CONNECTING MUSIC INDUSTRY + MUSIC EDUCATION
DIRECTORS
Phil Nelson & Chris Cooke
Meet the directors of the Pathways Into Music project
PHIL NELSON is an artist manager and music business educator.
He has worked as an artist manager since 1988 with his current clients including Grammy-winning Matt Hales (aka Aqualung), platinum-selling Duke Special and Mercury-nominated Sweet Billy Pilgrim.
Previous clients include The Longpigs and The Levellers, the latter of whom pioneered the direct-to-fan approach that is now industry standard and – after headlining Glastonbury – worked with Phil to launch their own 15,000 capacity festival Beautiful Days, which continues to this day.
Throughout his artist management career, Phil has also played an active role in the wider music industry. He was Vice Chair of the Music Managers’ Forum from 1997 to 2007, he co-founded The Great Escape showcase festival in Brighton with Martin Elbourne and Jon McIldowie, and along the way dreamed up the Breakers Chart for Music Week.
Phil is also an experienced educator, currently teaching music business at BIMM. From 2016 to 2018, he was also Music Industry Ambassador for the BIMM Group of colleges, developing programmes that offered students hands-on music business experience and opportunities to network with the industry. This included setting up the Appetite For Disruption student conference and the student-run record label Pool Valley Recordings, as well as facilitating numerous ‘real world projects’ for BIMM’s dissertation students.
Since 2017 he has been working with CMU on mapping music careers, music industries and music education, research work that resulted in the creation of the Pathways Into Music Foundation, which he now leads.
The Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation that exists to support music educators and music talent development programmes, and to help early-career music-makers plan their personal pathways into music.
It does this through ongoing reseach projects, a series of guides and publications, and regular seminars and events, including the Fanbase Builder training and mentoring programme.
CHRIS COOKE is an editor, journalist and media entrepreneur.
He is co-Founder and MD of CMU, a company that helps people navigate and understand the music business. It does this through media like the CMU Daily bulletin and Setlist podcast; a consultancy unit and training business; and a future talent programme.
Via CMU, Chris writes, talks, teaches and consults about the music industry. He leads sessions at music conferences around the world and guest lectures at various music colleges. He delivers training for MMF and BPI, and consults for the Council Of Music Makers.
He also curated and hosted twelve editions of The Great Escape Conference; wrote the acclaimed book ‘Dissecting The Digital Dollar’; and compiled ‘Music Copyright Explained’ for the UK’s Intellectual Property Office.
Since 2017, Chris has been working with artist manager Phil Nelson to map music careers, music industries and music education. Research work that resulted in the creation of the Pathways Into Music Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation that exists to support music educators and music talent development programmes around the UK and beyond, and to help early-career music-makers plan their personal pathways into music.
Chris also pursues other projects via UnLimited Media, which champions and supports the content, culture, communication and music industries through media, research and training, educational initiatives, and live events.
Through UnLimited he also publishes cultural recommendations service ThisWeek Culture and its sister magazine ThreeWeeks at the Edinburgh Festival; and he helped to launch and develop the award winning Taylor Bennett Foundation, which is enabling more ethnic diversity in the communications industry.
With degrees in both English and Law, Chris regularly writes about, discusses and comments on the music business, intellectual property, and the wider content, culture and communication sectors.
