keep an international network talking, at a time of year when many conferences were happening?
The music events network
This year, Reprtoir’s team planned on going to a few events: MusicBiz in Nashville (which has been postponed), MIDEM and Wallifornia (now digital editions) to name a few. Of course, some events had to cancel and resume to the next edition (Canadian Music Week was officially cancelled earlier this month for example). These events for professionals in the music industry are an important moment to network and connect with an ecosystem between music and innovation.
All in all, the losses are enormous. Just taking a look back at SXSW and adding all cancellations put numbers through the roof. Billboard has been keeping track of all cancellations in the music industry. Whether we’re talking about purely professional conferences or festivals, the event industry is at a full stop here.
So now that we are out of occasions to meet within the tech and music industry, what are the alternatives?
Music events alternatives
Well, first of all, as I mentioned, these events reinvented themselves. Either they managed to postpone (I guess we’ll have to wait and see what happens towards the end of the year), either they moved on to a digital edition. It is the case for Wallifornia, keeping keynotes and pitches, so the main trends are still shared and discussions still triggered. MIDEM is also having a digital edition, completely free! All in all, the network is maintained. MusicBiz has been planning online conferences for music professionals, since the main event (mid-May) was postponed until August.
Other than these initiatives from music events, some actors took charge and put together regular meetings online. These virtual conferences and networking sessions have been recurrent. To name one of the firsts, Music Tectonics (from RPS) team has been organizing weekly meetups and conferences online internationally, mixing tech and music industry. For the few we attended, we could count a bit less than a hundred participants online. Which means the network is still here, we just need to find a way to connect efficiently!
There are a lot of initiatives from different actors amongst music professionals, but the main idea is the fact that music events have been able to find a way to relocate online. But these solutions are not the end game.
Music events professionals expectations for the future
Of course, these solutions are not viable on the long term, and for now it is complicated to know when we’ll be able to go back to these events. Even for the end of the year, going back to international gathering seems impossible. Even the first event planned for 2021 in New Orleans has been officially cancelled because of the current crisis. The network of innovators in music will have to wait to meet again, but as we saw, many opportunities are available.
Everything being online, it is time to work on your own online presence, tools and, again, remote work (we talked about it here). As for us, we will be taking part of the online meetups and helping in any way we can to keep building projects, releasing music and collaborating within the music industry.
This is the main idea at the origin of Reprtoir: collaboration with a SaaS solution for music labels and publishers. So don’t hesitate to give the platform a try and message us, we’re here to help!
