Institutional Research

In the music industry, institutions are record labels. A music label is the brand that is associated with the marketing of the artist, their records and the artist's music videos. it is usually the company that co-ordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, promotion and then enforcing the copyright of all that belongs to the artist and its label. A record label is also one that scouts new artists and develops them into something that they believe will produce them revenue. Furthermore, a record label will also maintain contracts with their artists and their managers.

There are many record labels that are around today, like film institutions there are major record labels and minor labels, here are a few:

The EMI Group is a British music company and it is the forth largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry. The company was formed in 193

1 and opened the famous recording

studio Abbey Road in London. During the 1930's and 40's it's artists that were signed included Edward Elgar and Otto Klemperer, and in this period George Martin was appointed and one of its A&R managers who later brought The Beatles into EMI. When EMI was managed by Sir Joseph Lockwood in the late 50's to early 70's it mainly consisted of signing artists of the 'Popular Music' field. The artists that were signed to EMI were also signed to its subsidiary labels, which were, at that time Parlaphone and HMV and Capitol Records, which then at that time made EMI the most known and successful in the World.

It also signed artists of the pop/rock sub genre including artists like The Beach Boys, Pink Floyd and The Beatles. HMV was then converted by EMI to an exclusive classical label in 1967. Nowadays artists like Katy Perry, Radiohead, Corinne Bailey Rae, Professor Green, The White Stripes and Gorillaz are signed to EMI and

their sub labels, give the variety of music taste and produce a large amount of income through their various genres.

Universal Music Group is the largest group of records in the recording labels, being the largest of the 'big four' record companies in the World due to its market shares and global operations. Before 1996, it was known as MCA Records and it was once attached to film studio Universal Pictures and in 1998 it was merged with PolyGram when its parent group brought the label. Universal Music Group has many subsidiary labels including Def Jam Music Group, Polydor Records and Mercury Music Group, and artists Annie Lennox, Mariah Carey, N-Dubz, The Wanted, Colbie Calliat, Avril Lavigne, Coldplay and Bob Sinclar.

Sony Music is the second largest global recorded music company of the 'big four' record labels. Sony Music was founded in 1929 as the ARC through the merging of several smaller record labels. Then, in 1938 ARC was brought by the Columbia Broadcasting System, and through various merging, eventually, on January 1, 1991 Sony Music Entertainment was born and further more 13 years later Sony entered a joint venture with Bertelsmann Music Group, 'BMG', then becoming known as Sony BMG. However, in 2008 Sony then acquired back it's 50% share and went back to Sony Music Entertainment. There are many standalone operating divisions of Sony Music Entertainment, and a few of these are Columbia/ Epic Label Group, Sony Masterworks and Syco Music. Signed to it's label of sony music are artists such as Alicia Keys, Anastacia, Beyonce, Britney Spears, Calvin Harris, Dido, John Legend, Leona Lewis, Natasha Bedingfield, Pink and Susan Boyle, showing the huge variety of artists that it takes on board, increasing their income through the large amount of genres.

Warner Music Group is the third largest business group/record labels in the recording industry. It began as Warner Music Group as it is today in 2004 when it was 'spun off' from Time Warner and it now as nothing to do with it, even though it still has the name. During the 1970's, Warner had a very powerful position within the music industry, having leading Rock acts like The Doors, Tim Buckley and Love. At that same time Warner's subsidiary record labels signed artists such as Ray Charles, The Drifters, The Coasters and also had signed many Soul artists such as Aretha Franklin, Ben E. King, Wilson Pickett and Otis Redding. Furthermore Warner also signed major British and American acts, particularly of the rock genre, including Led Zeplin, Cream, The Faces, Bette Midler and Average White Band. Warner continued to sign bands such wise, and one of their wisest investments was Fleetwood Mac, and they also had signed The Rolling Stones. Nowadays, such artists as Gnarls Barkley, B.O.B., Micheal Buble, Gym Class Heroes, JLS, The Kinks, Madonna, Muse and Paramore are signed to Warner Music Group, again like the other three major record labels increasing their revenue due to the vast array of artists that they have signed.

After looking at each of the Record Institutions it has been decided that our artist shall be signed to a subsidiary label, and this shall be Columbia Records, which of course is a subsidiary label of Sony BMG. This being due to the artists that are signed to Columbia Records firstly, and secondly artists that too are signed to Sony BMG. Artists like Adele are a perfect example, she fits the bill of Blue Eyed Soul perfectly. Previous artists, although they are not Blue Eyed Soul artists they are still legends of Soul, like Ray Charles. The fact that Columbia Records is a subsidiary of the second largest Record Institution in the World means that they have the support for out artist and she shall get all the support that she needs, and being that they have had the history of such Soul artists means that they know what they are dealing with.

Music Channels


4Music is a music and entertainment channel that is available in the U.K. It is branded under Channel 4, however it is within the Box Television Network. 4Music replaced The Hits and is available on freeview and also on terrestrial television. 4Music broadcasts 24 hours a day. 4Music doesn't consists of just showing music 24 hours a day, it also screens entertainment programmes, such as Balls Of Steel, Shipwrecked, The Simple Life and Trigger Happy T.V., indicating that its target audience is possibly young adults. 4Music also shows concerts of the likes of Kylie Minogue and has coverage of festivals during the summer.







VIVA is a free to air 24 hour music channel, very much like 4Music. It not only shows music but entertainment programmes too, and originally before it became VIVA on U.K. television on the 26th October 2009 it was know as TMF. VIVA was acquired by MTV and is now operated under it. VIVA plays up-to-date-songs and shows programmes like 'MADE', 'The Hills' and 'My Super Sweet 16' indicating its target age of teenagers.



MTV is an America network based in New York that was launched

1981. Originally the purpose of the MTV was to play music videos that were guided by on-air hosts. In the past MTV has had a huge impact on the music industry and popular culture as it was. As soon as slogans were thought of, the concept that MTV brought to our screens what we know of music television today. MTV has several sister channels in the U.S., however they are still viewable in the U.K. by terrestrial television. MTV operates a group of channels that are under the name of MTV Networks. These are VH1, formed in 1985, and it was initially designed to play adult comtempary music videos, whereas nowadays it is now aimed towards celebrity and popular culture programming. There are several other channels within the MTV chain, and these be MTV Charts, which show all the songs that are in the charts. MTV Base focus' on more of a Urban genre of music, whereas MTV Dance show dance hits. MTV Rocks are aimed more towards the Rock Genre, and MTV Hits shows the songs that are hits right at that moment in time.

It has been chosen that we will promote our artist on 4Music. This is due to many facts that seem to outweigh both channels, but in particular MTV. Even though MTV is a well established name in the world of music, people have to pay to watch it, and the fact being that we will gain a larger audience with a channel that people don't have to pay for, promoting our artist better as more people will tune in. The reason as to why we chose 4Music over VIVA was because of the audience that 4Music draws in. It draws in a much mature audience that is still young compared to VIVA, that is the type of audience that we want as our artist is getting promoted to the younger generation, however it cannot be too young a generation, hence picking 4Music over VIVA.