Photo by Brad Ardley, of/de Thompson Egbo-Egbo

Video première – SOCAN: For the Record

Story by Howard Druckman | Tuesday May 21st, 2019

SOCAN has released SOCAN: For the Record, a new video that illustrates how our members create music, their careers in action, and how we collect and distribute their royalties.

First launched in March at the 2019 JUNO Gala Dinner & Awards presented by SOCAN, the two-minute story-in-motion is now available for all to enjoy.

SOCAN: For the Record follows several SOCAN members as they write, record, and launch their music, which makes its way around the world, with SOCAN tracking, collecting, and returning their well-earned royalties.

The video stars SOCAN members Sydanie, Command Sisters, Thompson Egbo-Egbo, Dr. Draw, and Steph Copeland, creating and capturing their music, hitting the Send or Enter key to release or upload it, then follows various paths the music takes, along with royalty-collecting statistics, in an animated sequence.

We hope you enjoy SOCAN: For the Record!

SOCAN mourns the loss of member composer Derek Holman

Story by Howard Druckman | Thursday May 23rd, 2019

SOCAN member composer Derek Holman – also an organist, choirmaster, professor, animal lover, and Member of the Order of Canada – died in Ottawa on May 20, 2019, at the age of 88.

Holman was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 2002 for his services to music, and received an honourary Doctor of Sacred Letters degree from Trinity College at the University of Toronto. He also won two National Choral Awards from the Association of Canadian Choral Conductors, for Night Music (1988), written for the Toronto Mendelssohn Youth Choir, and Sir Christëmas (1990), written for the Canadian Children’s Opera Chorus.

His compositions include commissioned works for the National Arts Centre Orchestra, the Ontario Choral Federation, the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir, the Canadian Brass, and the Canadian Children’s Opera Company (then Chorus). Holman collaborated with iconic Canadian author Robertson Davies on the children’s opera Doctor Canon’s Cure and the oratorio Jezebel. He was an associate of the Canadian Music Centre and a member of the Canadian League of Composers.

Born in Cornwall, England, in 1931, Holman earned a Doctorate in Music from the University of London and was a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music, the Royal School of Church Music, and the Royal College of Organists. In England, he held posts in various churches, including the Westminster Abbey Choir School and St Paul’s Cathedral.

Holman moved to Canada in 1965, working as choirmaster at Bishop Strachan School, and organist and choirmaster at Toronto’s Grace Church-on-the-Hill. He began teaching music at the University of Toronto in 1966 and served for almost 30 years in its Faculty of Music, in the Department of Theory and Composition. He directed the Concord Singers of Toronto and the Canadian Children’s Opera Company (then Chorus) and was the organist and choirmaster at Church of St Simon the Apostle. He was an inspiring mentor to countless young people in his church choirs, at the university, and in the chorus of the children’s opera.

Holman is survived by his wife Margaret Holman; children Susan, Nicholas and Judith (and her partner Peter); grandchildren Derek, Michael, and Riley; sister Pearl (and her partner John); and his extended family. SOCAN offers its condolences to his family and friends at this sad time.

A memorial service will be held in Toronto this fall to honour Dr. Holman’s musical legacy. In lieu of flowers, donations in his memory to the Toronto Humane Society are welcome.

Photo by Dave Chan/Ottawa Executive Portraits. Left to right/De gauche à droite : SOCAN's/Marc Ouellette and/et Eric Baptiste/de la SOCAN, The Honourabke/L'honorable Pablo Rodriguez, Brett Kissel.

SOCAN brings sweet music to Parliament Hill

Story by Howard Druckman | Thursday May 16th, 2019

Parliament Hill in Ottawa was rockin’ on the evening of May 14, 2019, as Minister of Canadian Heritage and Multiculturalism, the Honourable Pablo Rodriguez, and more than 300 Members of Parliament, Senators, and government staff, attended SOCAN’s fifth annual Parliamentary reception.

This year, the party was held at the Chateau Laurier hotel, because the usual location – the East Block Courtyard of The Senate – was closed for renovations. SOCAN’s event has become one of the most popular of the year on Parliament Hill, where federal officials learn more about SOCAN, enjoy drinks and passed appetizers, and listen to live and recorded music from our members.

This year Brett Kissel performed in person, representing our English-speaking community of music creators, while Les sœurs Boulay played on behalf of our Francophone membership. Each offered several songs, and talked about the need to keep copyright strong, and how crucial SOCAN is to their livelihood – and to those of our nearly 160,000 members.

Among the SOCAN representatives who met with decision-making officials – not only at the reception, but in several other sessions and meetings while in Ottawa – were SOCAN CEO Eric Baptiste; President and Chair of SOCAN’s Board of Directors Marc Ouellette; SOCAN executives Andrew Berthoff, Jennifer Brown, Geneviève Côté, Gilles Daigle, Jeff King, Andrea Kokonis, and Diane Petrucci; and SOCAN Board members Vivian Barclay, Patrick Curley, Damhnait Doyle, Ed Henderson, Past President Stan Meissner, Jennifer  Mitchell, Glenn Morley, Past President Earl Rosen, Diane Tell, and Denis Wolff.

The leaders of several Canadian music industry and rights organizations were in attendance as well, including representatives from the Screen Composers Guild of Canada, RE:SOUND, the Canadian Live Music Association, and the Canadian Private Copying Collective.

The event focused on the cultural and economic impact of SOCAN members in the domestic market, and provided SOCAN with an important forum to emphasize the value that our songwriters, composers, #ComposersWhoScore, and music publishers bring to the global economy as well. The reception also allowed us to present our policy positions in an informal setting, to a wide range of politicians, decision-makers, and their advisors.

“The world of music is changing with the arrival of new technologies,” said SOCAN CEO Eric Baptiste. “That’s why we look forward to the reports of the INDU and CHPC committees and we hope that there will be solutions put forward by the government to improve the conditions of creators. We are also following very closely the work of the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review panel…It is up to you, elected officials, political staff, and public servants, to make sure that we can still hum our home-grown melodies in the future. We count on you.”

SOCAN’s Board of Directors President and Chair Marc Ouellette said, “SOCAN is Canada’s largest music rights management organization with more than 160,000 songwriters, composers, music publishers, and now visual artists as our direct members…Our executive team is gender-balanced, and our Board of Directors is close to gender parity. We are proud of the fact that 60% of our staff and the majority of our new members are women.”

The Honourable Pablo Rodriguez; The Honourable Steven Blaney, Conservative Shadow Minister for Canadian Heritage; Pierre Nantel, NDP Critic Canadian Heritage; Andy Fillmore, Parliamentary Secretary  for the Minister of Canadian Heritage and Multiculturalism; and Senator Terry Mercer all spoke of the important work that SOCAN does.

SOCAN’s efforts to communicate with our federal government, and the three major political parties, continue to pay off for our members.