“Everything was locked in a few months ago, thankfully, so now it’s just keeping up with the marketing and advertising,” Raynor says, sounding awfully calm given how close the event is to launch. “The sample CD has just been finished and everything else fairly organised.”
Every festival, music conference and musician claims that their latest product is their greatest thus far but with AWME still so young, their claims are valid for the 2012 program. “This year we have our strongest line-up of international delegates that we’ve ever had,” he says. “This year has been the strongest response from the industry both here and overseas, that’s been great. The best element this year really is the mix of delegates we’ve got coming including festival directors and booking agents. We’ve got CMJ from New York, we’ve got Glastonbury, Womad UK, The Great Escape, Fuji Rock and great booking agents from Asia, the States and UK – there’s a really big cross section. These delegates will be able to buy – or represent and book – artists from here in their regions.”
Despite the fact music festivals seem to appear and disappear with great speed, Rayner is confident that the music conferences of Australia and the greater region are managing to complement each other rather than create conflict. “We focus on indigenous, roots and world music – blues, funk and soul – so we program different artists to most, actually I think nearly all, conferences and trade fairs,” he explains. “That’s our niche and we try and match up the delegates that will be interested in a product to aim to get the best outcome for the artists that we can. I think that we’re different and unique to other trade fairs in Australia and the region. Our market is unique so the networks we work with have a different objective. We feel the event’s growing each year and our support networks have increased, specifically in our genre, we feel we’ll go from strength to strength.”
Australasia can often be reduced to simply Australia and New Zealand, with all of the smaller nations that surround us seemingly forgotten. AWME have made a conscientious effort to support the greater Pacific region. “We have artists this year showcasing from New Caledonia and smaller Pacific islands – we really try and program artists from those regions as well as covering this area. There needs to be a cross-section of artists representing the diversity of this region,” he says. Not only does the conference focus on the broader cultural influences surrounding us, they have also taken the time to realise that while regional touring from bigger name bands has fallen away of late, so has support for the emerging artists in regional Australia. This year, AWME and Arts Victoria have established a scholarship program to assist regional artists attend the conference as well as sourcing performers from those areas. “We link up with several regional organisations across Australia and we encourage applications from various parts of Australia,” he says. The showcase component of the event is diverse and is sure to be a lure for the general public to get exposure to new artists as well as industry professionals. “We try to have a combination of well-known artists and emerging artists but there still were artists who want to perform at trade events despite their current standing in the industry here,” he explains. “They might want to get export opportunities, they might want to get tours into Europe, North America, and Asian, so their agents and managers are pushing their act. We’re definitely here to support more emerging artists who want to break into the national market and the international market if they have the ability. So many artists in Australia have incredible potential.”
BY KRISSI WEISS
