Thinking international means thinking future

Fernando Ladeiro-Marques, Director

Yesterday
Since its creation in 2010, MaMA has been open to the world, and has considered the international dimension an essential part of its project. Whether it's exhibiting artists or welcoming speakers to debates, fostering the exchange of expertise or opportunities for collaboration, identifying new emerging approaches or responding to technological challenges, the international aspect has always been a priority (last year, 6,830 professionals representing over 50 countries attended MaMA). Over the past few years, MaMA's international initiatives have been many and varied. With the "Avant-Garde" program, launched 9 years ago and enabling French artists to perform before an audience of mainly international professionals, the focus was on exports and support for French productions. The first French event to sign the Keychange charter in 2018 and to support parity in all areas, MaMA offers meetings with international artists and innovators every year. Last year, for the first time, MaMA hosted the "Music Moves Europe Awards" evening, organized with Reeperbahn and the European Commission, to promote and reward the best European artists.

Today
Earlier this year, alongside five European events (including Eurosonic and Reeperbahn), MaMA was behind the creation of the first Federation of Music Conventions (FoMC), announced in the Netherlands at Eurosonic. For the 2023 edition, a "Focus" is devoted to Canada, to better understand the specificities of this market, to meet its players, both French- and English-speaking, and to discover its new artists. In association with the Mancunian event "Un Convention", MaMA proposes a discussion around the Brexit and its impact in the UK, but also in Europe. Note that a few days later, this topic will be the subject of a second debate to be held in Manchester, during "Un-Convention". Other operations, carried out in collaboration with international partners, encourage the discovery and exploration of little-known markets such as Lebanon, Madagascar and Taiwan, helping to promote musical diversity and broaden musical horizons.

Tomorrow
With the extension of the Federation of Musical Conferences to defend common interests and promote ethical and responsible practices, with the export of the "Avant-Garde" project to other European events, with the ambition to develop new partnerships on transnational circuits, MaMA is committed to a resolutely international future. The future is an opportunity, but also an obligation. Peter Drucker (not to be confused with Michel), considered the inventor of modern management, said: "The best way to predict the future is to create it".

So let's set an example, let's be creative...

Fernando Ladeiro-Marques

Co-creator and director of MaMA Music & Convention, the international meeting place for music professionals in Paris, and communications director of Printemps de Bourges for many years, Fernando Ladeiro-Marques has a thorough grasp of current events and the specificities of the music world.

With Gato Loco Productions, a structure specialized in international exchanges of which he is the director, Fernando Ladeiro-Marques is behind numerous international events. As producer or co-producer, he is involved in the creation of festivals & conventions such as BAM (Barcelona), Rock Pop Festival (Bratislava), Europavox (Clermont-Ferrand), Green Energy (Dublin), Cosmopolis (Lisbon), EuroConnections (Prague, Budapest, Bratislava, Warsaw), Move (Prague), SIM (São Paulo), Dong Dong (Beijing) and MIL (Lisbon).

As a music specialist and connoisseur of international markets, he is regularly invited to speak at conferences in Vienna, Montreal, Tallinn, Warsaw, Lisbon, Zurich, Buenos-Aires, Barcelona, Budapest, Stockholm, Riga...

Over the years, Fernando Ladeiro-Marques has built up an international network of music professionals present in over 40 countries, from Montreal to Lisbon, Sào Paulo to Prague, Hamburg to Taipei, Tallinn to Amsterdam...

MaMa 2023. Looking ahead

Daniel Colling, General Manager

After two years following the COVID-19 pandemic, during which MaMA persevered while transforming itself, the 14th edition looks resolutely to the future. For this edition, new formats and a new structure! 

Our MaMA Great Debates are organized differently, with three major themes structuring the afternoons: Wednesday will be dedicated to Music & Image, Thursday to Music & Artificial Intelligence and Friday to Music & Decarbonation.

The inextricable link between music and image will also be one of the main themes of this year's convention, with both the Grands Thèmes and the traditional courses. Synchronization, hybridization of media in the music and audiovisual industry, and legal and financial issues are just some of the issues addressed by the MaMA Great Debates. As an example, we'll have the chance to welcome Nora Felder, music supervisor whose work on "Stranger Things" won her an Emmy Award in 2022, for a meeting and a SynchAudio listening session.

Other formats are also integrated into the MaMA Great Debates, such as the Conversation with where we welcome an industry professional to share his or her expertise and career development in an in-depth interview. Jean-Philippe Thiellay, President of the CNM, will do us the honor of joining us for one of these four Conversations . In the morning, the Grands Débats will address programmers' freedom of expression, the smac model and its future, as well as the Bargeton report and its follow-up.

In addition, last year we welcomed Orelsan, the artist of all records, for a Keynote. This year, we welcome the young and already great artist-composer Zaho de Sagazan for a conversation about her musical universe and her dazzling success.

The Trianon will once again be the venue dedicated to innovation at MaMA Invent, with numerous speakers and solutions on hand to discuss technological solutions and industry issues with professionals.  

Last but not least, this year's music festival, which will be held in 8 venues including two new ones (360 Music Factory & Le Centre Culturel Jacques Bravo) and will welcome 180 artists, will once again showcase the talents of tomorrow, both French and international. Emerging talent and diversity are the keystones of our program, which we hope will be both cutting-edge and open-minded.

Finally, with more than 170 conferences, over 400 speakers and nearly 2,600 organizations expected to attend this year's convention, we'd like to thank the industry professionals who have once again joined us for this ^14th edition.

We would also like to thank our public and private partners for their financial support, expertise and renewed confidence.

Let's look to the future together!

Daniel Colling

With a career spanning almost 50 years, Daniel COLLING is probably the entrepreneur in the world of popular music with the most accomplished and independent experience of all the trades in this sector, and the most proven knowledge of all the flows and issues that have shaped it, and continue to shape its contours and dynamics in 2017. His career path has taken him, simultaneously and/or successively:

• to develop the careers of a number of leading French artists
• to produce major Anglo-Saxon rock stars
• to create, produce, develop and establish one of our country's major festivals.
• play a leading role in the creation, development and evolution of institutions in the world of live performance music
• to be one of the main architects and architects of a network of major French concert halls, based on a model that is unique in the world. The exercise of drawing a chronological and exhaustive line from his CV, while it would enable us to take the measure of the ground he has covered (and, in so doing, the work he has accomplished), would not give us the material to understand the special place he occupies in this profession. As a result, the biographical framework below organizes the main stages of his career in four distinct fields,
  although they all form part of the popular music/musiques actuelles professional sector.

Show production
1970 to 1973: Production Manager (Productions Mazarine): Léo Ferré, Georges Moustaki,
Golden Gate Quartet and classical music (Marie-Claire Alain / Maurice André, Pierre Cochereau...)
1974 to 1976: Production Manager

Institutional life, general interest
1985: Initiator of the syndicat des producteurs de spectacles, now known as PRODISS
1985 to 2002: Founding member and Director of the Fonds de Soutien à la Chanson, la Variété et le Jazz.
2002 Appointed by Jacques Chirac (for 3 years, renewed in 2005) as President of the Centre national de la Chanson, de la Variété et du Jazz (CNV), the public institution that succeeded the Fonds de Soutien.
2009 to 2017: Creation with Fernando Ladeiro-Marques, production and management of Mama, the annual
international music industry trade fair, in Paris 18 . 8 editions to date.

Le Printemps de Bourges
1977 to 2015: Creation and production of 39 editions of Printemps de Bourges.
1989 to 2015: Creation and presidency of the "Réseau Printemps" association (identifying young artists nationwide under the label "Découvertes", then "Inouïs du Printemps de Bourges").
The Zénith adventure
1981 to 1984: Jack LANG's project manager for the large rock venue at La Villette, the future Zénith de Paris, inaugurated in 1984.
1984 to 2002: Creation and management, with Daniel Keravec, of Société Coker, responsible for programming shows and welcoming the public to the Zénith de Paris.
1987 to 1989: Support for the launch of the Montpellier Zenith
1985 to 2002: At the Fonds de Soutien à la Chanson, la Variété et le Jazz, administrator in charge of the national development of the Zenith program.
1992 to 1995: Assistance with the start-up of the Nancy Zenith.
2002 to 2019: Creation of the Société "Le Zénith de Paris", to operate the Paris Zenith. DSP contract renewed in 2011 for 8 years.
2006 to 2018: Inauguration in December 2006 and start of operation of the Nantes Métropole Zenith under a public service delegation contract with the Communauté Urbaine de Nantes Métropole.
DSP contract renewed in 2010 for 8 years.
2017 to 2026: Creation of Colling & Cie, the company chosen by the Communauté Urbaine de Toulouse Métropole to operate the Toulouse Zenith.

To date, Daniel COLLING has ceased all show and festival production activities, and concentrates his efforts on operating the Zenith halls, the Bourges Exhibition Centre, and the
"Mama" international professional meetings.