Jody Gerson
Co-President
Sony/ATV Music Publishing
Twitter: @SonyATVMusicPub
POWER MOVE: Signing A$AP Rocky, Azealia Banks and fun. members Jack Antonoff and Andrew Dost.
THE RUNDOWN: Last year’s biggest success and greatest challenge for Jody Gerson was Sony/ATV’s acquisition of EMI Music Publishing—the latter a company the Los Angeles-based executive spent 17 years helping build before joining Sony/ATV in 2008. Boosted by its administration of EMI’s songs, Sony/ATV became the top-ranked publisher in Billboard’s most recent Publishers Quarterly, boasting a 25.7% share.
“This is a transformative moment for Sony/ATV,” she says. “We went from being a small, yet mighty, global company to the world’s largest music publisher. The challenge was not getting so caught up in the workload of integrating the company, and not forgetting about why I get to do what I do: identify, sign and work with talent.”
Gerson credits a “quickly combined and cohesive team” for closing deals with emerging new talents like A$AP Rocky, Azealia Banks, Clams Casino, Mikky Ekko and fun. members Jack Antonoff and Andrew Dost, as well as nurturing superstar acts Lady Gaga, Enrique Iglesias, Jeff Bhasker and Pharrell Williams.
Defining power as “having the confidence to surround oneself with a strong team of people who achieve success together,” Gerson is incredibly optimistic about the future. “Music is licensed more than ever before, and it continues to define people’s lives,” she says. “This year, I intend to branch out and expand my relationships above and beyond the usual business. There are many new ways to discover and hear music . . . and I want to be on that music publishing forefront.”
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Jody Gerson photo by Joseph Llanes