Discovering Lady Gaga — How Artists Break Through and so much more | BMI’s Samantha Cox

Sarah sits down with Samantha Cox, Vice President of Creative at BMI New York, to explore the vital role BMI plays in supporting songwriters and artists as well as her take on how women are reshaping the music industry.

Sam's journey from small-town Texas to becoming an influential figure  in the industry serves as both inspiration and masterclass. With remarkable candor, she shares the moment she discovered a teenage Stephanie Germanotta—soon to become Lady Gaga—and instantly recognized the creative force that would soon captivate the world. "I fell in love instantly," Sam recalls, describing how she watched Gaga transform from an unknown performer on BMI's Lollapalooza stage to returning years later as a global superstar.
 
 Beyond the star-spotting stories, Sam delivers invaluable wisdom for songwriters navigating their careers. Her insights on collaboration, protecting creative work, and leveraging performance rights organizations reveal pathways through the industry that many creators never discover until it's too late. "If someone says you don't need a lawyer, don't work with that person," she warns, providing the kind of straightforward advice that can save careers.
 
 What makes this conversation truly special is the window it provides into BMI's multifaceted support system for artists. From creating networking opportunities through their innovative "Speed Dating for Songwriters" program to serving as advisors, connectors, and advocates, Sam illuminates how performance rights organizations function as much more than just royalty collectors.
 
 Whether you're a songwriter looking to understand your rights, an industry professional seeking deeper insights, or simply curious about how the music business really works, this episode delivers rare, honest perspective from someone who's helped shape countless careers. Listen now and discover why Sam Cox is the music industry powerhouse everyone wants in their corner.

https://www.instagram.com/scoxadoodledoo/

Transcript

Podcast Introduction

Speaker 1 0:03

She creates noise. She creates noise. She's moving through the world with a powerful voice. She creates noise. She creates noise, she creates noise.

Sam Cox's Journey to BMI

Speaker 2 0:24

Hi, you're listening to Sarah Nagourney and welcome to. She Creates Noise, a new podcast spotlighting women who power the music industry, coming to you from New York City. Now, if you don't know me yet, here's a little background. I'm a songwriter, producer, manager, educator and mentor. I've written platinum selling songs, had tracks on Grammy nominated educator and mentor. I've written platinum-selling songs, had tracks on Grammy-nominated records and released music on both major and independent labels. I've been a jazz singer, a jingle singer, toured with big bands and became a pop artist, and I've performed at festivals across the US, europe and Asia. These days, I focus on writing with and developing young talent. In the coming weeks, I'll be pulling back the curtain on the music industry's female changemakers. Some are close friends, others I'm just getting to know, but all have reshaped the business in profound ways. My goal here is to help listeners better understand how the music business really works and just how instrumental women behind the scenes have been. You'll hear from both sides of the desk artists, producers, managers, label executives, lawyers. Women making things happen, often without the spotlight on them. Thank you for joining me on this journey.

Speaker 2 1:42

Now let's dive in. Today we're talking to someone who's truly a powerhouse in the music industry, my dear friend Samantha Cox, vice President of Creative New York at BMI. Sam is one of the most supportive, knowledgeable and genuinely generous people I've met in the business. A few years ago I made the decision to leave ASCAP an amazing organization in its own right but I moved over to BMI because I wanted to work more closely with Sam. That's how impactful she is. The care, insight and advocacy she gives to organizations, artists and songwriters is unmatched. What's even more impressive is how she manages to accomplish so much. She's only one person, but somehow it feels like there's five of her.

Speaker 2 2:26

If you're not familiar with BMI, don't worry, sam's going to break it all down in this episode. In short, bmi is what's known as a PRO, a performance rights organization. They play a critical role in making sure that songwriters, composers and music publishers get paid when their music is played publicly. So if you're an up-and-coming artist, a seasoned songwriter or just curious about the business side of music, this is an episode you don't want to miss. Welcome, sam Cox. I'm trying to think of how long I've known you, and maybe we shouldn't say, but it's been a while. I've known you through you know different offices and many artists that I've worked with and many artists you've introduced me to, and it's a pleasure to have you on. I just want to talk a little bit about your journey and what inspired you to pursue a career in the music industry, and how did you come to find your current role.

Speaker 3 3:16

Thank you so much, sarah. I love what you're doing here. It's been great to know you all these years. It's been incredible working with you.

Speaker 3 3:22

Yeah, let me tell you a little bit about how I got started in the music industry. You know, I think, like many people, they always wonder how do you get into the music industry? I think it's like you sort of feel like it's this closed door and to this day I feel so lucky. You know, and of course you have to put yourself in the right place at the right time, and I sort of felt like all that happened for me. But essentially I grew up in a very small town, a little itty bitty town called Belleville, texas, and I had about 300 people in my high school.

Speaker 3 3:56

And when I graduated from high school in 1988, I thought it was going to go to college and be a teacher. My mom was a teacher. I knew I always loved music, but I just thought I'm never going to get a job in the music industry. How am I going to do that in Texas? There's nothing here. And so I went off to college and I met my roommate and my roommate happened to love music as much as I did, and she was from San Antonio, texas, from a bigger, bigger city. Her parents were both, you know, entrepreneurial. The first thing she asked me she was like, why would you be a teacher if you love music so much? And I said, because where am I going to get a job? How am I going to do that? I don't know enough about it.

Speaker 3 4:41

And her friends at the time, actually in San Antonio, played in a band and they were a band called Pariah. They were signed to Geffen Records and I was like, are you kidding me? Your friends are in a band. That's crazy, right? And so we would start to go see shows together. We became really good friends and, fast forward, she convinced me to change my major, and back then there weren't music business programs like there are now. So I thought, what am I going to change my major to? But I did.

Speaker 3 5:13

I changed it to communications and then I minored in business and in the communications track at the school I was going to, you could choose between radio, advertising or journalism. And I was like, well, I'm not going to do journalism. And I thought, well, I'm not going to do advertising, Maybe I'll do radio. Well then, when I found out I had to be on air. I was like no way not doing that and so I ended up doing advertising and I interned at an advertising agency in Texas, in Austin, texas, called GSDNM, and then from there I interned at a radio station, which was the most fun I've ever had. Everyone there was so incredibly nice and I learned so much of both my internships. Right, but also I lived in Austin and every year, as most people know that work in the music industry.

Speaker 3 6:12

There's a big music conference called South by Southwest and so every year I would attend South by Southwest and one year I happened to meet a bunch of New Yorkers and they were like come hang out with us. You know there was, they were throwing a party, there was, there was a show out on the street that year with Iggy Pop and Joan Osborne and we all just became friends and they were so nice. They convinced me to come to New York City for the summer stay and they started introducing me to everyone in New York city. And that's literally how I ended up in New York city. I think my mom was completely shocked. She always thought I would live in Texas and all of a sudden the small town girl is like moving to New York city. And luckily I was like young and naive and I was like, yeah, let's do it.

Speaker 3 7:02

And I just I just went, you know, and at that point they had introduced me to a few people. But one of them they introduced me to still very, very, very good friends with is Jeff Cohen, and Jeff Cohen at the time worked at BMI in the creative department Actually they called it writer, publisher relations back then and I I went in and I met him and I remember before I, before I went in, I was like I got out my all you need to know about the music business book and started reading everything I could find out about BMI, because at the time I was like what is BMI? And I did as much research as I could and I went in and I interviewed with Jeff and he couldn't have been nicer. And at that point he says you know, I love you, but we literally just hired someone and I said, well, I will, I'll do anything. You know, can I come in? Can I intern? And again, back then times were completely different. He was like, yes, you can come in, you can intern. And I literally just started coming in five days a week and no HR. No, none of those things. And I just came in and what was great yeah, what was great is that the new girl that he had just hired was brand new too, so we literally became really good friends. We helped each other out, and she's gone on to do amazing things.

Speaker 3 8:18

Her name was Brooke Premont, and you know, we're we're friends to this day and same with Jeff Cohen, and as I was in interning, though, he introduced me to one of his good friends at Polygram at the time, and I, of course, went for the, the interview, like immediately. I remember, like memorizing the entire timeline of Polygram. I read every book, everything I could get my hands on, about Polygram, and I go to this interview, and at the end of the day, they called me back and said, hey, you, you have the job if you want it. And I thought, oh my gosh, I didn't, wasn't expecting that, right. And.

Speaker 3 8:54

But at the same time, there was a position at BMI in the performing rights department, and the guy who was looking for looking to hire at that time had come to me and said, hey, do you want to apply for this position in this department? And I had interviewed for it as well. And he called me and said you have the job if you want it. And so all of a sudden, you had these two job opportunities and was like I didn't know what to do. But my gut told me to go with BMI. And one of the reasons why is everyone at BMI was generally so incredibly nice. And two, I thought I was going to learn a lot at BMI. I thought I was going to be able to grow at BMI. And don't get me wrong, Polygram was great and it seemed it was so appealing because the job at BMI was behind the scenes. It wasn't a creative role, but there was something in my gut that told me to do BMI, and it's to this day.

Speaker 3 9:54

I do not regret it and a lot of times when I give advice, I always tell people as long as you've done your research and you've looked into all your options, your gut in the long run is going to tell you what to do. And that's exactly what I did in this situation. And you've been there ever since. Really, I've been there ever since and that's impressive.

Speaker 3 10:13

Yeah, which is sort of crazy because, as you know, in this music industry that just doesn't happen. You bounce from place to place to place, and not because someone's not good at what they do. It's just that the business changes. Things shift. You get new people, new presidents come in, things change and BMI has always been consistent. It's been a consistent place and we generally get to help people and for me, that's what I love doing and so even though I've had yeah, I've had chances to go other places throughout my career, but I've always decided to stay and I and I think I've made the right decision. So I'm so happy to be here and I know that's not really a quick way to explain how I got into the music industry.

Understanding BMI's Role

Speaker 2 11:02

No, it's very interesting. I never knew any of this and I know you've talked a couple of times about you know why BMI appealed to you so much. Those people listening who might not be familiar with how BMI works and its role in the music industry maybe you could tell us a little bit about how it supports songwriters.

Speaker 3 11:19

So essentially, bmi is a performing rights organization and we ensure that songwriters get paid when their songs are performed publicly so, for example, like on radio, dsps, retail stores, bars and restaurants, venues, et cetera. So we're the ones that license those publicly performed businesses. We take in the money and then the money that we bring in we distribute back out to the songwriters that we represent. So this is one of the main places that a songwriter is going to get paid and that's important in this day and age.

The Lady Gaga Success Story

Speaker 2 12:02

So you've worked with so many fantastic artists. I mean, the roster that BMI has is incredible and you've been there for a while so you've really had so many artists pass through. Can you share a memorable success story and also part two of the question can you tell us a little bit about how you kind of look for that special something, that X factor, and how you know someone has that potential?

Speaker 3 12:26

You know, there's so many incredible stories. I've worked with so many incredible songwriters and artists throughout my career. I feel so lucky to have come, just be in the presence of so many, so many, so many talented people. But I have to say maybe one that really stands out is Stephanie Germanotta. I happened to meet her probably. I think she was probably about 17.

Speaker 3 12:49

A good friend of mine at the time was working at the Songwriters Hall of Fame and he called me up and he said there's this, there's this girl you have to meet. You know, she's absolutely incredible. And she came into the office, played a few songs on piano and I fell in love instantly. I was like who is this? This is incredible. And a lot of people thought I was crazy at the time. They thought I don't get this, I don't understand. And I was like I absolutely love this, I want to do whatever I can to help. And we built a relationship, stephanie and I, and I remember the first time she came to me and said hey, I think I'm going to change my name. I'm going to change it to Lady Gaga. I was like I love it, absolutely love it. And to Lady Gaga, I was like I love it, absolutely love it, and we did a lot of things together.

Speaker 3 13:42

The highlight for me, and I think the most fun story to tell, is when she played our Lollapalooza stage in 2006.

Speaker 3 13:46

And when no one knew who she was, and I just remember the music came on and people just started swarming our stage and going who is this?

Speaker 3 13:58

And I remember standing next to Vincent Herbert, who had just signed her, was in the process of signing her, and both of us looking at each other and going she is going to be massive, a global superstar, no doubt in our mind. Massive, a global superstar, no doubt in our mind. And what's really crazy is that I think it was like two years later she was headlining Lollapalooza. And not only did she headline Lollapalooza, she came back to the BMI stage that same year and got on stage with Semi-Precious Weapons and stage dived off the stage and we have the most amazing shot of it. And so for me, those are just like it's just an incredible moment, a success story of someone that I was able to meet early on in my career, someone who's just so gifted, talented, kind, thoughtful, appreciative, and just for her to come back to the stage and do that at the height of her career was insane and I was literally like in complete shock, complete shock.

Speaker 2 15:05

I mean, that was someone you recognized your talent early on and you saw her early on.

Speaker 3 15:09

Yeah, Absolutely, like, 100%. What I loved about Stephanie, and what I still love about her to this day, is that she was creative in every aspect. You know, she wrote incredible songs, she designed her own clothes and she understood choreography. She was just creative all around. She knew what she wanted. She was determined to succeed.

Speaker 3 15:36

Her passion, her drive every bit of it was there right, every single bit of it. She was determined, born this way, right, right, I mean yes, absolutely. She was born that way, 100%. And in fact, I give her as an example a lot of times. When to answer your question about how do you, what do you look for in talent, and I say the work ethic and number one thing, I mean yes, talent is, of course, you know, very, very, very important, but I can tell you I'd rather take someone that still needs a little time to grow, but I know that they have that drive and the passion and the work ethic to just get better. You know, and they learn every single day and I'll bet on someone like that any day, all the time.

Speaker 2 16:24

And I remember she especially remembered you for all of your support too. You told me something about that.

Speaker 3 16:29

Billboard Women in Music had just it just started. I think it was like maybe the second year they were doing these awards, right Go Board Women in Music Awards. I forgot what year it was, but she was being honored along with Beyonce and she had. I hadn't seen her like in a year. She had been on the road touring, and so I was so excited to see her right, and it was just sort of like she had gone from like playing her stage at Lollapalooza to just like blowing up Right, and which I knew she would. And so as soon as I got there, of course, I went and found her and I said hi to her and her parents and give her a big hug, and it was just so nice to see her.

Speaker 3 17:07

And then I stopped back down at my table and the awards happened and she got up there and talked about her career and thanked so many people that helped her throughout her career and ended up thanking me as well, and, to be honest, it was like I was so shocked I did not know what to do. It was like I was famous for 10 minutes in the room and everyone just turned their head and I said, wow, this was. This is what it must be like to be famous right For at least 10 minutes. It was really unbelievable and to this day I don't think she knows how that sort of changed my career trajectory so much and how people looked at me completely differently after that.

Speaker 2 17:48

Well, it sounded like she did more than thank you. She really made a big statement about how important you were in her career.

Speaker 3 17:54

She did, she did and it was one of those moments that I will never forget it and, and literally I, sometimes I'm, I just I'm like still blown away by it and every day I I do believe she changed the trajectory of my career, Much deserved. If you're listening, Gaga, thank you Great.

Speaker 2 18:18

Well, that's fantastic. I know that you and I have talked about this, the importance of collaboration, because we know artists that like to write by themselves. We know artists that never like to write by themselves. But how important do you think collaboration is in songwriting, and how does BMI foster opportunities for them to connect?

Collaboration in Songwriting

Speaker 3 18:36

A lot of people can write songs on their own, and I think they can be great at writing songs on their own. But what I will say is when you collaborate, there's more opportunity. As a young songwriter, you know, I meet sitting in the position that I sit in at BMI. I tend to meet people very early on in the career, I mean the first starting. They don't have a lot of connections, and so we at BMI and myself, we tend to be the conduit for connections right into the music industry and you can write a song by yourself, which is great, but when you collaborate with other people, you're giving yourself more opportunity to reach more people, which is why I always encourage collaboration, one of the main reasons. The other reason is because you may learn something that you never thought of before, right, and maybe you don't like the song you wrote at that moment with that person, but maybe you learned something in that songwriting session that you take into a new session, right. So there's a lot of great reasons for collaborating, but those are two of my most favorite.

Speaker 3 19:39

And really it's like when you write with, say, three or four people, maybe you're not published yet, but the other two people are published and they're going and playing the song that the three of you wrote to their publisher and the publisher's going wait, who did you co-write that with? Oh wait, I don't know that person. I need to meet that person. So it's like this natural way of meeting publishers or meeting people in the industry without having it be forced. You know, if your name starts to come up in more conversations, everyone starts to go wait, who is that person? It's basically networking is what it is at the end of the day. So I think it's so important to have an open mind, as hard as it is as a creative, to collaborate. Sometimes collaborating can really change your career and move you in a direction that you could never imagine. You know where it can take you.

Speaker 2 20:35

And also there's four people in the room. If you don't want to release the song, maybe somebody else who's in the room wants to release the song.

Speaker 3 20:40

Absolutely. There was a time when I'd hoped to cut a songwriting session up. I won't name names right, but it was a really good session. A couple of writers that were still, you know, on the rise. They hadn't had major things happen yet, but they were all really, really talented. Things were happening. People wanted to work with them. They came out writing an incredible song.

Speaker 3 21:06

It was supposed to be for this artist that was in the room and the artist was so excited about it and loved it. But then the producer who was on the song had played it for a friend of his at a label and the guy at the label said oh my gosh, this would be amazing for this artist that I have. And it was a big artist, a very big artist. And the young, up-and-coming artist that had written the. And it was a big artist, a very big artist, and the young, up and coming artist that had written a song that was so excited to release it was so disappointed, right, Like, very disappointed. Like this was her song. She was so excited, it was gonna be a great song for her to release.

Speaker 3 21:42

But at the end of the day, the bigger artists released it and it changed the younger artist's career. It really spawned her career at that point and changed the whole direction of her career and she has become a huge artist since then. So again, being open-minded, as hard as it might be, and knowing sort of where you are in your career and knowing what kind of leverage you have I always say leverage is the name of the game and knowing when to just sort of fight your battles and when to sort of go okay, let's, let's go ahead and and and try this thing and see what happens, right, see where it leads.

Speaker 2 22:20

We've got a Benson Boone or someone like that who wants to do your song. Go, let it go, let him do it. Yeah, actually, if, if I could ask you it's just off the top of your head can you mention a few names of people who've passed through your office and you've watched develop, other than Lady Gaga?

Speaker 3 22:35

Kesha, to Halsey, to ex-ambassadors, to oh my gosh, I feel bad because I know I'm leaving so many people out. Like when you just think about those are all artists, but but songwriters, when I think about songwriters, I think about you know, I was just at our BMI pop awards in Los Angeles and, um, seeing Jesse Fink win an award this year for stargazing blew my mind, because I've known him for a very long time when he was at Penn and he had his band Hay Days. Hay Days at the time had signed to Universal and he had his band Hay Days. Hay Days at the time had signed to Universal. The band sort of split and broke up, but then he continued to write and he just had, you know, one of the biggest songs of last year and and then we also honored him with a number one award, come along with another BMI songwriter, peter Finn, who I absolutely love and endure as well. Just a great moment to see someone that you've known for so long really just rise to the top.

Speaker 2 23:43

I wonder if you could I know we've talked a little bit about this but maybe offer some advice to aspiring songwriters practical steps. I know we talked about collaboration, how to protect their work, how to avoid common mistakes. Is there anything that comes to mind?

Speaker 3 23:57

Sure, yeah, going back just on the collaborating part a little bit, one of the things that BMI does is and this really goes to answer your question right now too is we do something called speed dating for songwriters. It's exactly what it sounds like. We take four top liners, four producers and four artists and we really curate these right and work with my team here in New York. And we don't just do it here in New York, we do it in our other offices as well. What we do is we bring we bring those 12 people together. What we hope at the end of the day is they become friends, they build community, they grow together in the industry and that they find collaborators that they can work with throughout their career. Yeah, it's just a great place. Again, it goes back to like at BMI, we're here to help the young, new songwriter, right, and that's just one of the ways we do it.

Advice for Aspiring Songwriters

Speaker 3 24:53

I think about, you know, when Andrew Seltzer met Maggie Rogers in Speed Dating and they I think her third single that came out was something that they had written together in Speed Dating right, and so there's people that have become partners together, like production duos together, right, and gone on to do great things. So it's just a great way again to network, meet the right people in the music industry and use BMI as your support system. Right, that's what we're here for, so that's just one way. So, basically, registering with your PRO and getting to know the creative people on your team at your PRO I would know the creative people on your team at your PRO, I would say.

Speaker 3 25:31

The MLC is another great place Sound exchange, you know, those are all things that you need to do as a beginning songwriter to make sure that you get paid. I always tell people if they want to. Those are like ways to protect their works. But another way to protect anything you do is just just don't sign anything, not until you actually talk to someone that that either works in the business or you find an attorney to talk to. I would say if someone really wants to work with you, they're going to be fine with you speaking to an attorney or speaking to someone like myself or or others that work in the music industry, so that you can get advice, and solid advice and good information before you sign anything with anyone whatsoever.

Speaker 2 26:14

If someone says you don't need a lawyer, don't work with that person.

Speaker 3 26:20

Absolutely. And again, that just goes back to sort of what we do in the creative department at BMI. I feel like I should expand upon that A lot of times. I like to say I have five jobs and one of them is I feel like I'm an A&R executive at a label, in the sense of, you know, being in the studio, discovering new music, going out and seeing new live music. I feel like I'm a publisher a lot of times because I'm hooking up co-writes and connecting songwriters and producers and artists together on a regular basis.

Speaker 3 26:54

A lot of times I feel like I'm a manager and you know a lot of songwriters and producers. They don't have managers, right, and artists don't have managers either when they're when they're first starting off. So we become sort of like a safe place for songwriters to to come, get, get information and advice to help them, you know, point them in the right direction, so that they don't, you know, get into situations which I'm sure you hear about a lot, like someone will come in and they'll be like, oh, I signed this deal with someone and I'm like, well, who did you? Who, who allowed you to sign that? And they're like, oh, I just signed it. And I'm like, well, I look and I'm like, oh my gosh, we can help you navigate a lot of this Right. And so when I say I feel like I'm a manager, what I really mean is we're like advisors. You know, maybe someone approached you and you're not sure if they're a legitimate person. Nine times out of 10, we'll know. You know, we'll know if that's a legitimate person.

Speaker 3 28:08

If it's not, um, we can help you do your research. Um, we can, we can help introduce you to attorneys, we can help introduce you to managers and, you know, really just help put your team together, frankly, um, help create opportunities for you. You know, we have, um, our indie page, where we feature new artists. We have our music Monday playlist, where we feature new artists. We have our indie page, where we feature new artists. We have our Music Monday playlist, where we feature new artists. We have we'll do Instagram takeovers. We have our stages, which I alluded to earlier, like at Lollapalooza and Austin City Limits. We have we do things at South by Southwest.

Speaker 2 28:40

And also the artist showcases which you're having, one tonight which I'm going to go to?

Speaker 3 28:44

Yes, we are. We do something called the Acoustic Lounge. We do that on a monthly basis where we have it's sort of like a storytelling acoustic night, sort of like Bluebird Cafe style, very Nashville, where we have two writers perform in a round and talk about their songs and then they play their songs. So it's always a great night of music, and so we do all those types of things here, and so from that A&R publicity, I guess moving on.

Speaker 3 29:18

So there's A&R there's publishing, there's management.

Speaker 3 29:21

I feel like we are event planners, and that goes back to some of the things I was just touching on, from our showcases to our services, like our new Music Monday playlist, our acoustic lounge.

Speaker 3 29:34

So the big thing is, I feel like we are administrative and education executives, and what I mean by that is, from an administrative standpoint, we want to make sure that a writer gets signed up with BMI, they get their publishing company set up, they get their works registered, they're signed up for BMI Live All of these really, really important things. Because if those things don't get done, you're not that, you get paid, you're performing rights, royalties and your songs are played on radio, tv, dsps and live performances. So we want to help you get all that set up and explain to you what it all means as well. Right, and so we also speak on panels a lot, we speak at conferences, we educate the community at large about what we do at BMI. So that's, believe it or not, a quick way to explain what we do. It's amazing. That's the way I sort of like to explain it.

Speaker 2 30:35

I, like you, have five jobs. This is why we want to business people in the world. It's amazing what you guys do. You're incredibly helpful and always a resource. I mean whenever possible, when you have the time, I love sitting down with you and getting some ideas about what I'm working on and who I'm working with, and you've always got so many suggestions and ideas of who I should talk to or whatever, and it's an incredible resource. You are an incredible resource.

Speaker 3 31:03

We love doing it. It's so much fun because when you make those connections and then you see people go on to succeed in those connections, it's, it's rewarding, right, and it's sort of what keeps you going and and it makes you go. Okay, we are, we are valuable and we do, we do provide a service and so so thank you for that.

Speaker 2 31:24

Yes, I I'm, you know, always impressed with what you do. I just wonder if there's anything that I missed asking you, anything you wanted to mention. There's so much to cover. Yeah, I mean there's?

BMI's Creative Department Services

Speaker 3 31:33

oh gosh, there is. I think we have probably talked for another hour. If you let me right, I guess what I might mention is recently we launched this new program called the Spark Program and it's designed to help music creators really thrive throughout every stage of their career. That's where we offer exclusive deals and special discounts on different types of things, like in career development, lifestyle and wellbeing and education, things like that. So there's discounts for, like, band lab or Berkeley online or co-signed or disco just makers on the website. It had to be in my website, okay, yeah, on disco, disc makers and that's on the website. You had the BMI website. Yeah, on our website, right, and I'm just excited about it because we just launched it. Really, it's something that I've wanted us to do for a long time and we have finally been able to do it and it's really exciting for me to talk about.

Speaker 2 32:22

I'll try to put it in a link at the bottom of the interview.

Speaker 3 32:26

Yeah, absolutely, we can definitely do that. I'll get that link for you and I'll send it over. Yeah, I would say that's probably it, and I just want to really maybe just give some inspiring advice to songwriters is just to never give up, because this industry is ever changing and if someone tells you no, that person that tells you no could be out of a job tomorrow and they'll be a new person in that position. So to just just keep going and remember that we do this for the love of music and that's really, yeah, what inspires me, what inspires, I think, all of us, and why we're all here. And so, if you ever get down or you're feeling like you're uninspired, go listen to your favorite album, go see a show. I mean, that's, that's really what excites me and keeps me going.

Speaker 2 33:10

That's great, Wonderful advice, so wonderful to have you, Sam. I I'm looking forward to listening to this back and and seeing you tonight at the showcase at the Acoustic Mound.

Speaker 3 33:21

It's going to be a fun night of great music and it's at Pete's Candy Store tonight. We moved to a new venue because, sadly, Rockwood Music Hall closed down very, very sadly. But we've been doing Pete's Candy Store, which has been very kind to us, and this is the I think the third time we're doing it there. So it's going to be a great night of music. So if you hear this, come, come join us.

Speaker 2 33:43

I look forward to it. Thank you so much, sam. She creates noise. I'd like to thank today's sponsor, heard City, the premier audio post-production company servicing the advertising, motion picture and television industries right here in NYC. I'd also like to thank Antello, aka XON, for singing the she Creates Noise theme that I wrote Thanks for listening to. She Creates Noise. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe, rate and share. I want to thank the team here Blair Reinle, jelena Stavanovic, emily Wilson and the Master of Engineering and Grammy-winning Cooper Anderson. We'll see you next time.

Speaker 1 34:22

She creates noise. She creates noise. We hear her voice she creates noise. We hear her voice she creates noise. She creates noise. She creates noise. We hear her voice, she creates noise.