Music Industry Moves: Recording Academy Adds Yola, Jimmie Allen, Others to Black Music Collective Council; WMG Taps Tracie Parry as Senior VP

The Recording Academy‘s Black Music Collective (BMC) has added new members to its honorary chairs and leadership council. Together, the group is committed to the “inclusion, recognition and advancement of Black music and its creators and professionals within the Recording Academy and music industry at-large,” according to the BMC.

Yolanda Adams, Valeisha Butterfield Jones, Ethiopia Habtemariam and Yvette Noel-Schure will be joining returning honorary chairs Jeff Harleston, Jimmy Jam, Quincy Jones, and John Legend. New on the leadership council are Prince Charles Alexander, Jimmie Allen, Denzel Baptiste and David Biral (Take a Daytrip), Jennifer Goicoechea, Mickey Guyton, Claudine Joseph, Ledisi, Herb Trawick, Ebonie Ward and Yola.

“The Black Music Collective has remained steadfast in its mission to advance Black music since its founding in 2020. We are thrilled to have inaugural members of the BMC returning and honored to have an esteemed community of new industry leaders joining us to accelerate progress,” said Harvey Mason Jr., CEO of the Recording Academy. “Black music is an integral part of all music, and we are committed to the long-term work required to drive real and measurable change.”

New and returning leaders will work with the Academy’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion team and BMC leads Ryan Butler and Ricky Lyon. Rico Love, the vice chair for the Recording Academy’s board of trustees, serves as the new BMC Chair.

+ Warner Music Group’s global catalog division has named Tracie Parry as its new senior VP, head of business and legal affairs. In her new role, she will report to Kevin Gore, president of the global catalog, recorded music division. 

Parry will continue to be based in Nashville, where she was most recently senior VP/head of U.S. legal shared services for WMG’s Center Of Excellence. Parry will also bring several members of her current legal team to the global catalog division along with her expanded duties, including VP of legal affairs Jeff Allen. 

Parry will run the legal and business affairs department and oversee all U.S. catalog artist and production deals, catalog acquisitions, joint ventures, and all licenses and trademarks, as well as catalog deals in the emerging Web3 space. 

+ Abby Harari, who formerly worked publicity at Def Jam, has transitioned to a new role as a publicist for Nettwerk Music Group. In her new role, Harari will be working closely with the roster’s indie/alternative talent, in addition to its pop artists and singer-songwriters. Nettwerk’s roster includes Passenger, Neil Francis, MallRat, SeaFret and more.

Claire Julian, director of publicity at Nettwerk, said: “Abby is a dynamic and driven publicist and a true music fan, and we are so happy to have her join our growing team here at Nettwerk.”

+ Troy Carter and Suzy Ryoo’s Venice Music Collective, a distribution and artist-support platform, has officially launched its new consumer-accessible subscription services.

Venice will transition from NFT-gated, membership-only access to a subscription-based platform, with three different tiers available: essential plans (starting at $60 annually), professional plans ($500 annual) and premium plans (invite-only).