a2 media studies - institution research

InstitutionMarket share

EMI (9.62%)

Associatedlabels

Blue Note Label GroupCapitol Music GroupCaroline DistributionEMI Christian GroupVirgin Music Group

Type of record label

Major label (Big 4)

Integration Ownership:Parent companies:

- Citigroup- Terra Firma Capital Partners- Time Warner- Thorn EMI

History of institution

1897 - Ernie Berliner formed: The Gramophone Company in London. Taking the lead in collaborating new sound recording hardware and musicians. 1926 - The Gramophone Company released its first million selling soundtrack. 1930 - The Gramophone Company undergoed a steady incline in business succession, until the Great Depression become apparent; sales of records declined by over 80%. 1931 - The Gramophone Company and The Columbia Gramophone Company become a merged company, known to be EMI, in response to The Gramophone Company's decline. 1963 - British pop music grew suddenly, EMI had a succession of music releases of 15 out of the 19 number one singles in that year. 1980’s - the record industry undergoed a significant sales decline, encouraging newer genres to emerge. In which, EMI signed one of the first heavy metal bands (iron maiden); being noticed in the music charts. 1983 - EMI released their first recordings on the CD format; which accounted for most of the albums sold by EMI before 1990. 1992 - EMI bought Virgin Music Group; at the time was the largest independent music company. 1996 - EMI persisted to grow and include companies and entrepreneurs into the the group business. EMI further purchased 50% of the Jobete music publishing catalogue; EMI purchased the other 50% between the years 2003-2004. 2007 - EMI was possessed by Terra Firma company. After financial difficulties, Citigroup sold the company and its groups. Universal bought EMI worldwide, Warner music bought EMI records as a result of forced-sale due to the european parliamentary legislators decision to sell the United Kingdom based company. Furthermore, EMI Music Publishing was possessed by Sony Music.

Genre basis Various genres


SONY BMG(29.29%) (SME)

Associatedlabels

Columbia RecordsEpic RecordsRCA RecordsKemosabe RecordsSony Music NashvilleProvident Music GroupRCA InspirationSONY MasterworksLegacy RecordingsRED DistributionCentury Media Records

Type of record label Major label (Big 4)(Ceased 01/10/08)


- Sony corporation (50%)- Bertelsmann (50%)

History of institution 1929 - American Record Corporation was branded as the new founding company to be, SONY BMG. 1938 - The company was renamed to Columbia Recording Corporation. 1996 - Columbia Recording Corporation was realigned to be CBS Records. 1987 - Sony Corporation bought the company; later rebranding the company to the name of Sony Music Entertainment in 1991. 2004 - Sony Music Entertainment and Bertelsmann Music Group undergoed a merge in business, becoming Sony BMG Music Entertainment. 2008 - Sony bought BMG’s share in the company, and reverted back to the name of Sony Music Entertainment; BMG relaunched as BMG Rights Management.



Universal Music Group (29.85%)

Associatedlabels

Interscope-Geffen-A&MCapitol Music GroupRepublic RecordsDef Jam recordingsCaroline RecordsUniversal Music Group NashvilleUniversal Music Latin EntertainmentThe Verve Label GroupUniversal Music EnterprisesEagle Rock EntertainmentUniversal Music UK

Type of record label Major label (Big 4)

Integration Ownership:Parent company:

- Vivendi

History of institution 1934 - Universal Music was associated with Universal Pictures, the film studio. 1996 - MCA Music Entertainment Group was renamed to Universal Music Group. 1998 - The current organisation (Universal Music Group) was founded due to it’s parent company, Seagram, purchasing PolyGram. 1999 - PolyGram and Universal Music Group merged together. 2004 - Universal Studios become possessed by General Electric and merged with GE’s NBC; Universal Music Group become under separate management due to the newer possession. 2006 - Vivendi (French media conglomerate) owned the Universal Music Group Label, completely. 2011 - Announcements were made of EMI to sell it’s recorded music operations to Universal Music Group for a sum of £1.2 Billion; EMI’s music publishing operations were announced to be sold to a sony-leading association for a sum of £2.2 Billion also. 2012 - Universal Music Group completed their possession of EMI. Universal Music and Hewlett-Packard launched a marketing operation: customers could access music from exclusive content and Universal artists (with a HP connected Music computer). 2014 - Universal Music announced their separation between Island Def Jam Music (one of four operational umbrella groups within Universal Music).



Warner Music Group (19.13%)

Associatedlabels

Atlantic Records GroupWarner Bros. RecordsParlophone Label GroupRhino EntertainmentWarner Music NashvilleWarner Classics

Type of record label Major label (Big 4)


- Warner Bros. Records- Warner Bros. Seven Arts- Kinney National Company- Time Warner- Access Industries

History of institution 1958 - Warner Music Group was founded, with the founding name: Warner Bros. Records. 1967 - Seven Arts Productions took possession of Warner Bros., Atlantic Records, Warner Music Group’s oldest label and its subsidiary: Atco Records. 1969 - Warner Bros. - Seven Arts as a company, was sold to Kinney National Company for a sum of $400 Million. 1970’s - Kinney Group become the commanding company in the music industry; 1970, Kinney bought Elektra Records and its sister label: Nonesuch Records for $10 million. 1972 - The Warner Group gained possession of David Geffen’s Asylum Records for the sum of $7 Million. Warner also paid Geffen and Roberts (as part of the Geffen-Roberts management company) 121,952 common shares with a value of $4,700,000, $400,000 cash and additionally $1.6 Million in promissory notes (convertible to common stock). Within six months after the possession of Asylum Records, Warner's shares declined from $4.5 Million to $800,000. 1976 - Warner purchased the Atari computing company; gaining a somewhat lead in digital media, with the additional acquiring of The Franklin Mint company. 1989 - Announcements were made, Warner Communications was to merge with Time Incorporations, founding Time Warner; completed within 1990. 1990’s - Time Warner become the largest media company worldwide. Possessing assets beyond $20 Billion; annual revenues by billions of dollars also. 1991 - Warner’s labels were generating sales beyond $3 Billion, with operating profits of $550 Million. Furthermore, WEA was renamed to Warner Music Group. 1995 - Warner’s music division dominated the United States of America’s music industry; including a 22% share of the domestic market. 2000 - Time Warner merged with AOL (America's leading ISP), founding AOL Time Warner. Whom tried to acquire the conglomerate EMI, but failed to do so. 2003 - Time Warner departed from AOL due to its decline in profits and stock value; caused by the dot-com crash. 2004 - Time Warner sold Warner Music Group to a group of investors for the sum of $2.6 Billion. 2007 - Warner announced that it would sell digital music without Digital Rights Management through AmazonMP3. 2009 - Warner Music took possession of its south-east Asian and Korean distributions of EMi audio and video products. 2010 - Warner formed a partnership with MTV networks allowing MTVN to sell ads on Warner Music Group's premium content, on an exclusive basis; meaning views of Warner Music Group with be accounted for views on MTVN. 2011 - Warner Music Group announced its sale to Access Industries (a conglomerate controlled by Len Blavatnik) for a sum of $3.3 Billion. 2012 - Google made an announcement of Warner Music’s portfolio, being added to Google Play Music offerings. 2013 - Warner Music Group ended its possession of Parlophone Label Group; Warner Music later announced that it would provide distribution Disney Music Group in Russia and the CIS.


Copyright policies

Copyright defines to be: “The exclusive and assignable legal right, given to the originator for a fixed number of years, to print, publish, perform, film, or record literary, artistic, or musical material.” - Oxford Dictionary. In consideration of my music video production, I will be required to obtain permissions from the publishing body of the content that I intend to use; where if permission is granted, I am obliged to use their content for explanatory purposes(such as educational advancement etc).

Established record labels in relation to my music video production

In relation to my institutional research, I have discovered that mainstream music institutions such as Warner Music Group operate with artists that produce songs within many genres. However, to the current day, artists affiliated with these institutions are dominantly producers of music of the genres: hip hop, R&B and pop. Nevertheless, most hip hop music videos are performance or narrative structured. In consideration of abstract, narrative and performance structures, I have come to the decision of implementing abstract and narrative elements into my production, however will be predominantly performance based. In which, such diversity of structure would potentially attract a larger audience span to my production.

In consideration of these music genres being the dominant genres, hip hop will be my focus of music video production. Hip hop is a rapidly developing music genre, in which targets the youth age groups. As a hip hop music video production, would have a larger potential audience in comparison to productions of other genres. As a potential target audience being teenagers and young adolescence, can use various means of marketing such as advertising within social media platforms; people of such age groups vastly interact with social networking, meaning there would be a large potential audience. Moreover, institutional research has enabled me to obtain an understanding of copyright-protected content and it’s usage. Whereby, in consideration of my own production, I would have to obtain permissions from the publishing record label to be able to use copyright-protected content legally. For the usage of the content, I would be expected to credit the artist and publishing record label in some manner.

a2 media studies - institution research

Education