2019 Program
2019 Contemporary Music Roundtable Program
Dates: Wednesday 5th June & Thursday 6th June, 2019
Venue: Erskineville Town Hall, 104 Erskineville Road, Sydney
Event Description and Background:
The next Contemporary Music Roundtable (CMR) will be held 5 – 6 June, 2019 at Erskineville Town Hall in Sydney. Hosted by Music Australia and made possible by our Government Partner City of Sydney, the CMR is uniquely positioned at NSW’s number one music industry conference and the national go to policy and development event. Now in its fourth year, the CMR program was developed in partnership with all national music industry peak bodies, specialist agencies, and key commercial companies, and has a core objective to cooperatively drive growth of Australian contemporary music.
Music Australia has had no difficulty getting together great people to discuss music industry issues, but has been less effective in getting great outcomes from getting people together. For the 2019 Roundtable, we have slimmed down the agenda and guest list, in the hope of achieving actionable outcomes on a few key issues. These issues are:
- Economic study: Uniting stakeholders behind a new study that will value the economic and cultural contribution of the Australia music industry, and will be updated on an annual basis, similar to the annual Measuring Music study put together by UK Music. This would be a great advocacy tool for the industry;
- Equality and equity: We wish to examine practical actions to advance equity and equality in the Australian music industry, such as publication of an annual set of metrics which chart the gender gap in the music industry. We will also examine work which has been done by LPA and APRA AMCOS with regards to sexual harassment and bullying. Other issues such as mentoring programs for women will be discussed. Equality will also be explored through the perspective of other groups;
- Presenting a united front in political lobbying: We wish to host a session which continues the great work recently led by APRA AMCOS and ARIA in attempting to present a unified music industry voice to the government on reforms and priorities, which otherwise can be perceived by politicians as a cacophony of voices. This session will look at lobbying priorities for the newly elected Federal government;
- Industry/research/teaching connection: This will focus on PWC’s industry skills forecast as part of their VET music training package review. This informs what is taught in the VET sector. We will also examine issues around ensuring tight alignment between the higher education sector and industry on teaching, skills development and research. Other practical outcomes might be Music Australia mapping the research that is going on in the sector and engaging with the Australian Bureau of Statistics on definitions and data collection.
Because of its reduced scope, some valuable topics we would like to discuss cannot be accommodated, and will be held over for future meetings. This is the first step in a process, and we will review the success of this format before deciding the format of future Roundtable meetings.
Note that attendance is by invitation and no registration fee will be charged for the event. A full delegate list can be viewed here.
Details in this Program are subject to (minor) change.
Day 1: Wednesday 5 June
8:45 – 9:30 Registration and Coffee
9:30 – 10.00 Welcome and Introductions
- Acknowledgement of Country
- Official opening by our Lord Mayor of Sydney, Clover Moore
- Welcome by Paul Saintilan (CEO) and Michael Smellie (Chair), Music Australia
10.00 – Session: Equality & Equity
Chair: Catherine Gerrard, Music Australia Board Member
10:15 – 11:00 Presenter: Ange McCormack, triple j Hack reporter. Author of Hack’s annual report on the gender gap in the Australian music industry
Open Discussion: What would be the issues of the industry getting behind a set of aggregated metrics which are tracked annually?
11:00 – 11:30 Coffee Break
11:30 Presenter: Kim Tran, Director Policy & Governance, Live Performance Australia – LPA’s work on a code of conduct and training in relation to sexual harassment and bullying in the workplace
11:55 Presenter: Jana Gibson, Head of Member Services, APRA AMCOS – Rolling out LPA’s work into other industry sectors; mentorship programs to assist women in the industry
Australian singer-songwriter Jack River will also be contributing to the Equality & Equity session.
Open Discussion: Potential to roll out this work into other areas of the industry.
12:30 – 1:30 Lunch
1:30 – 3:00 Session: Lobbying Roundtable
This session will address the advocacy priorities of the industry based on the newly elected Federal government. The discussion will led by APRA AMCOS and ARIA, updating the Roundtable on their recent lobbying work. Some interstate representatives will be dialling in for only this part of the meeting. We will confirm the dial-in protocol closer to the meeting.
3:00 – 3:30 Coffee Break
3:30 – 5:00 Session: Equality and Equity: Other Perspectives
3.30 – 4.00 Presenter: Peter Morris, General Manager, RAP Program, Reconciliation Australia – Workplace Reconciliation Action Plans (RAP)
4.00 – 5.00 Presenter: Josh Kane, Acting CEO & Sara Glaidous, Board Member, The Push Inc – Youth Engagement in Music
5:15 Join us for complementary drinks – Meet the Delegates
City of Sydney & Music Australia networking event. Vivid Festival is also on in Sydney at this time.
Day 2: Thursday 6 June
9:00 – 9:30 Registration and Coffee
9:30 Session: Uniting stakeholders behind a study which values the economic and cultural contribution of the Australian music industry
Chair: Ed St John, Music Australia Board member
Presenter: Associate Professor Shane Homan, Monash University – status report on an Australian music industry economic study, including background to the study
Open Discussion: feedback on the plans, scope, access to data, support, funding strategy etc
10:30 Session: Ensuring industry relevant research, teaching and skills development
Presenter: Alexandra Gifford, Culture and Related Industries Lead, PwC’s Skills for Australia – Industry Skills forecast as part of the music training package review
Open Discussion: Industry engagement with the skills forecast
11:15 – 11:45 Coffee Break
11:45 – 12:30 Session: Ensuring industry relevant research, teaching and skills development (cont.)
Presenter: Ben O’Hara, Dean, Collarts – Understanding and Engaging with Music Industry Education
Presenter: Paul Saintilan, CEO, Music Australia – 10 reasons academic research in business and economics does not necessarily possess industry relevance: why industry needs to fight for industry relevant research
Other practical outcomes from the morning’s session might be Music Australia mapping the research that is going on in the sector (which has no overall co-ordination) and engaging with the Australian Bureau of Statistics on definitions and data collection.
12:30 – 1:30 Lunch
1:30 – 2:45 Open Forum
Open discussion of areas where greater co-operation between music organisations could advance our mutual interests; further feedback/suggestions on advancing any of the meeting priorities; questions tabled in advance of the meeting by Music Australia members
2:45 – 3:00 Closing thanks from Music Australia to speakers and delegates
3:00 Official Close – [a friendly closing time for interstate delegates heading to the airport]
[3:30 – 4:30 Private Music Australia meeting to affirm action points and agree the way forward]
