12.40PM - 1.20PM PANELS

SELF-RELEASING CLASSICAL MUSIC AS A COMPOSER OR PERFORMER
Hear from Matthew Whiteside, composer, and author of ‘Self-Release Guide Book for Composers & Musicians’ to learn how to self-release music within in the Classical music sector. The talk will cover everything you should consider when self-releasing, including setting yourself realistic budgets, what your budget should be spent on, how to run recording sessions, promoting yourself online and the process of getting your music onto major streaming platforms as well as reaching listeners.

ROOM: TBA

Matthew Whiteside, Composer // Author // Artistic Director of ‘The Night With…’

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Matthew Whiteside
Matthew Whiteside

Matthew Whiteside, the List Hot 100 2019, is a composer, collaborator, sound designer and concert producer based in Glasgow, named ‘One to Watch’ in the Herald’s Culture Awards 2017 and winner of the Light Moves Innovative Use of Sound Award for his work Entangled with Marisa Zanotti. His music has been described as “Effective and Unsettling” by BBC Music Magazine and “post-minimalist bold sparseness” by the Herald. In 2020 he won the SMIA Award for Creative Programming…

ATL INTRODUCING: DANCE MUSIC – HOW TO GET STARTED AND HOW TO BREAK THROUGH
This panel will unpack ways for artists to break into the music industry as EDM, Electronica or Dance acts. The panellists will touch on tips for how to build up an audience, steps you can take to help you make contacts, book gigs and progress in the field - specifically in the UK & Ireland - and what to expect along the way. The talk will also touch on the experiences of women who have paved the way in this male dominated field.

ROOM: TBA

Gemma Bradley, BBC Radio 1 Presenter & Artist
Sarah McBriar, Founder of AVA Music & Arts Festival
Caoimhe Moreland, DJ
Sally C, DJ

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Sarah McBriar
Sarah McBriar

Sarah McBriar is the Founder & Creative Director of AVA & UP Productions, specialising in large-scale festival and conference creation, production design and programming across the audio, visual arts (AVA) sector.

Sarah’s experience and passion for the sector this year earned her a nomination for the title of ‘Underground Hero’ in DJ Mag’s Best of British Awards for notably promoting the music sector, while her creation AVA has been described as ‘A cultural catalyst’ - The Independent , ‘Ireland’s most innovative electronic music festival’ – The Irish Times, ‘One of the top ten city music festivals in the UK’ – The Guardian , ‘One of the world’s most exciting electronic festivals’ - Mixmag

With over 12 years’ experience across the live entertainment, events and cultural sector, Sarah focuses on concept creation, production design, producing and fundraising for live events. She has partnered with a number of high profile brands including the BBC, Avant Arte, Boiler Room and Broadwick Live.

Sally C
Sally C

Biography coming soon

YOUR PRESS RELEASE SUCKS! HOW TO WRITE A PRESS RELEASE THAT WORKS
Writing a great press release can be considered an art form in itself - and in the music industry, a press release is a vital tool for bringing an artist or business publicity. Any publication you get from your press release will be free, so it’s easy to see why writing a good press release is a valuable skill for artists and their teams to learn. Join music journalists to hear the best tips for how to write a killer music press release that will get you noticed and ultimately help you publicise yourself - they’ll cover everything from what you should include, how you should present it and who to send it to.

ROOM: TBA

Brian Coney, Editor, The Thin Air
Niall Byrne, Founder, Nialler9

PLUS MORE PANNELISTS TO BE ANNOUNCED.

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Élise Mollé
Élise Mollé

Élise Mollé is a recording and mixing engineer from Nantes, France. She worked in Iceland at Greenhouse Studios and UnStudios before spending several years crafting her skills at Analogue Catalogue, a studio in Northern Ireland that records artists solely to tape machine. In 2020, Élise relocated to Dublin and joined the roster of Camden Studios while continuing her freelance work, including projects with Sony, Warner, Decca, Parlophone.

Niall Byrne
Niall Byrne

Niall Byrne is the founder of the most-read Irish music site Nialler9, operating out of Dublin city since 2005, where he writes about music and hosts the Nialler9 Podcast.

In addition, Niall is a DJ and resident of the monthly Lumo Club and an artist manager for alternative rock artist Skinner.

Niall produces, curates and hosts gigs, parties & events around Ireland. Niall has curated once-off music events at SXSW in Austin, Texas & Camden Crawl in London as well as nationally for Musictown, Dublin Theatre Festival, Cork’s Sounds From A Safe Harbour and Happenings among others.

Niall has a keen interest in utilising creative and under-used spaces in the city, where possible having previously produced events at Monster Truck Gallery, Block T, Dublin Food Co-op, Granby Park, and the Garda Boat Club. Most recently, Niall co-produced Night Moves a DJ-lead event at the Fruit & Veg Market off Capel Street as part of Culture Night Dublin.

Brian Coney
Brian Coney

Brian Coney is an editor, writer, musician and PR agent based in Belfast. He is the founder and editor of Irish music and culture magazine The Thin Air, and a writer for Pitchfork, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, Wire, The Quietus, Bandcamp, Dazed & Confused, Clash, Loud + Quiet, Consequence of Sound, DJ Mag and The Line of Best Fit. As well as DJing and promoting in Belfast, he’s also a founding member of the Northern Ireland Music Prize-winning band Junk Drawer and an independent music PR agent working closely with Irish artists.

PRSfM  PRESENTS: GET PLAYED GET PAID - ROYALTY COLLECTION IN ELECTRONIC MUSIC WITH PRS 
MORE INFO TO FOLLOW.

ROOM: TBA

PANELLISTS TO BE ANNOUNCED.

ON MUSIC PRESENTS: KIND OF BLUE - PLACING NORTHERN IRELAND BANDS IN BBC1’S SERIES BLUE LIGHTS
Hear from the creative team behind the hit 2023 BBC TV series ‘Blue Lights’ on their process for selecting commercial music for the project, including their choice to include a wealth of NI artists in the soundtrack and how this decision enhanced the script and action. They’ll be joined by Simon Pursehouse of Sentric Music - the revolutionary publishing company who make countless sync deals happen for artists throughout the UK every single day (including placing 32 tracks in Love Island 2022); and Abbie Triggs of On Music - the Belfast based music data experts who ensure composers and songwriters get paid when their music is synced in globally renowned TV productions across BBC, Channel 5, Netflix and more.

ROOM: TBA

Abbie Triggs, Director of Operations and Business Development, On Music
Catherine Grimes, Music Supervisor, ‘Blue Lights’
Louise Gallagher, Producer, ‘Blue Lights’
Simon Pursehouse, Sentric Music

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Abbie Triggs
Abbie Triggs

Abbie Triggs is the Director of Operations and Business Development at On Music Ltd - the leading provider of back-office administration services for organisations in the media industry.  Over the past 18 years, Abbie has worked with some of the world's largest performance rights organisations, television broadcasters and music publishers to establish best in class standards for metadata relating to copyright and royalty administration...

Simon Pursehouse
Simon Pursehouse

Simon Pursehouse has been an integral part of Sentric Music Group since the company’s infancy overseeing the signing of Sentric’s first artist in 2006 to its now established community of over 400,000 songwriters.Simon works within the Business Development and Creative Departments at Sentric and is the point person for their roster of signed songwriters. Previously at Sentric, Simon headed up the sync division, which under his supervision was nominated as Best Indie Publisher at the Music Week Sync awards for six years running…

Louise Gallagher
Louise Gallagher

Louise started her career at the BBC in Belfast working in production across Radio, TV and Online services. She flew the BBC nest and started working on independent shorts and features, producing her first feature film, A Bump Along The Way, starring Bronagh Gallagher and Lola Petticrew. She joined Hattrick at the start of 2020 to run their most westerly outpost in Belfast, seeking out new and exciting projects from across Ireland. Louise is the recent recipient of an IFTA for best short film Rough written and directed by Declan Lawn and Adam Patterson, and is co-creator and Executive Producer on BBC drama series Blue Lights.

Catherine Grimes
Catherine Grimes

Catherine Grimes - Music Consultant and Music Supervisor. Catherine has over 30 years experience in the field of Music Rights and Music Supervision for Television. She headed up the Music Rights Team at the BBC for over 10 years, and created the music strategy for BBC Studios Production & Distribution before starting her own music supervision company in 2021. Since then has worked on a variety of television programmes including Happy Valley for BBC1 , Good Omens for Amazon Prime, Trying for Apple TV+ , Hans Zimmer…

GET IN THE VANS - HOW VANS WORK WITH EMERGING TALENT IN MUSIC
Brand partnerships - what are they and what do they mean for the brand and artist involved? This panel will give delegates an opportunity to hear from Tony Arthy of globally renowned brand, Vans, on their values and how these tie into the music industry, leading them to create incredible opportunities for emerging artists. He’ll be joined by New Champion Management founder, Ben Magee, to discuss the Vans’ Musicians Wanted competition, which allowed NI artist Lemonade Shoelace the insane opportunity to support Yungblud in Mexico City in 2022. They’ll discuss what this has done to help propel the artists’ career, how artists can approach / pitch themselves to brands, and famous success stories of other brand partnerships.

ROOM: TBA

Tony Arthy, Worn Out Agency // Vans
Benjamin Magee, Artist manager: Lemonade Shoelace, Chalk, Joshua Burnside

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Tony Arthy
Tony Arthy

Tony Arthy is the founder of brand and music partnerships agency Worn Out Creative based in London. He started the agency in 2008 after having worked in marketing, pr and entertainment for multiple action sports distribution companies and brands including Insight, Paul Frank, RVCA, Vestal Watches and Atticus clothing. Tony’s worked with hundreds of bands including Coldplay, The Prodigy, Oasis & Muse…

Ben Magee
Ben Magee

A music enthusiast at heart, Ben’s journey in the music industry began on the cowboy side, as a journalist and roadie for acts in his local scene. This all changed when he established New Champion Management in late 2019, setting up a home and infrastructure for the artists and sounds that he loved. With global partners, 80+ million streams across the roster and live performances in 20+ countries, New Champion represents the best artists in Ireland with bespoke strategy and unwavering passion…

GO FUND ME - OPPORTUNITIES FOR FUNDING FOR ARTISTS AND MUSIC BUSINESSES
Hear from members of staff at key UK music organisations who offer funding, support, advice and opportunities for music projects, including Arts Council of Northern Ireland, PRS Foundation and Help Musicians. Whether you’re a music creator, organisation, music business or working across creative disciplines, this panel will provide delegates with an insight to the latest music funding and grants available in various sectors of music and creative industries, as well as upcoming schemes. You’ll also hear about what these opportunities can mean for those who receive them, including how funding can help an artist or music creator take their music to the next level.

ROOM: TBA

Ciaran Scullion, Head of Music & Opera, ACNI
Westley Holdsworth, Grants and Programmes Manager, PRS Foundation
Hannah Gibson, Engagement Officer, HMNI

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Ciaran Scullion
Ciaran Scullion

Ciaran Scullion is the Head of Music & Opera at the Arts Council of Northern Ireland where he leads the support and development of the NI music sector at home and abroad. An award-winning musician and arts manager he is a sought after artistic advisor to key cultural institutions in the UK and Ireland.

Westley Holdsworth
Westley Holdsworth

Westley is a Grants and Programmes Manager at the PRS Foundation, working across The Open Fund for Music Creators, the Open Fund for Organisations, The International Showcase Fund, and the Oram Awards. Before joining the PRS Foundation he was the International Coordinator at the New Zealand Music Commission helping to launch and grow the international careers of a diverse range of artists…

Hannah Gibson
Hannah Gibson

Hannah Gibson is Northern Ireland’s very own Engagement Officer for Help Musicians. In her role she advises and supports artists who are interested in applying for our funding or knowing more about the charity. You can find her based in the Help Musicians hub on the second floor of the Oh Yeah Music Centre. In her free time, Hannah also co-runs Soup Ink Co-op, which allows her to obtain insight on the ground across Belfast's creative scenes.