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MMF doubles membership in two years

By Andy Malt | Published on Friday 2 July 2021

The Music Managers Forum in the UK has announced that it has almost doubled its membership over the last two years, going from under 700 in 2019 to more than 1200 today.

At the organisation’s Annual General Meeting yesterday, CEO Annabella Coldrick put the rapid increase in members down to various outreach and development programmes, as well as the organisation’s emergency funding scheme for artist managers during the pandemic.

“It’s been a ludicrously tough twelve months and throughout the MMF has rallied to support the management community with initiatives like ReBuild, Unite and Accelerator, extensive virtual learning sessions, and tireless campaigning and advocacy work”, said Coldrick.

“I’ve no doubt it’s why we’ve seen such a huge and rapid increase in our membership”, she goes on. “Music management can be an isolating and highly pressurised way of making a living, and I’m proud of the way the MMF continues to be an organisation where knowledge is shared and everyone is welcome”.

The boost in membership numbers has also resulted in an improvement in diversity, with 38% of members now female or non-binary, and 29% from black, Asian or other ethnic minority backgrounds.

As part of the AGM, four new members were elected to the MMF board. Big Drum Entertainment’s Adenike Durosaro, Whole Entertainment’s Ross Patel, This Much Talent’s Sandy Dworniak and William Orbit manager Karl Nielson will serve for three years on that committee.

They replace Everybody’s Adam Tudhope, Red Light’s Lisa Ward, ATC’s Ric Salmon and Iluvlive’s Rachael Bee. Vice-Chair, Ferocious Talent’s Kwame Kwaten, was also re-elected.