Music

UPDATED: After several tumultuous months at PledgeMusic that have seen many artists going unpaid, cofounder Benji Rogers announced on Tuesday that he will be returning to the company temporarily “on a voluntary basis, as an unremunerated strategic advisor and board observer,” he told Variety. Last week Rogers, who left the company in 2016 to focus

January 29, 2019 5:19PM PT Ozzy Osbourne has postponed another leg of his “No More Tours 2” tour on doctor’s orders. The decision follows an announcement in October pushing back the remainder of the tour’s North American leg. The rocker had developed a serious infection in his hand and, had he continued the treks, he would have

Maroon 5 will not do a press conference ahead of this Sunday’s Super Bowl Halftime Show, the NFL announced Tuesday. In the past, halftime performers including Justin Timberlake, Lady Gaga, and Katy Perry have held a press conference prior to the event. Instead, the NFL announced Tuesday a social media rollout of exclusive footage of

January 29, 2019 4:03PM PT Christina Aguilera is the latest star to hang her shingle on the Las Vegas Strip, announcing today that she’ll be settling into the Zappos Theater at Planet Hollywood for 16 shows, starting May 31 and continuing in intervals through October 5. The show is titled “The Xperience” and is set

January 29, 2019 1:41PM PT [embedded content] Anyone who tuned into “Saturday Night Live” this past weekend likely got a good belly laugh when Chris Redd parodied Soulja Boy during “Weekend Update.” The three-minute clip featured Redd sporting a white Gucci band in homage to Soulja’s rant on morning show “The Breakfast Club” which went

James Ingram, one of the biggest stars in R&B music in the 1980s and ’90s, and a double Grammy winner and two-time Oscar nominee, has died at age 66. Longtime friend Debbie Allen confirmed the news on Twitter. “I have lost my dearest friend and creative partner James Ingram to the Celestial Choir,” she wrote.

Marc Byers has been named to the newly created position of General Manager, Motown Records, it was announced today by the label’s President Ethiopia Habtemariam, to whom Byers reports. According to the announcement, the entrepreneur and executive will be based in Hollywood at the Capitol Tower and will oversee the label’s day-to-day operations and work closely with

“Empire” star Jussie Smollett was hospitalized early Tuesday following an assault in Chicago in what is described as a possible hate crime, Variety has confirmed. According to a statement released by the Chicago Police Department, Smollett was beaten by two men who approached him by yelling out “racial and homophobic slurs” at approximately 2 a.m. Tuesday

Universal Music Group today announced a series of executive management appointments within its Global Classics and Jazz division, which is coming off a year of successful releases by artists including Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Max Richter, Andrea Bocelli and John Coltrane. Effective immediately, Holly Adams has been appointed to the role of Head of Soundtrack and Score,

Although most people might question the credibility of a video purporting to show a “leaked” list of 2019 Grammy Award winners posted on Twitter by someone claiming to be an 18-year-old based in Moscow, that video gained a surprising amount of traction in industry circles on Monday night. A rep for the Recording Academy confirmed

Tim McGraw, Florida Georgia Line, and Dan and Shay will headline the iHeartCountry Festival, iHeartMedia announced today. The lineup for the sixth annual festival, taking place May 4 at the Frank Erwin Center in Austin, Texas, also features Luke Combs, Little Big Town, Lauren Alaina, Old Dominion, Chris Janson, Bobby Bones & The Raging Idiots

January 28, 2019 3:34PM PT There’s some new information you oughta know regarding Alanis Morissette’s acclaimed musical “Jagged Little Pill.” The new musical, inspired by Morissette’s seminal album of the same name, is set to open on Broadway this fall, following a highly successful world premiere at Boston’s American Repertory Theater last summer. After premiering on May 5,

John Mayer will embark on a 27-date North American tour this summer, the musician announced Sunday. His solo tour will follow a 19-date run with the Dead & Company, going from late May to early July. After a two week break, Mayer will go back on the road playing his own tunes, beginning July 19

Cardi B, Travis Scott and Migos have been announced as the top headliners for the Rolling Loud Festival, taking place at the Hard Rock Stadium festival grounds in Miami Gardens, Fla., on May 10-12. Kid Cudi and Lil Wayne are also among the top-billed artists for the three-day music festival’s fifth anniversary celebration. Cardi B and

The Recording Academy and Clive Davis today announced that industry veteran and urban music pioneer Clarence Avant will be honored at Davis’ annual Pre-Grammy Gala, taking place at the Beverly Hilton on Feb. 9, the night before the 61 st annual Grammy Awards. At the ceremony, Avant will be recognized as the 2019 Grammy Salute

January 28, 2019 7:35AM PT Republic Records has promoted Tim Hrycyshyn to vice president of digital marketing, it was announced today by Kevin Lipson, the company’s executive VP of commerce, streaming & digital strategy. “Tim’s approach to digital marketing is nothing short of innovative,” Lipsons said. “He leverages a rich sense of personal creativity and extensive relationships to

Michael Jackson’s family released a statement on Monday condemning “Leaving Neverland,” the two-part HBO documentary that alleges the late singer molested young boys as a “public lynching.” The documentary premiered Friday at the Sundance Film Festival, prompting a statement from the singer’s estate that called it a “tabloid character assassination.” “We can’t just stand by

January 28, 2019 1:58AM PT Nick Burgess has joined Parlophone Records in a co-president position with Mark Mitchell, Warner Music UK announced today. Most recently, Burgess served as senior VP of A&R at Virgin EMI. His start date is Feb. 1 and both he and Mitchell, who has led the label since Jan. 2018, report to

Michel Legrand, who died in Paris Saturday at the age of 86, was among the most renowned film composers and songwriters of our time. He won three Oscars and five Grammys, and many of his songs have entered the pantheon as among the greatest of the 20th century. Here are 10 great film music moments

January 26, 2019 10:36PM PT The crowd at Las Vegas’ Park Theater was treated to a surprise appearance during Saturday night’s Lady Gaga show: “A Star Is Born” director and costar Bradley Cooper, who joined the singer for a finale performance of the song “Shallow.” The song, which was nominated for an Academy Award earlier

January 26, 2019 2:36PM PT In a free-form rant posted online back in October, Kanye West said he’d tried to purchase his publishing catalog from Sony/ATV Music and they declined. “I have the money to buy [back] my publishing,” West says in the video. “And they told me that I couldn’t buy my publishing…. It’s

The cheering was so loud that Kacey Musgraves turned to her band with her mouth agape. She’d been baiting the crowd good-naturedly, talking about how loud the Philadelphia audience had been the night before. But when the house lights at New York’s Beacon Theatre went up mid-show for a “let’s get a look at you”

Tributes have begun pouring in for Michel Legrand, the three-time Oscar-winning composer of “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg,” “Yentl” and “The Young Girls of Rochefort,” who died at his home early Saturday in Paris at the age of 86. Gilles Jacob, the former president of the Cannes Film Festival, said that Legrand’s “notes were soft as

Vampire Weekend’s last album, 2013’s “Modern Vampires of the City,” racked arguably the best reviews of the band’s already sound career for some smart sonic multitasking that no longer leaned heavily on twee twists on African sounds. This week, the band finally resumed that trajectory back to North America with a teaser (“120 Minutes of

Kim Foxx, Chicago’s top prosecutor, has received 12 responses since she openly called for women who have sexual-misconduct claims against R. Kelly to come forward with their stories. The singer has been under renewed criticism since the Lifetime docuseries “Surviving R. Kelly” aired early this month. The New York Times reports that Foxx herself is

After a week of turbulent anticipation, Dan Reed’s “Leaving Neverland” made its Sundance debut at Park City, Utah’s Egyptian Theater on Friday. Moments before the screening began, festival director John Cooper informed the packed house that health care providers supplied by the state of Utah were standing by to offer counsel for those distressed by

I’ll never forget seeing “Rent” for the first time. My mom used to bring me to shows in New York, so I was used to “Phantom of the Opera” and “Cats,” which are great, but hadn’t really hit home as an artist. “Rent” was the most inspiring musical I had ever seen. When I was 16

It is no broad boast to call “Enter the Wu (36 Chambers)” — the first album from the Staten Island hip-hop collective Wu-Tang Clan — one of the most powerful and influential debuts of the last century. From its incendiary 1993 start, Wu-Tang Clan had an auteur’s cinematic touch (credit producer and film fan RZA)

Earlier this week, Fastball unexpectedly found themselves at the center of the latest flare-up from direct-to-consumer platform PledgeMusic when blogger Bob Lefsetz wrote about a conversation with the band’s manager in which he said they hadn’t been paid by the service. As Variety reported last year, the platform, which is intended to help artists facilitate

January 25, 2019 10:56AM PT “Hamilton” creator Lin-Manuel Miranda has called the news of a mostly performance-less Oscars ceremony “disappointing.” Variety exclusively learned that only two of this year’s five-Oscar nominated songs may be performed live at the Academy Awards show on Feb. 24. Sources said Kendrick Lamar and SZA’s “All the Stars” from “Black Panther”