Photo by courtesy/courtoisie. Left to right/De gauche à droite : Big Little Lions, Buck Twenty, JoJo Worthington.

Five SOCAN members win Second-Place Prizes in 2020 Unsigned Only song competition

Story by Howard Druckman | Monday September 14th, 2020

SOCAN members Helen Austin and Paul Otten of the duo Big Little Lions; Mike Ure and Aidan Johnson-Bujold of the duo Buck Twenty; and solo artist JoJo Worthington have all won second-place prizes in the genre categories of the 2020 Unsigned Only competition.

Big Little Lions took the honours in the Americana category, for their song “Against the Wall,” and also earned an honourable mention in the Screenshot field, for “Here We Go Again.”  Buck Twenty won in the Country category, for “All I Can Do,”  while JoJo  Worthington reached the penultimate prize in the Screenshot field, for her song “Stabilize,” which also earned an honourable mention in the Adult Contemporary category.

In addition to these genre winners, 13 other SOCAN members, or acts featuring SOCAN members, also earned honorable mentions in their respective categories, including double recognition for solo artist Madison Olds and the duo Scot Free Sessions.  These winners are:

Adult Contemporary (AC)
Madison Olds, “Sorry”

Americana
Scot Free Sessions, “Beckett”

Country
Robyn Ottolini, “Girl Next Door”
Genevieve Fisher, “Someone Else”

Electronic Dance Music (EDM)
Enevold, “Space Machine”

Folk/Singer-Songwriter
Benjamin Dakota Rogers, “Better By Now”
Scot Free Sessions, “Istanbul”

Pop/Top 40
Madison Olds, “3’s a Crowd”
The Free Label, “M.I.A. (Money Isn’t Available)”
Fenmore, “The Alchemist”

Rock
The Royal Foundry, “Okay?”

Screenshot
Liz, “Fences”

Teen
Mikalyn Hay, “It’s Dangerous””

Vocal Performance
Hannah Thomas, “I Will Always Love You” (in the style of Whitney Houston)
Alexz Johnson, “Still Alive”

SOCAN congratulates all of our winning members on these achievements. For a complete list of winners, and to hear the winning songs, click here.

Photo by courtesy of / courtoisie du Gala Country

Gala Country 2020: Léa Jarry wins SOCAN Songwriter of the Year Award

Story by Eric Parazelli | Tuesday September 15th, 2020

The country music community of Québec assembled on Sept. 11, 2020, to celebrate the artists and songs that have most strongly reached country music lovers over the past year. In all, 13 “Willie” Awards were handed out on Stingray’s Palmarès ADISQ channel to celebrate the achievements of Francophone Canadian artists and craftspeople and Anglophone Québec artists and craftspeople who stood out in 2019.

SOCAN was once again a partner in the celebration, and the SOCAN Songwriter of the Year Award was presented by our Chief Quebec Affairs & Visual Arts Officer, Geneviève Côté. This prestigious award went to the talented Léa Jarry, who’ll also have the opportunity to enjoy a free creative stay at the SOCAN House in Nashville as soon as circumstances allow.

Jarry expressed her appreciation for SOCAN’s work with these words in her acceptance speech:

The Gala Country 2020 winners are:

  • Original Song Album of the Year: “Si on y allait” (Patrick Norman)
  • Covers Album of the Year: Laurence Jalbert au pays de Nana Mouskouri (Laurence Jalbert)
  • SOCAN Songwriter of the Year: Léa Jarry
  • Song of the Year: “La Gibson de mon père” (Performer: Patrick Norman; Songwriter: Danny Boudreau)
  • Breakthrough Artist of the Year, sponsored by Paja Communications: Beauséjour
  • Promoter of the Year: Festival Country de Lotbinière
  • Radio Show of the Year: En route vers l’ouest with Véronique Labbé
  • TV Show of the Year: Tout simplement country with Guylaine Tanguay
  • Group of the Year: Beauséjour
  • Female Artist of the Year: Laurence Jalbert
  • Male Artist of the Year: Patrick Norman
  • Show of the Year: Matt Lang
  • People’s Choice Award: Daniel Bertrand

SOCAN warmly congratulates all Gala Country 2020 winners!

Photo by Brad Ardley

Patrick Curley to receive 2020 Christopher J. Reed Award

Story by Eric Parazelli | Monday September 14th, 2020

The Professional Music Publishers’ Association (APEM) will honour Patrick Curley with its eighth annual Christopher J. Reed Award on Sept. 24, 2020, during the Pop Montreal festival.

A songwriter and lawyer, Curley is the founder and President of Third Side Music, a Montréal-based music publishing company with offices in Los Angeles.

Since 2005, Third Side Music has become one of North America’s most active and respected music publishing companies with a catalogue of more than 55,000 works by Canadian and international artists.  The company, which also acts as a North American sub-publisher for a variety of partners, is especially recognized for its activities in the audio-visual music sector, and as a grantor of hundreds of music licences for films, TV series, advertising, videogames, etc.

Curley has been invited to participate in numerous international events such as MIDEM, CMJ, ALAI, Canadian Music Week (CMW), North by Northeast (NXNE), and the Paris Sync Summit, besides being invited to speak as an expert by McGill University, Trebas Institute, the Professional Music Publishers’ Association (APEM), and SOCAN. Originally from Jonquière, Québec, Curley is a committee member of the Mechanical Licensing Collective in the U.S. and, since 2014, a member of the Board of SOCAN, an organization he joined as a music creator in 1990.

Named after one of Canada’s most influential music publishers, who died in 2012, the Christopher J. Reed Award is presented annually to an outstanding music-publishing advocate who has demonstrated a high level of commitment to the profession, as well as to copyright compliance and the rights of creators, and has made an exceptional contribution to the practice and recognition of the music publishing profession.

To attend the ceremony, click on here for live (limited number of seats), or here for online.