Emerging Agents + Managers Professional Development Program

This first of two workshops will offer a high-level intro to the fundamental concepts of digital discoverability and will cover content-based tactics to improve the digital presence of the artists that you represent: search engine optimization, implementing structured data on artist profiles, Creative Commons licenses.

Offered in French and English with simultaneous translations, with English Live Transcription - French Transcription available after the event.

Facilitators

Dessa Hayes is an open data initiate, freelance writer, and self-described Renaissance woman. Born into a working-class family of amateur musicians, she has a passion for breaking down silos and engaging people of all backgrounds with arts and culture. As a graduate of Western University’s School for Advanced Studies in the Arts and Humanities (SASAH) (B.A. 2017) and University College London’s Institute of Archaeology (M.A. 2019), Dessa has had the privilege to work and volunteer with various nonprofits in both Canada and Britain. She currently lives in her hometown of Ottawa and works for the Canadian Association for the Performing Arts (CAPACOA) as a Digital Discoverability Consultant.

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Frédéric Julien has been active in the performing arts for several years as an artist, an arts administrator, a consultant, an advocate, and a change maker. Frédéric has been leading research and development activities at CAPACOA since 2010. In this capacity, he has directed or authored several key research initiatives such as: The Value of Presenting, Digitizing the Performing Arts, and Indigenous Artists and Wikidata. Since 2018, Frédéric has been leading the Linked Digital Future Initiative, a multi-prong initiative that seeks to foster digital discoverability, collaboration and a data-centric transformation of the performing arts.

Behind every great roster is a great agency marketing and promotional plan. Nicole Rochefort, founder of AIM: Artists in Motion booking agency uses her nearly 20 years of experience as a booking agent to review, revise and recommend marketing and promotional materials so that your artists stand out from the crowd. This workshop will encourage participants to share their websites, social media channels and promotional tools to collaborate in group review and discussion. Standard industry marketing and promotional practices will be shared and explored.

Offered in English, with English Live Transcription - French Transcription available after the event.

Facilitator

Nicole Rochefort is the owner/founder of AIM: Artists In Motion, an independent agency that celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2020. AIM represents a variety of award-winning musicians with a focus on the performing arts & festival marketplace. AIM is an Internationally recognized agency that attends showcase and exhibit conferences in Canada, US and UK annually on behalf of the roster.

In addition to AIM, Nicole provides career consulting, panel moderation, meeting facilitation and guest-lecture services. She is a member of the Ontario Creates Music Industry Advisory Committee and Folk Music Ontario’s Advocacy Committee. Nicole’s excited to be working on a new project, a digital platform to increase community engagements called ARC: Artists Reaching Communities. 

Website | 2023/2024 Digital Brochure @AIMbookingagency | Spotify | YouTube

Scope of Work (Agent, Manager, Tour Manager) - Understanding the Job and Setting Boundaries.

• Overall career goals, setting objectives, giving advice, strategizing, rights and contracts, attending events, finding a team, priorities + international reach, recording / live show success,  finding producers /collaborators, negotiation, booking as needed, grant applications or capital research
• Business management - finances, contracts, accounting, International representation, investing, long term strategy
• Personal management: Artist brand/profile, day-to-day problem solving,  calendar, time management, seeking opportunities/contracts, attending events/conferences advancing career
• Booking/agent work, touring
• Road management, itinerary planning, accompanying artist, merchandising, on-site communication, interviews
• Protecting the artist & manager: Time allocation.

Offered in English, with English Live Transcription - French Transcription available after the event.

Facilitators

Mary Catherine Harris is a veteran music businesswoman, who runs COUTEAU Music and GENISON publishing. She has a strong background in recording, production, management, marketing, synchronization licensing and contracts.She handles career development and publishing for independent artists and writers.  She also is a successful publisher, and  pitches music for synch, representing a curated roster of artists.

Mary Catherine’s past history includes founder of Harris & Wolff a BtoB company known for high-end, curated content and as a go-to source for music supervisors, producers and directors for use in television series, documentaries and feature films.  Prior, she was a partner at Third Side Music. She has been an avid champion of indie Canadian bands and artists. 

Representing: Fredy V & The Foundation, Malika Tirolien, Jason Lang, Frase, + others

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Heidi Fleming Since 1986 Fleming Artist Management (FamGroup/Direction d’Artistes Fleming) has specialized in jazz, folk, blues and global roots music.  Her artists have performed world-wide from their base in Canada; their success and the agency’s growth are a testament to Fleming’s commitment to long-term development of a diverse roster. Heidi Fleming programmed Montreal International Jazz Festival’s acoustic blues series 1997-2000. She has executive produced or produced over 35 albums, many of them Juno, Felix or Opus nominated or award-winning. 

Current roster artists include Malika Tirolien, Wesli, Christine Jensen, François Bourassa, Durham County Poets and Jason Lang’s Handled With Care project: A Tribute to Penny Lang.

***This one-hour session is only available to the Emerging Agents and Managers Cohort***

Join an agent for an informal conversation about what it is like to work in the field.

Offered in English with Live Transcription.

Facilitator

A veteran of the Canadian music industry with 22+ years of experience, Grant Paley has experienced his love of music as both an award-winning artist and agent. His journey into a life of music began on stage as the frontman & DJ of the electrifying Moses Mayes. After a decade of touring, he transitioned behind the scenes as a music agent and he's never looked back. Following 12 years at Paquin Artists Agency where he developed his own unique roster of live and electronic acts, he left in 2020 to co-found Midnight Agency. Today under the Midnight banner he represents an award-winning roster of clients from an array of genres in Canada, the USA, Australia, and New Zealand.

Midnight Agency

***This one-hour session is only available to the Emerging Agents and Managers Cohort***

Join a presenter for an informal conversation about what it is like to work in the field.

Offered in English with Live Transcription.

Facilitator

Erin Kennedy is the Artistic Director of the Vernon and District Performing Arts Centre (VDPACS), which is located in the Okanagan Valley in the interior of British Columbia. For the past thirteen years, she has been programming a multidisciplinary 24-38 performance season which includes theatre, dance, circus, kid’s shows, comedy, music, school presentations as well as the North Okanagan Children’s Festival. VDPACS delivers over 50 community engagement activities each season which help deepen the community’s connection to the artists’ work.

Prior to her work at the Vernon and District Performing Arts Centre, Erin worked as a freelance theatre maker in design and management in Montreal, Vancouver and the interior of BC. Erin is a graduate of the National Theatre School of Canada’s Technical Production Program.

This two-hour panel will share the experiences of amazing network builders. Hear their stories, steal their tricks. Moderator: Graham Cozzubbo

Offered in French and English with simultaneous translations, with English Live Transcription - French Transcription available after the event.

Facilitators

Dani Fecko is a first generation Canadian of Czech and Slovak descent who lives on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm, Skwxwú7mesh, and Səl̓ílwətaɬ Nations. She is Executive Director of Fascinator Management, an agency and consultancy. Fascinator consults and coaches internationally and nationally providing curated connections, network program design, tour and producing guidance and strategic planning. She was a Leadership Fellow with the Association of Performing Arts Professionals from 2016 – 2018 and a Fellow with ISPA from 2012 – 2014. Dani has served on juries for Creative Scotland, the Canada Council for the Arts, the BC Arts Council and New York’s Creative Capital; and been on panels in Sweden, Darwin, Montreal, Scotland, Ireland, Vancouver and Ottawa and hosted workshops in Vancouver, Victoria and Calgary. Dani is sometimes a sessional instructor on Creative Entrepreneurship at Simon Fraser University.  She lives with her piano playing husband, Angus Kellett and their fish, Hyfinn, as well as many pandemic plants.

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Nigel P. Jenkins is a graduate of the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University, with a Certificate in Entertainment Law from Osgoode Hall Law School. Nigel is an artist manager and record label owner based in Steady Brook, NL. Through his company, Laughing Heart Music, Nigel has worked with artists like Classified, The Lytics, Anthony OKS, Ben Caplan, Hillsburn and many others as a manager, label owner, and music publisher. Nigel is the Chair for the Board of Directors for MusicNL, and sits on the board of directors for the East Coast Music Association. He was nominated for the 2022 East Coast Music Award for Artist Manager of the Year, the 2021 Music NL awards for Industry Professional of the Year and Outstanding Company of the Year, and the 2019 East Coast Music Award for Artist Manager of the Year.

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Jon Weisz is the founder and president of Indie Montréal, an artist development company known for specializing in the province of Quebec. In his past life as a concert promoter, Jon presented over 2000 shows of all genres and sizes across Quebec and Ontario. IMTL now has three banners - IMTL Agency offering management and booking, IMTL Promotion offering media relations, web promotion and street marketing and IMTL Label Services offering grantwriting, consulting / coaching and event production. He co-founded franconnexion.info, Canada’s french-language music trade press and a professional development entity serving over 7000 members of Quebec and Canada’s francophone music industry. He also founded and is the Executive Director of Les SMAQ, Quebec’s small venue association. Sporting over 70 members across Quebec, its spaces collectively present over 75% of the province’s indoor music concerts annually. Jon has 20 years experience in the Canadian music sector and holds a business degree from McGill University. He’s also involved in a number of music industry organizations and is a board member of the Canadian Live Music Association.

http://indiemontreal.ca | http://lessmaq.ca | http://franconnexion.info

***This one-hour session is only available to the Emerging Agents and Managers Cohort***

Join an agent for an informal conversation about what it is like to work in the field.

Offered in English with Live Transcription.

Facilitator

Ulysses de Paula was born in the crib of classic Samba, Rio de Janeiro. Music is his greatest passion. Based in Toronto, Canada, since 2018, he is an accomplished professional with over 20 years of experience in the music and culture industry with a reputation for excellence in artists’ career management and event production. In 2012, Ulysses founded the Showzaço music agency, managing over 100 talented artists in Brazil, Canada, China, Western Europe, South America and South Africa. He has a diploma in Journalism, an MBA in Cultural Marketing (Brazil), and Music Business Diploma (Canada). He is a Music Booking Agent licensed by the Canadian Music Federation, a FACTOR’s juror team member, and an effortless promoter of Afro-Brazilian and Latin music in Toronto and GTA.

This two-hour panel will cover considerations, best practices, and stories about working with and supporting Indigenous agents.

Offered in French and English with simultaneous translations, with English Live Transcription - French Transcription available after the event.

Moderator

Denise Bolduc is an established creator, director and producer who programs to transform perspectives and activate change. Her career represents countless contributions and connections with numerous artists, thinkers and institutions nationally and internationally. For over three decades, she has led and curated small to large-scale multi-disciplinary arts events and festivals. 

Recent key activities include as writer & director of the film Zaagidiwin, as co-editor and contributing writer of the award-winning book, Indigenous Toronto: Stories That Carry This Place, and as lead curator of The UNcommon Wealth and Built on Genocide. Currently, she is working on a piece as part of the Pemmican Collective and Punctuate Theatre’s Playwrights’ Cohort, is an advisor with Smithsonian Folkways Recordings Canada Series, a co-curator on a concert event with Koerner Hall, co-curator of an International Indigenous Exchange with CAPACO and the CAPACOA conference 2023, a co-editor with Zaagigin | Coach House Books and more. She has received a number of awards, is a member of several boards and committees, a mentor, instructor, host, facilitator, witness and arts advisor. Denise is Anishinaabe and French, born and raised in the Lake Superior | Robinson Huron Treaty Territory, and is a member of the Batchewana First Nation with familial ties in Garden River First Nation.

Facilitators

Juno nominated Cris Derksen is an Internationally respected Indigenous Cellist and Composer. Derksen braids the traditional and contemporary, weaving her classical background and her Indigenous ancestry together with new school electronics to create genre-defying music. She is in high demand as a composer and performer with symphonies and chamber groups across Canada. Derksen’s strength lies in her diversity as a composer outside of classical music for Dance, Theatre, Film and Television, Animation, Fashion, and Podcasts.Recent concert destinations include Norway, Chile, Hong Kong, Australia, Mongolia, Europe and a whole lot of Canada: the place Derksen refers to as home.

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While working in the Newfoundland and Nova Scotia music industry since 2008 as both a musician and industry professional, Mary Beth Waldram has organized and supervised large-scale events, created successful grant proposals, and helped various artists with their work. Mary Beth is a graduate of Memorial University's School of Music and Nova Scotia Community College's Music Business Program. She’s since gone on to work with many Atlantic Canadian music festivals including Halifax Pop Explosion, Lawnya Vawnya and The Newfoundland and Labrador Folk Festival, all while managing bands and booking tours for Atlantic Canadian artists. Winner for MusicNL’s Industry Professional of the Year 2022, Mary Beth currently resides in St. John's, Newfoundland and is working with Lawnya Vawnya, Newfoundland and Labrador Folk Festival, Silver Wolf Band and Laughing Heart Music. 

MusicNL Industry Professional of the Year 2022
Artist Manager of the Year 2023 Nominee
Women in Music Canada Honours - Long List Nominee

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With several years of experience as a musician and in music financing, Antoine Fallu is currently working as a booking agent for Ruel Tourneur, an agency specializing in the production and booking of French-language and First Nation artists. With his colleague Guillaume Ruel, he represents several musicians from the Innu and Atikamekw Nations : Florent Vollant, Scott-Pien Picard, Katia Rock, Pako, Maten, Matiu and Ivan Boivin-Flamand.

Antoine Fallu is also a professional musician performing mainly with Le Winston Band, which he co-founded in 2012.  He has recorded and produced 3 albums as well as 4 EPs, in addition to performing over 600 shows across Canada, Europe and the United States. Holder of a bachelor's degree in cultural anthropology, he has worked as the financing manager for the non-profit Musique Nomade, which accompanies Indigenous artists in music.

***This session is only available to the Emerging Agents and Managers Cohort***

A space for the Emerging Agents and Managers to come together and chat with each other about what the process was like and to make connections.

This second of two workshops will cover unique identifiers and the interlinking of an artist’s digital assets via Wikidata. Agence Danielle Lefebvre will talk about their implementation of these strategies in their agency. If time permits, participants will be guided as they perform their first edits in Wikidata.

Offered in French and English with simultaneous translations, with English Live Transcription - French Transcription available after the event.

Facilitators

Dessa Hayes is an open data initiate, freelance writer, and self-described Renaissance woman. Born into a working-class family of amateur musicians, she has a passion for breaking down silos and engaging people of all backgrounds with arts and culture. As a graduate of Western University’s School for Advanced Studies in the Arts and Humanities (SASAH) (B.A. 2017) and University College London’s Institute of Archaeology (M.A. 2019), Dessa has had the privilege to work and volunteer with various nonprofits in both Canada and Britain. She currently lives in her hometown of Ottawa and works for the Canadian Association for the Performing Arts (CAPACOA) as a Digital Discoverability Consultant.

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Frédéric Julien has been active in the performing arts for several years as an artist, an arts administrator, a consultant, an advocate, and a change maker. Frédéric has been leading research and development activities at CAPACOA since 2010. In this capacity, he has directed or authored several key research initiatives such as: The Value of Presenting, Digitizing the Performing Arts, and Indigenous Artists and Wikidata. Since 2018, Frédéric has been leading the Linked Digital Future Initiative, a multi-prong initiative that seeks to foster digital discoverability, collaboration and a data-centric transformation of the performing arts.

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Danielle Lefebvre - With a background that includes French horn studies in Quebec’s conservatories, piano and teaching certificates, the founder and actual executive director brings a unique expertise and synergy to her organization. She received the 2014 Agent of the Year award from the British Columbia Touring Council and was nominated for CAPACOA’s (The Canadian Association for the Performing Arts / l’Association canadienne des organismes artistiques) Agent of the Year award in 2011.

She sat on ​the Board of CAPACOA​ for six years, 2015-2021. Since its founding in 1985, CAPACOA has fostered and developed pan-Canadian network for presenters, presenting networks, artist managers/agents and performing arts administrators.

She currently sits on the Board of AASPAA Canada​ (Agences des arts de la scène Performing Arts Agencies Canada​). AASPAA Canada is an organization whose foundation is rooted in the representation of Agents & Managers profession in a diverse, inclusive and equitable voice; to act as advocates for the members’ common interests and growth within the Performing Arts sector in Canada.​