A&R
Encyclopedia
Artists and repertoire is the division of a record label
that is responsible for talent scouting and overseeing the artistic development of recording artists. It also acts as a liaison between artists and the record label.
An A&R executive is authorized to offer a record contract, often in the form of a "deal memo": a short informal document that establishes a business relationship between the recording artist and the record company. The actual contract negotiations will typically be carried out by rival entertainment lawyers hired by the musician's manager and the record company.
A&R executives rely mostly on the word of mouth
of trusted associates, critics and business contacts. They also tend to favor bands that play in the same city that the record company is located. Contrary to popular belief, their decisions are rarely based on unsolicited demo tapes
sent by musicians (Citation needed). (However, major labels outside the United States and various independent labels
may accept demos.)
, scheduling time in a recording studio
and advising the artist on all aspects of making a high-quality recording. They work with the artist to choose the best songs (i.e.repertoire) to record. For artists who do not write their own music, they will assist in finding song
s and songwriter
s. A&R executives maintain contact with their counterparts at music publishing companies to get new songs and material from songwriters and producers.
As the record nears completion, the A&R department works closely with the artist to determine if the record is acceptable to the record company. This may include suggesting that new songs need to be written or that some tracks need re-recording. A key issue is whether the album has a single
: a particular track which can be used to market
the record on radio. As Tom Petty
sang in "Into the great wide open"
, the industry cliché, "I don't hear a single!", refers to this process.
, promotion
and the artist) chooses a single
to help promote the record.
discovered Billie Holiday
, Bob Dylan
, Aretha Franklin
and Bruce Springsteen
. Hammond's colleagues were initially skeptical of these artists because none of them appeared to be creating "commercial" music. However, Hammond's instincts proved to be correct and these artists went on to sell hundreds of millions of records. Geffen Records' Gary Gersh signed the band Nirvana
at a time when alternative rock
music was not considered commercial. Gersh was able to convince his co-workers to push the record in spite of their misgivings. In cases like these, A&R people have radically changed the direction of popular musical tastes and introduced large numbers of people to new sounds.
However, this kind of prescience is the exception, rather than the rule. Historically, A&R executives have tended to sign new artists that fit into recent trends and who resemble acts that are currently successful. This has caused several waves of similar sounding music, including teen pop
(1998–2001), alternative rock
(1993–1996), hair metal (1986–1991) and disco
(1976–1978). This practice, however, can be counter-productive, since it has often led to a backlash. Towards the end of each wave record companies have found themselves faced with enormous losses as consumers' tastes changed. For example, at the end of the disco boom in 1978, millions of records were returned by record retailers, causing a deep recession in the music business that lasted until 1983, when Michael Jackson
's Thriller
finally brought the public back into record stores in large numbers.
This trend-following mindset has taken even greater precedence as record companies have become more corporate and financially oriented. The general move towards more conservative and business-minded signings from the 1980s onwards is seen to be symptomatic of an industry where the most powerful figures are no longer music fans or people with musical backgrounds, but business people. Traditionally A&R executives were composers, arrangers and producers - Atlantic Records
's heads Jerry Wexler
and Ahmet Ertegun
were producers and composers respectively - but an A&R with musical ability and knowledge has become a rarity, with Ron Fair
and Martin Kierszenbaum
being notable recent exceptions. The composer and arranger Richard Niles
has said,
and Lizard King Records
founder Martin Heath, the A&R community in the UK is more integrated than it is in the US, being very London-centric and encompassing a relatively small number of people. "If scouts are chasing a band, you’ll see the same thirty people in one room. You get a herd mentality in the UK, but also some very diverse signings as well," he said in an interview with HitQuarters
. Heath believes that in the USA it is more typical for A&R to wait until a band is established - having attracted other offers or achieved a level of sales - before taking action, a technique which often works out as being more expensive.
, a large number of A&R staffers have been terminated. It is unclear whether A&R executives will shape the future of musical tastes as they have in the past.
www.beyondoneentertainment.com Beyond One Entertainment official website
Record label
In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...
that is responsible for talent scouting and overseeing the artistic development of recording artists. It also acts as a liaison between artists and the record label.
Finding talent
The A&R division is responsible for discovering new recording artists and bringing them to the record company. They are expected to understand the current tastes of the market and to be able to find artists that will be commercially successful. For this reason, A&R people are often young and many are musicians, music journalists or record producers.An A&R executive is authorized to offer a record contract, often in the form of a "deal memo": a short informal document that establishes a business relationship between the recording artist and the record company. The actual contract negotiations will typically be carried out by rival entertainment lawyers hired by the musician's manager and the record company.
A&R executives rely mostly on the word of mouth
Word of mouth
Word of mouth, or viva voce, is the passing of information from person to person by oral communication. Storytelling is the oldest form of word-of-mouth communication where one person tells others of something, whether a real event or something made up. Oral tradition is cultural material and...
of trusted associates, critics and business contacts. They also tend to favor bands that play in the same city that the record company is located. Contrary to popular belief, their decisions are rarely based on unsolicited demo tapes
Demo (music)
A demo version or demo of a song is one recorded for reference rather than for release. A demo is a way for a musician to approximate their ideas on tape or disc, and provide an example of those ideas to record labels, producers or other artists...
sent by musicians (Citation needed). (However, major labels outside the United States and various independent labels
Independent record label
An independent record label is a record label operating without the funding of or outside the organizations of the major record labels. A great number of bands and musical acts begin on independent labels.-Overview:...
may accept demos.)
Overseeing the recording process
The A&R division oversees the recording process. This includes helping the artist to find the right record producerRecord producer
A record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...
, scheduling time in a recording studio
Recording studio
A recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties...
and advising the artist on all aspects of making a high-quality recording. They work with the artist to choose the best songs (i.e.repertoire) to record. For artists who do not write their own music, they will assist in finding song
Song
In music, a song is a composition for voice or voices, performed by singing.A song may be accompanied by musical instruments, or it may be unaccompanied, as in the case of a cappella songs...
s and songwriter
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
s. A&R executives maintain contact with their counterparts at music publishing companies to get new songs and material from songwriters and producers.
As the record nears completion, the A&R department works closely with the artist to determine if the record is acceptable to the record company. This may include suggesting that new songs need to be written or that some tracks need re-recording. A key issue is whether the album has a single
Single (music)
In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...
: a particular track which can be used to market
Marketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...
the record on radio. As Tom Petty
Tom Petty
Thomas Earl "Tom" Petty is an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He is the frontman of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers and was a founding member of the late 1980s supergroup Traveling Wilburys and Mudcrutch. He has also performed under the pseudonyms of Charlie T...
sang in "Into the great wide open"
Into the Great Wide Open (song)
"Into the Great Wide Open" is the third song on the 1991 album Into the Great Wide Open by the group Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.-Music video:...
, the industry cliché, "I don't hear a single!", refers to this process.
Assisting with marketing and promotion
Once the record is completed, the A&R department (with assistance from marketingMarketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...
, promotion
Radio promotion
Radio promotion is the division of a record company which is charged with placing songs on the radio. They maintain relationships with program directors at radio stations and attempt to persuade them to play singles to promote the sale of recordings, such as CDs, sold by the record company...
and the artist) chooses a single
Single (music)
In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...
to help promote the record.
History and influence
The tastes of particular A&R executives have influenced the course of music history. A&R man John H. HammondJohn H. Hammond
John Henry Hammond II was an American record producer, musician and music critic from the 1930s to the early 1980s...
discovered Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday was an American jazz singer and songwriter. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and musical partner Lester Young, Holiday had a seminal influence on jazz and pop singing...
, Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
, Aretha Franklin
Aretha Franklin
Aretha Louise Franklin is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Although known for her soul recordings and referred to as The Queen of Soul, Franklin is also adept at jazz, blues, R&B, gospel music, and rock. Rolling Stone magazine ranked her atop its list of The Greatest Singers of All...
and Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss," is an American singer-songwriter who records and tours with the E Street Band...
. Hammond's colleagues were initially skeptical of these artists because none of them appeared to be creating "commercial" music. However, Hammond's instincts proved to be correct and these artists went on to sell hundreds of millions of records. Geffen Records' Gary Gersh signed the band Nirvana
Nirvana (band)
Nirvana was an American rock band that was formed by singer/guitarist Kurt Cobain and bassist Krist Novoselic in Aberdeen, Washington in 1987...
at a time when alternative rock
Alternative rock
Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...
music was not considered commercial. Gersh was able to convince his co-workers to push the record in spite of their misgivings. In cases like these, A&R people have radically changed the direction of popular musical tastes and introduced large numbers of people to new sounds.
However, this kind of prescience is the exception, rather than the rule. Historically, A&R executives have tended to sign new artists that fit into recent trends and who resemble acts that are currently successful. This has caused several waves of similar sounding music, including teen pop
Teen pop
Teen pop is a subgenre of pop music that is created, marketed and oriented towards teenagers. Teen pop copies genres and styles such as pop, dance, R&B, hip hop, country and rock....
(1998–2001), alternative rock
Alternative rock
Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...
(1993–1996), hair metal (1986–1991) and disco
Disco
Disco is a genre of dance music. Disco acts charted high during the mid-1970s, and the genre's popularity peaked during the late 1970s. It had its roots in clubs that catered to African American, gay, psychedelic, and other communities in New York City and Philadelphia during the late 1960s and...
(1976–1978). This practice, however, can be counter-productive, since it has often led to a backlash. Towards the end of each wave record companies have found themselves faced with enormous losses as consumers' tastes changed. For example, at the end of the disco boom in 1978, millions of records were returned by record retailers, causing a deep recession in the music business that lasted until 1983, when Michael Jackson
Michael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson was an American recording artist, entertainer, and businessman. Referred to as the King of Pop, or by his initials MJ, Jackson is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time by Guinness World Records...
's Thriller
Thriller (album)
Thriller is the sixth studio album by American recording artist Michael Jackson. It was released on November 30, 1982, by Epic Records as the follow-up to Jackson's critically and commercially successful 1979 album Off the Wall...
finally brought the public back into record stores in large numbers.
This trend-following mindset has taken even greater precedence as record companies have become more corporate and financially oriented. The general move towards more conservative and business-minded signings from the 1980s onwards is seen to be symptomatic of an industry where the most powerful figures are no longer music fans or people with musical backgrounds, but business people. Traditionally A&R executives were composers, arrangers and producers - Atlantic Records
Atlantic Records
Atlantic Records is an American record label best known for its many recordings of rhythm and blues, rock and roll, and jazz...
's heads Jerry Wexler
Jerry Wexler
Gerald "Jerry" Wexler was a music journalist turned music producer, and was regarded as one of the major record industry players behind music from the 1950s through the 1980s...
and Ahmet Ertegun
Ahmet Ertegun
Ahmet Ertegün was a Turkish American musician and businessman, best known as the founder and president of Atlantic Records. He also wrote classic blues and pop songs and served as Chairman of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and museum...
were producers and composers respectively - but an A&R with musical ability and knowledge has become a rarity, with Ron Fair
Ron Fair
Ron Fair is a veteran A&R executive, record producer arranger, recording engineer and songwriter. In a career that has spanned over 30 years at major record labels he has produced and arranged hits for several artists, but he is best known as a "guru/mentor", guiding the careers of unknown artists...
and Martin Kierszenbaum
Martin Kierszenbaum
Martin Kierszenbaum is a graduate of the University of Michigan and head of A&R at Interscope Records and president of Interscope's subsidiary imprint Cherrytree Records...
being notable recent exceptions. The composer and arranger Richard Niles
Richard Niles
Richard Niles is an American composer, arranger, producer, guitarist, broadcaster and journalist. He has lived in London since 1975. Because of his extensive work across many genres Sound on Sound magazine referred to him as "one of the most versatile men in modern music".-Early years:Niles was...
has said,
"What you've got now is huge multinational companies where most of their A&R staff are businessmen. They’re people who look at music from the standpoint of marketing, not from the standpoint of music and talent. They will say, 'Go out and get me anything that’s popular now.'"
Regional variations
According to Rhythm King RecordsRhythm King Records
Rhythm King Records Ltd was an independent record label founded in the mid 1980s by Martin Heath, Adele Nozedar, DJ Jay Strongman and James Horrocks.-Beginnings:...
and Lizard King Records
Lizard King Records
Lizard King Records is a New York and London-based independent label. Lizard King's distribution goes through ADA in America and Pinnacle in the UK.-Artists:Current*Surefire*Greater Good*Me*OxzanaFormer*Clear Static*Drive-by Argument*Santogold...
founder Martin Heath, the A&R community in the UK is more integrated than it is in the US, being very London-centric and encompassing a relatively small number of people. "If scouts are chasing a band, you’ll see the same thirty people in one room. You get a herd mentality in the UK, but also some very diverse signings as well," he said in an interview with HitQuarters
HitQuarters
HitQuarters is an international music industry publication and contact database founded in 1999. It is noted for in-depth interviews with industry figures, with past subjects including Simon Cowell, Martin Kierszenbaum, Jason Flom, Diane Warren, Peter Edge, Ron Fair and RedOne, as well as its A&R...
. Heath believes that in the USA it is more typical for A&R to wait until a band is established - having attracted other offers or achieved a level of sales - before taking action, a technique which often works out as being more expensive.
Recent changes
New forms of digital distribution have changed the relationship between consumers and the music they choose. Gerd Leonhard and others argue that the wide selection of music on digital services has allowed music consumers to bypass the traditional role of A&R. In the wake of declining record salesMusic industry in the 21st century
In the first decade of the 21st century consumers began to use computers and computer networks as the primary means to record, distribute, store and play music. This technological shift caused widespread economic changes and fundamentally changed the relationships between artists, record companies,...
, a large number of A&R staffers have been terminated. It is unclear whether A&R executives will shape the future of musical tastes as they have in the past.
External links
- A&R Interviews - Database of interviews with A&R people
www.beyondoneentertainment.com Beyond One Entertainment official website