The Green Team: Music Sustainability Alliance Bringing Together The Music Industry For Climate Action

The past year saw dozens of concerts and festivals affected by severe weather, from shows interrupted by disasters including tornados to gigs such as Taylor Swift’s Nov. 18 “Eras Tour” performance in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, called off because of high temperatures as 2023 went down as the hottest year on record globally. It’s clear there’s no time to waste when it comes to combating the climate crisis and the Music Sustainability Alliance aims to help the industry do its part by bringing various sectors of the business together to learn, innovate and collaborate.

The Music Sustainability Alliance was co-founded in 2021 by Amy Morrison, who serves as president and board member of the nonprofit, and Board Member Michael Martin. Morrison spent more than 20 years at Concerts West/AEG Presents, serving as the SVP of Marketing and co-leading AEG’s Climate Positive Touring team. Martin, who produced the first-ever National Earth Day concerts, is the founder/CEO of reuse platform r.World and CEO/founder of boutique consultancy Effect Partners. The team also includes Director and Board Member Eleanor Anderson, Board Member Kurt Langer and Strategy Director and Industry Council Chair Joel Makower.

Though many artists and companies in the business have been striving to make the music industry as climate-friendly as possible, these efforts have often been siloed.

“So much good work was happening. And in the meantime, there were people starting from zero, reinventing the wheel and not having any knowledge [of[ what other people were doing. So that was really the simplest idea of how to get [the MSA] started,” Morrison says. “The driving force is to be this convener and sharing of resources and information and this place where people can learn — just to harness that power of community to move the industry toward sustainability and leverage its voice and platform for maximum societal benefit.”

On its website, the MSA offers resources including a list of actions you can take now to make tours and events more sustainable, as well as the Music Industry Resource Guide – an aggregation of tools, service providers, and vendors that support sustainability goals.
In February MSA put on the inaugural Music Sustainability Summit at The Novo in downtown Los Angeles. The event, which was hosted by the GreenBiz Chairman and co-founder Joel Makower, highlighted issues related to sustainability within the music industry with panel topics including artist activism, waste reduction strategies, transportation emissions, collaborative approaches towards sustainability and sustainable food practices.

The summit — which was sponsored by AEG, ASM, Circular Unity, Moxion, and Everywhere Apparel — drew attendees from all sectors of the industry including executives working at labels and production companies, as well as managers, agents, promoters, NGOs and artists. The panels also included insight from scientists and academics.

“One of the big takeaways for me was it was so clear that everyone wanted to be in community with each other … and that people do want to work together … and they see the common threads of [sustainability],” Morrison said.

To continue fostering community engagement, MSA will be opening sign-ups for “Working Groups,” in April as well as hosting monthly educational webinars starting in June.

As Morrison explains in her guest post the working groups will “bring together individuals across industry sectors to tackle overarching environmental challenges in the context of the music industry. Through collective expertise, the working groups deliver industry-reviewed and vetted recommendations that are measurable and can be implemented at scale.”

She adds that “through this collaborative model, the industry itself has an opportunity to use its clout and buying power to demand sustainability in supply chains and drive operational change.”

Co-founder Michael Martin adds that he’s encouraged by the response to the MSA.

“With almost 1,000 people in the music industry signing up to get involved with MSA, it is clear there is a strong need and desire for the industry to up its sustainability game and leverage the industry’s powerful communication platform for environmental impact,” Martin says.

Looking ahead, the MSA is focused on fundraising to keep its efforts going.
“Production vendors have been supportive as you can see on our website from our founding partners,” Morrison says of partners that include Clair, Nighthawk, PRG, REVERB, Rock-it Global, Rock Lititz, r.World, Solotech, TAIT, and Upstaging. “We want to broaden this outreach to the larger stakeholder groups including but not limited to promoters, venue management companies, artists, artist management, talent agencies, and labels. Also, companies with an environmental ethos like Patagonia, for example.”

She explains that funds will be used for MSA’s annual summit, program support (happy hours, webinars, working groups), resource guide, research, operations including salaries for staff, and marketing.