The UK government’s Department for International Trade (DIT) has teamed up with Distiller Music Group in association with Ostereo, Arista Media Nashville, and Accidental Ent. LA, to facilitate a virtual songwriting camp this week.
The invite-only week of sessions has seen 80 songwriters from the UK and US writing to specific briefs received from music supervisors around the world on behalf of Netflix, CBS and others.
Working with different partners each day, these songwriters are composing in real time with two other people via a series of virtual songwriting rooms.
Operations are being coordinated by a specialist production team based at Distiller Music Group’s The Distillery studios based in Bath, England.
At the end of each day the results of each sessions are sent back to the studio where they are mixed ready to be pitched to music supervisors.
All songs written are being split equally between the number of writers in the room (unless otherwise agreed on the day). Split sheets are being signed and collected each day digitally and distributed to each writer/publisher/management involved.
This virtual camp has brought together songwriters from Los Angeles, Nashville, Miami and London.
“In these difficult times for the songwriting community we are really pleased to be able to team up with the Department for International Trade and Ostero along with our other partners to facilitate these collaborations.”
John Thompson, Distiller
The DIT teams in the UK and US , alongside its partners, have sourced both the writers taking part and the individual briefs. As a result of the pandemic these are happening virtually but under normal circumstances this would have been the 4th year holding the event in in Los Angeles and the 6th year in Nashville.
Notable successes from previous DIT songwriting camps include placements in the Oscar-winning movie, The Shape of Water, as well as other Hollywood productions.
John Thompson, CEO of Distiller Music Group said, “In these difficult times for the songwriting community we are really pleased to be able to team up with the Department for International Trade and Ostero along with our other partners to facilitate these collaborations. We have so many talented people taking part and an amazing range of briefs; this is a really positive initiative that will hopefully result in some amazing music.”
“We are proud to support these talented songwriters in developing their craft and building international relationships.”
Emily Cloke, British Consul General in Los Angeles
John Saunderson, Head of Ostereo Publishing & Management said, “I am delighted to be a part of this superb world-wide virtual writing camp with our friends at Department for International Trade, Distiller Music Group and our global partners.
“It’s amazing to see these great writers/producers embrace the diversity of this camp. They are working on major and independent artist briefs alongside song searches for Japanese/Korean bands. We also have some incredible sync briefs and some of the writers are coming right out of their comfort zones, but as I always say whether it’s Indie, R&B, Country, Pop or D&B… a good song is a good song!”
Emily Cloke, the British Consul General in Los Angeles said, “This songwriting camp shows the strong relationship between the US and UK in the music industry. We are proud to support these talented songwriters in developing their craft and building international relationships.”
Distiller Music Group has interests across a number of industry sectors including Distiller Records, Distiller Publishing and Distiller Live.Music Business Worldwide
