BMG DRIVES NORTH

The BMG kingdom is expanding to Canada. The company's recorded music operations will now have a home in Toronto, with dedicated A&R, marketing and promotion resources, thanks to a just-announced partnership with Jason Murray's Canadian indie, Black Box Music.

Murray will lead things up north, reporting to BMG U.S. President Repertoire & Marketing Zach Katz (pictured) and BMG EVP Recorded Music Jon Cohen.

“Canada has a long history of generating great artists," shared Katz. "Canadian people are great music fans. So it is absolutely natural for us to have a strong presence in Canada. We have made no secret of our goal to build a recordings business as strong as our presence in music publishing. Scaling up in Canada with a trusted and credible partner like Black Box will enable us to further improve our service to artists.”

You'll recall that BMG recently signed two big Canadian acts: Avril Lavigne (who's working on a new album now) and Nickelback.

According to the 2017 IFPI Global Music Report, Canada is the world’s sixth biggest global music market, while figures from Nielsen show the music market grew by 14.4% in the first half of 2017 compared with the same period in 2016.

Also, they have poutine up there, which we expect is the real reason for the expansion.