MIDEM: Cannes At Its Best

MIDEM director of music markets Bruno Crolot announced the move by saying “a June date is when Cannes is at its best.” Simon Gillham, a Vivendi vice president of communications, whose company has had closer links with MIDEM over the last four years, said; “If we can do this in the kind of atmosphere that Cannes offers in June – all the better.”

Europe’s mushrooming music showcase conferences have put the squeeze on MIDEM, where courting the live side of the business and then the technical side have done little to halt the steadily falling delegate numbers. When it started nearly 50 years ago, it was a magnet for publishers, musicians, producers, managers, lawyers, and various music biz executives, who could all peddle their wares to each other – but now the downside is that ultimately the end-user will likely steal them.

A half-century later MIDEM has shrunk as the recorded music and publishing businesses have shrunk. Crolot says staging MIDEM in the summer will enable it to put on more live acts outdoors, while making another attempt to connect with the live side of the business.

This year MIDEM attracted 6,140 delegates, 7 percent down on the previous year and nearly 25 percent down on the 8,000 it was doing five years ago, but Crolot believes the numbers will now stabilise.

“I think we will do 6,200 or 6,300,” he told Pollstar, pointing out that’s a personal target he’s set for himself. At the end of September MIDEM announced that Danae Ringelmann, co-founder and chief development officer of crowdfunding platform Indiegogo, will be the first keynote speaker.

Other speakers and panel subjects will be announced in the coming weeks. MIDEM 2015 will run June 5-8.