BRIGHTON (MUSIC CONFERENCE) ROCKS!

The first-ever Brighton Music Conference (BMC) launches this April in the south coast city, and is being billed as “the first annual electronic music conference in the UK run by the industry, for the industry”.
A number of leading DJs, industry figures and industry people have already signed up for a series of panels, talks, seminars, exhibitions, showcases, networking opportunities and club nights over the course of the two-day event, and a number of big industry brands — including DJ Mag — have signed up to sponsor the conference.

The BMC grew out of an idea hatched by a few Brighton music friends in a pub one night. 

“We had an audacious idea to try and get a few of the clubs in town to work together for just one weekend,” Brighton-based international trance DJ John '00' Fleming tells DJ Mag. “I've always believed that electronic music's true power resides in bringing people together, so why not bring people together in Brighton? And then I said, 'Wouldn't it be brilliant if we could also have a business conference during the day, with club events at night?', like a kind-of UK version of ADE. The idea snowballed quickly, and from the very beginning we seemed to get support across the industry.”

Conference panels include topics such as Understanding Revenue Streams, Music Synchronisation, Royalty Distribution and How To Get An Agent, and a number of kick-ass club nights are in the process of being arranged to complement the daytime activities.
Former Brighton resident Dave Clarke, dubbed 'the Baron of Techno' by the late John Peel, is an enthusiastic supporter of ADE in his new adopted city of Amsterdam, and is one of the special guests at BMC.

“The UK has made so many great contributions to the scene over the decades, not just in techno but across all genres, so I'm really looking forward to finally seeing a proper dance music business conference in this country,” Dave says. “Brighton is the perfect spot for it. I don't think it would work in London, as the city is just too large to create the kind of condensed energy you want at a conference like this. I look forward to seeing how it evolves over the next few years.”

Brands already involved include Spotify, Sennheiser, Ableton, Mixcloud, Kvant, Traktor, Skint Records and many more.

The BMC is designed to complement the Great Escape festival, the weekend event in Brighton in May that's more focused on indie-rock. Centred on the magnificent Dome building in the centre of Brighton and various other venues around the city, the ground has been laid for it to become a significant addition to the dance music calendar — and an unmissable event for UK DJs, producers and industry folk.

More at brightonmusicconference.co.uk.