(Image Credit) -www.africanmusiclaw.com
An artiste manager is one who oversees the day to day business affairs of an artist, advice and counsels the artiste on professional matters, long term plans, and personal decision that may affect the career of such artiste. An active artiste Manager’s should focus on developing a reputation for the artiste; help to build a fan base, which often include recording, distributing and promoting and launching a demo CD, developing and holding press releases, promotional activities and also booking shows.
Today as the entertainment industry is moving, the job of an artiste manager has gone way beyond the archaic roles of just booking duties of a manager to giving them the power of attorney which either makes or mars the artiste he/she is managing, so rather than focusing on getting signed to the devils table, the manager has the responsibilities of being great at business development, brand equity, be focused, have influential networks. All of these and many more define if you are the progressive 21st century Manager or not.
The failure in the roles of an artiste manager has gone beyond not able to book an escape club performance and being a manager for the “culture”. To be on your manager A game you must first be well read and in my opinion good Lawyers and accountants make good managers you should get yourself a great one today. The record label and artiste are always overwhelmed in the process of making hits and recouping their investment plus profit so they all rely your professional guidance, to bring ensure the other aspects of the business is covered and being clueless means you may ruin the artiste’s chances of full potential maximisation which of course affects the label at the long run.
A 21st manager should know basic maths and accounting, of course I didn’t say know all the semicolon, petty and one column cashbooks, you should be able to account for even as small as travel meals, keep track of your artiste earnings so to maximize incomes by renewing royalty and get paid for more events, look up on taxes (Personal income tax, Corporate income tax bracket, Value added tax) which by the way most managers don’t know that their artiste need to pay tax either as an entity or an individual. Looking up into taxes of your artiste should involve getting tax deductions so to pay little tax as possible.
A good manager should be abreast with the law, rather than feign ignorance and thereafter looking for ways to break the law. An artiste manager should understand and know to the letter that the artiste has various rights as from their works, image etc, a manager should be sure to push that the artiste does all necessary registration of their musical works, trademarks. A good manager should be aware of all relevant entertainment laws.
The 21st century manager, which I must stress that most artiste today who have failed or been one time hit makers have their management and their recklessness to blame to an extent for this failure. In employing a manager it should not only be about passion and having a degree in talent or music business management -which is an added advantage-, but be versatile, read up on people, their failures and what makes them successful in this terrain.
Above all do not be a lazy manager who would rather play video games, lay around and indulge in vices and play personal assistant role and expect that you will succeed in management in these new age.
