Concord Announces Inaugural Members Of Its Advisory Board

Nashville, TN -  Nov 20, 2024

CONCORD is excited to announce the formation of its new Advisory Board, an extraordinary group of accomplished executives that will provide input on the company’s strategic direction and innovation efforts to the benefit of its artists, team members, and investors. The Concord Advisory Board will comprise distinguished business leaders and entrepreneurs from art, science, and commerce, each of whom will bring a wealth of knowledge and experience to their new relationship with Concord.

Inaugural Members of the Concord Advisory Board:

• Greg Ballard: Greg has served as CEO for Glu Mobile (which he led to its IPO), SONICblue, MyFamily.com/Ancestry.com, and 3Dfx Interactive (which he led to its IPO). He is also a General Partner with Eleven Ventures, a seed venture fund. Previously, Greg was CEO and COO for Warner Custom Music and SVP of Social, Mobile, and Emerging Platforms at Warner Bros. In addition to his role on the Concord Advisory Board, he is a consultant and advisor to several companies.
• Liat Ben-Zur: Liat has over 25 years of experience catalyzing digital transformation and leading turnarounds at industry titans, including Microsoft, Philips, and Qualcomm. Liat brings her AI, product, and growth expertise to help companies scale. An ardent DEI advocate, Liat has driven notable cultural shifts at Microsoft and Philips, emphasizing diversity, equity, and inclusion to amplify underrepresented voices. Today, she serves as a Non-Executive Director for Talkspace, Compass Group PLC, and Splashtop, sitting on Audit, Corporate Responsibility, and Nomination and Remuneration Committees.
• Janicza Bravo: Janicza Bravo is a writer and director based in Los Angeles. She received her training in theatre at NYU. She has mounted plays in the states and abroad. Her film work has screened at AFI, BAM, Carnegie Hall, SXSW, Sundance, and Tribeca. Her short film Gregory Go Boom won the Jury Prize for US Fiction at Sundance. Bravo’s feature film debut Lemon premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and was distributed by Magnolia Pictures. Variety named her a director to watch in 2020. Her second feature, Zola, premiered in competition at Sundance and was distributed by A24 domestically and Sony International. Her latest project, The Listeners is a miniseries made in partnership with BBC which will be released globally in 2024/2025.
• Darien Dash: Dash’s career spans music, technology, finance, and culture. He is a seasoned business leader and advisor, known for his roles as a public company CEO and strategic advisor to U.S. Presidents and Congressional Black Caucus on technology initiatives. In 1991 he co-founded DASH Entertainment, the venture that would evolve into Roc-A-Fella Records, one of the most iconic labels in hip-hop history. From 2019-2023 he served as CFO and Global Head of Corporate Strategy for QC Media Holdings where he played a pivotal role in the $320M dollar sale of QC to HYBE. Currently Dash co-manages a roster of high-profile artists such as SAINt JHN with his long-time business partner, Roc-A-Fella records co-founder Kareem Biggs Burke and serves as the Chairman and Chief Investment Officer of The Guyana - Vision 2030 fund, a multi-sector Critical Infrastructure fund focused on the financing of Public Private Partnerships in the world’s fastest-growing economy.
• Marc Geiger: Marc is an American music executive and entrepreneur who has been consistently recognized for his ability to forecast trends in the music industry. Early in his career, he was a co-creator of the Lollapalooza Festival and EVP of A&R, Marketing, and New Media for Rick Rubin’s American Recordings. He then co-founded ARTISTDirect in 1996 on the premise that “the internet was going to radically reshape the music business.” In 2020, after 17 years at William Morris Agency/WME, part of which he spent as head of the music division, Marc founded SAVELIVE, an initiative to offset the economic impact of the Coronavirus pandemic on live music venues.
• Nick Grouf: Nick is an American entrepreneur, investor, and philanthropist. Described as a "pioneer of the Web 1.0 generation," he is the co-founder and managing director of Alpha Edison, a venture capital fund, and the founder of Clementine Capital, LLC, a technology-focused incubator. Nick co-founded Firefly, an outgrowth of the RINGO project at the MIT Media Lab. Firefly invented collaborative filtering and developed the first online collaborative recommendation software and helped to define online privacy standards as a contributor to the Platform for Privacy Preferences. He later co-founded PeoplePC, Spot Runner, and Pluto TV, which was sold to Viacom in 2019.
• TJ Haynes-Morgan: TJ is the Chief Audit Executive for Raymond James Financial, Inc., responsible for the Internal Audit department and the independent assessment of governance, risk management, and various controls across the firm. With over twenty years of experience in global financial services covering banking, consumer finance, internal audit, and compliance risk management, TJ joined Raymond James in 2018 as the Senior Vice President of Compliance Assurance. Before June 2018, she was Citigroup's Head of Compliance Risk Assessment & Analytics.
• Scott Pascucci: Scott is a member of Concord's Board of Directors and Chairman of its Advisory Board. He was the Chief Executive Officer of Concord from 2015-2023 and its Managing Director from 2013-2015. He currently serves as the Executive Chairman of Morrison Hotel Gallery. Before Concord, Scott was President and COO of Exclusive Releasing and President of Rhino Entertainment, a division of Warner Music Group. Also, he served as Co-Chairman of Frank Sinatra Enterprises. Scott is a GRAMMY® Award-winning producer for The Beatles: Eight Days a Week (2016).
• Jim Weber: Jim joined Brooks Running Company as CEO in 2001 and, for over 23 years, has been credited for the Seattle-based company’s aggressive turnaround story, focusing the team solely on delivering personally inspiring performance products as a standalone Berkshire Hathaway-owned company. Jim previously worked in the branded consumer products industry as Chairman and CEO of Sims Sports, President of O’Brien International, Vice President of The Coleman Company, and in various roles with The Pillsbury Company. His book, Running with Purpose: How Brooks Outpaced Goliath Competitors to Lead the Pack, was published in 2022.
• Tom Whalley: Tom started his career in the mail room at Warner Bros. Records in 1979, ascended into the A&R department, and returned 30 years later as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. After his initial time at Warner Bros. Records, Tom was Head of A&R at Capitol in the mid 80’s and then moved to be one of the co-founders of Interscope Records in 1990. Tom helped build Interscope to become one of the most successful independent startups in the history of the music industry. Tom returned to Warner Bros. Records as Chairman and CEO in 2001 where his creative approach led the company to a decade of success. After leaving Warner Bros. Records, Tom founded Loma Vista Recordings in 2012, a venture with Universal Music Group’s Lucian Grainge and Republic Records before taking the label to Concord in 2014. Shortly after bringing LV to Concord, Whalley agreed to lead Concord’s Label Group as Chief Label Officer, a position he maintained until 2023. Throughout his illustrious career, Tom’s commitment to creativity ensured worldwide success for many international artists.
• Jake Wisely: Jake is a co-founder and equity partner of Concord. He is a non-voting Director of Concord’s Board of Directors. He was Chief Publishing Executive at Concord from 2015 to 2020, having served as President of one of its predecessor companies, Bicycle Music, from 2006. As Chief Publishing Executive, he was responsible for all aspects of Concord Music Publishing, and from 2017 to 2019, those aspects of Concord Theatricals, including the creative operations, business affairs, licensing, and administration of Concord’s iconic catalog and roster. Jake retired from the day-to-day management of Concord Music Publishing in 2020.

“I am excited to welcome this amazing cohort of exceptional people and we are honored that they have chosen to be a part of Concord’s first Advisory Board,” said Scott Pascucci, Concord Board Member and Chairman of the Concord Advisory Board. “Every business wrestles with foreseen and unforeseen issues that can potentially affect its business or the industry in which it operates. The Concord Board of Directors is confident that this talented group will be an invaluable resource to the Company -- act as a sounding board for ideas, a conduit to networks of interesting people, and providing fresh perspectives that will help Concord to innovate and grow.”

“Over the past decade, we at Concord have significantly grown in our catalog, frontline roster, headcount, and overall scale. We have truly established our position as the world’s leading independent music company. As Concord continues on this trajectory and the music industry's ecosystem grows increasingly complex, having an advisory board of this caliber with such far-reaching expertise will be especially advantageous. I am delighted to have this group on the Concord team,” stated Concord CEO Bob Valentine.

Concord's Board of Directors was advised in the formation of its Advisory Board by global executive search and leadership development firm Boyden, led by David Archambault (Managing Partner Global Media, Gaming & Consumer Electronics Practice) and Gwen Sabo (Partner.)

About CONCORD

CONCORD is the world’s leading independent music company. The Company supports more than 125,000 artists and songwriters whose works are licensed, marketed, and performed globally. Concord's growing catalog of 1.3 million songs, compositions, sound recordings, films, plays, and musicals is one of the most impactful and culturally relevant collections of creative rights in history.

Concord is headquartered in Nashville with additional offices in Los Angeles, New York, London, Berlin, Melbourne, and Miami.

Original Source: Concord News