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Lords of the ILMC
by Manfred Tari - edited by Allan McGowan

In a retrospective view the ILMC 16, it is quite funny that the Crossing borders panel revealed something that is typical for the ILMC. The panel was chaired by Marc Lambelet from Black Lamb Productions and Chrissie Uerlings from Peter Rieger Konzertagentur. In particular Lambelet referred to some developments in Europe that show that the supremacy of the Anglo American music business is diminishing. While discussing the relevance of local talents in domestic markets, Tobbe Lorentz of The Agency Group Denmark, mentioned that he sees an increase of international agencies across Europe. It appears that agencies that are not based in the UK or the US are now getting a piece of the international booking cake. Certainly big profits are still gained by American and English repertoire, but the market share of European talent is growing. Some of the ILMC heavyweights were probably in the bar or elsewhere when Peter Smidt of Conamus received appreciation from Brian Nielsen of
Skandinavian for his work with ETEP, Eurosonic and the Noorderslag Seminar. Nielsen booked 4 artists at this year’s Noorderslag/Eurosonic Seminar and told the audience that he had been very satisfied with the results that came out of this showcase. Bernhard
Batzen of Azimuth Productions and Claudio Trotta of Barley Arts also both acclaimed the relevance of the projects. The expression “crossing borders” is a term that works especially well within the frame work of ETEP. It was Batzen who first used this title for showcases at Midem when he used to be the artistic director for the music convention in the mid nineties. But when Harvey Goldsmith as one of the ultimate Lords of the ILMC said during the ILMC XVI Autopsy that there are no political or official measures for music in Europe at all, he revealed that he has no clue about what already goes on in Europe on this level. Lambelet responded to this statement and advised him regarding the activities of The Network Europe of which he is a board member and also told him about the European Music Office (EMO) in Brussels. The upper house of the ILMC still represents the British live music business and the fact that Jean Francois Michel, Secretary General of the EMO, had been at the ILMC XV seemed to be almost forgotten.

The Crossing Borders panel began with answering the question stated in the ILMC Globetrotters guide: “Is there a lack of attention to secondary markets by major international artists and is this opening up the market for national acts?” But almost unexpectedly it also revealed that there are more continental European talents that cross borders in Europe in terms of record and ticket sales. Maybe the more appropriate question should have been “Are major international artists suffering from a lack of demand in secondary markets”. A panel heading such as this would have probably resulted more heavy weights attending the panel rather than disappearing to the bar.

Some of the Lords of the ILMC are getting older and losing the overview of the intricate developments that are currently taking place. It is still very interesting to listen to the outspoken ILMC-Elite, but it is occasionally a little reminiscent of major record company executives when they heard about of the existence of the MP3 audio format 7 years ago. It is the secondary markets and smaller and mid-sized companies that move things more quickly these days, not dramatically but slowly and surely. Therefore the complete answers to the questions raised during the Crossing Borders panel might be given at the ILMC XXVI.

However, the ILMC is a high quality conference that has an impact on the delegates. The ILMC organizers do well in terms of the choreography of the conference. Even if some issues on the conference agenda are in a repeating loop, curious delegates are provided with the opportunity to hear about new developments in the live music business and to learn something from the expertise made public by the Lords of the ILMC as long as they listen carefully.