Press Release - 2/14/03 - Bernard M. Resnick, Esq. speaks at the "URBAN MUSIC VILLAGE," at the 37th annual MIDEM music business convention in Cannes, France.

From "The Best of MIDEM", www.midem.com, 2/14/03

THE URBAN DAY OFFERED PARTICIPANTS THE OPPORTUNITY TO HAVE A DEEPER PICTURE OF THIS SECTOR OF THE MUSIC INDUSTRY.

The first ‚International Development Of Urban Music‚ conference was certainly one of the key Midem 2003 event. The event, co-organised with Punch Media, began with Damon Dash, CEO of Roc-a-fella Records / Def Jam, delivering a live speech by phone from New York. Aya Ohi of JVC Victor in Japan talked about the difficulty of approaching Japanese kids. There is a fundamental contradiction: "they want the imports with no Japanese writing on them because it means that they get the hot tunes much more quickly," she said. "On the other hand, in order to grow the market, it is very important that there is a translation of the lyrics. We regard providing a translation as part of the marketing campaign".

Looking for parallels between the effects of street marketing campaigns in France and the US, moderator Anthony Marshall of the Lyricist Lounge asked Christophe Lacroix of French promotion company 360 what had happened when his company used multi-sticker and flyer street marketing campaigns. "We certainly attracted a lot of attention from the police," Lacroix said. "But that was mainly because it was a new way of doing things." Marshall agreed that the tactic had also initially proved highly controversial in the US.

Chris Schwartz, CEO, Trimedia Entertainment Group/ Ruffnation Records, Kevon Glickman, Ruffnation and Wyclef Jean introduced the audience to their new film and DVD joint-venture, Trimedia and invited the audience to see "Snipes". Wyclef Jean talked about his new film "Shottas" and addressed the hip hop community in very straightforward terms: "The problem with rap people today is that they just want to be #1 in the charts, copying other people. The main thing is: whether you are signing people or whatever, there is a bigger scope of things that you have to put in mind of everybody: it's bigger than the charts. We are musicians, we have to be creative, do not copy, do not follow the charts. The street still dictates what's happening and what's not: if you keep with creativity, you will always be around".

Amba Callender, Compilations Consultant, X-Posure Media, Kai Kirchhoff, A&R International, Capitol Music, Nicolas Nardone, General Manager, Small, were also among the panelists.

The conference ended with an extraordinary improvised free-style delivered by (unsigned) artist Metaphor, who rapped his words both in French and in American.

Also new at Midem 2003, was the Urban workshop: Rudi Kidd, Partner, Gray & Co. and Bernard Max Resnick, Attorney / Manager, Bernard M. Resnick, Esq., P.C, answered many questions from hip hop and urban professionals about licensing and distribution contracts.