The mantra that eight music industry majors and their professors heard consistently during an intense week-long visit to Hollywood and the surrounding LA area was to network at every opportunity. Professors Carl Anderson and Dr. Todd Kelly accompanied Music Business and Music & Entertainment Industry majors to sunny California early in January 2018 to learn more about the music industry.
Their week was filled with unique meetings that represented a host of different career options for the students. Visits to places like the Musicians Union of Los Angeles and William Morris Endeavor Talent Agency in Beverly Hills gave students a great understanding of the support services that touring professional musicians use. Dean Truitt from BMG Music Publishing and composer David Wesley outlined the use of production music in movie trailers, TV commercials, and video games. Brad Rosenberger from Omnivore Recordings provided a wealth of information about the music publishing business from his decades-long career at Warner Chappell Publishing.
Students were also able to meet with Music Supervisor and Bradley Alumnus Conor Aspel (‘14) at Vibe Creative where he assembles and licenses music for upcoming movie trailers. The class was able to try their own hand at creating music trailer music with sound design artist Kathie Talbot at Bradley’s Hollywood Semester classroom.
Perhaps one of the most unique visits was with Grammy Award winning composer Dan Wilson. Mr. Wilson has collaborated with artists such as Adele, Jason Mraz, and The Dixie Chicks and gave students an insight as to the importance of establishing networking connections in the industry and staying true to your principles.
Later in the week, students visited Remo Drums, the largest manufacturer of drum heads in the world and met with Educational Director Bruce Jacoby, for an extensive factory tour of their product lines. The California visit concluded with an all-day visit to Yamaha Corporation of America in Anaheim, CA, meeting with many of their product managers and marketing staff including Bradley alumni Ken Dattmore (‘84) and Nicole Kasielski (‘17).
This annual trip gives our Music Industry students a first hand glimpse of the possible career opportunities in the music business and is part of the important experiential learning that Bradley University offers to its students.
