Artist management

The music manager is part deal broker, part baby sitter and 100% opportunity exploiter. You are the centre of business for your artist. You do the selling, they do the arty bit.

Artist management duties include:

1. Finding a top notch booking agent
2. Sniffing out multi million pound record deals
3. Organising studio time to record that critically acclaimed album
4. Ingenious PR to raise the band’s status
5. Hooking up lucrative syncronization deals with publishing houses
6. A cast iron grip of the artists diary
7. A cunning mastery of the A&R hype machine
8. Top-notch smoozing to elevate your band from Radio Lancashire’s E-list to Radio One’s A-list
9. Motivation and advice service – you’ll need a calm head and nerves of steel

The bigger picture

Managers are the lynchpin of the music industry. Without them, not a lot would get done. They are the key link between artist and label, publisher, booking agent and PR. There is great similarity with a football manager who acts as broker, motivator and strategist – you could be the Alex Ferguson of the music industry. 

Tips from the pros

Richard Thomas from Endless Entertainment manages Kano & Rory Joesph and offers important do’s and don’t in artist management:

• Don’t deceive your artist. If you ever get found out it’s the end of the trust. And all management relationships are totally built on trust.
• Do keep you motivation and perseverance up 100%, because you do get knocked down on a daily basis. And that’s quite hard, so the self-belief part of it is a major factor.

Richard’s career advice:

Be determined and don’t get into the music industry for money.