Australia’s music publishing sector has a new indie player.
Less than three years after opening for business Down Under, Cooking Vinyl Australia, the Australasian division of Martin Goldschmidt’s Cooking Vinyl Group, is launching a music publishing division.
Matthew Donlevy will oversee Cooking Vinyl Publishing Australia, and is tasked with signing and nurturing songwriters from Australia and New Zealand for development both domestically and abroad.
Donlevy, formerly managing director at Peermusic and a longtime AMCOS board member, is based in Sydney and will report to Goldschmidt, founder and CEO of Cooking Vinyl Group.
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“This is an amazing opportunity and with the support and infrastructure of an international music company behind me I can’t wait to start signing some amazing songwriters,” comments Donlevy on the new publishing arm.
Cooking Vinyl initially expanded into Australia with the launch of a company in late 2013, helmed in Melbourne by two former Shock Records executives, Leigh Gruppetta and Stu Harvey (the company also provides project management services to third party labels). The global rollout didn’t stop there. Earlier this month, the group, which is based in London and has arms in France and Germany, announced the expansion of its U.S. operations with the opening of a full service label division in New York City.
Cooking Vinyl, adds Donlevy, has an “exceptional roster of acts both locally and internationally and with Cooking Vinyl Australia enjoying major hits recently including a No. 1 album with Parkway Drive and a top five album from City and Colour it’s time to augment that success with a strong music publishing division.”
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Goldschmidt describes Donlevy as “the perfect person to develop and build our Australian music publishing company, which will complement the fantastic work that already been achieved by the label.”
The development comes on the heels of BMG’s launch in Australia, with an affiliate headed up in Sydney by former Universal Music Publishing Australia exec Heath Johns.