UNIFIED Music Group are proud to announce the winners of The UNIFIED Grant 2017. Established by UNIFIED Music Group Founder and CEO Jaddan Comerford, this week The UNIFIED Grant awarded twenty-five thousand dollars to five creatives to help them realise their dreams behind the scenes in the music industry.
Born out of the idea that everyone starts somewhere – including UNIFIED Music Group which started in a bedroom with nothing and has grown into a global full-service music company specialising in all aspects of an artist’s career – the idea behind The UNIFIED Grant is to nurture the next generation of creatives who want to work in the music industry. The UNIFIED Grant was launched in 2016, and in its second year received over 200 inspiring applications from all around the world. The winners were selected by a dedicated panel.
The 2017 recipients of The UNIFIED Grant awarded $5000 each to put towards their goals are:
- Jessica Hope – Don’t Fret Club: Don’t Fret Club is a podcast and positive mental health initiative helping music fans to talk about mental health. Don’t Fret Club work with a range of likeminded organisations to facilitate conversation around mental illness. Each podcast features interviews with artists about anxiety, depression and addiction in the hope of breaking the stigma and encouraging positive and empowering conversation.
- Brenton Tuohey – www.mediaaccreditation.com.au: The Media Accreditation platform is an automated list management system for publicists/managers, publications and their contributors. Created with the goal of simplifying the current application process, publicists/management can upload their artists’ tour dates into the platform and media can apply directly with all the information required: publication and social stats, as well as examples of previous work to ensure the best media outlets cover the event.
- James Morris – Baked Goods: Baked Goods is a media company bringing audiences the best of Australian music. Baked Goods strives to provide quality content as well as a media platform for working Australian artists to promote their work. Initially starting with interviews and live performances, the company has now expanded to all media forms in order to help artists further push their work.
- Pixie Weyland – FEED MUSIC: FEED MUSIC is a not-for-profit project that enables touring artists and bands to use their location to pinpoint cafés and restaurants where they can eat and drink at for free, promoting better mental wellbeing. The idea was born when Weyland opened a small café in Brisbane and used it as a platform to support touring musicians by providing free food to make their lives on the road a little bit easier.
- Andrew Brassington – Boys Don’t Cry: Boys Don’t Cry a Newcastle-based, all ages music collective. Run by Brassington, who is just 17 years old, the collective regularly puts on alcohol-free, all ages events, proving music to young people while also giving local bands the opportunity to play on a real stage. Boys Don’t Cry also has a management arm and a record label, releasing music for the bands within the collective.
The UNIFIED Grant 2017 winners left to right: James Morris, Andrew Brassington, Pixie Weyland, Brenton Tuohey, Jessica Hope.
The UNIFIED Grant will be open for applications once again in September 2018 to all original ideas behind the scenes of the music industry: photographers, producers, videographers, web developers, graphic designers, journalists, app builders, data analysts and all the other disciplines that haven’t yet come into focus.