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HMV PR chief moves to BPI

By | Published on Wednesday 29 May 2013

BPI

More HMV, and the retail firm’s long-time communications chief, Gennaro Castaldo, is moving to take the main comms role at record industry trade body the BPI, where he will replace incumbent Adam Liversage, who is departing the organisation on 14 Jun.

Castaldo has worked for HMV for 27 years, and enjoyed a higher profile than your average corporate PR as the go-to man for the newspapers for commentary on chart positions and record sales. Though in more recent years he was mainly responding to journalist emails along the lines of “so, when is your company going to hit the wall?” with the stock reply “Oh we’re fine, we’re selling iPads now, don’t you know”. Until HMV inevitably hit the wall in January, that is.

Though having tackled all those challenges of communicating for an HMV very much on the brink in recent years, while sitting on that vast knowledge of the charts, record sales and other such industry stats after nearly three decades with the big music retailer, Castaldo seems like just the main to take on the challenge of communicating for the record industry at large.

Confirming the appointment, BPI boss Geoff Taylor told CMU: “We are delighted that Gennaro is joining us at BPI. His long experience working with the music industry, his focus on consumers and his strong relationships with the press will be key assets as we represent our members’ views across a range of media. Meanwhile, we are grateful to Adam for his commitment over the last four years and we wish him every success in his future endeavours”.

Castaldo added: “I’m really looking forward to this exciting new challenge – working with Geoff and his team, [BPI Chair] Tony Wadsworth and, of course, the BPI members to communicate the exciting developments taking place in our industry during this dynamic time of change. I can’t leave HMV without saying what a privilege it’s been for me to have worked there and particularly with so many wonderful colleagues and associates past and present, who I will always think of with great affection. I will look to bring the same passion and commitment to my new role and build on the strong foundation of media engagement that is already in place”.



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