The 2020 Recap: Top Stories From FYI's Archive

By Nick Krewen

The Lord Giveth and the Covid Taketh Away.

It’s hard to argue that 2020’s top story was the sudden incursion of Covid-19, a worldwide SARS-driven pandemic that literally decimated the live music industry overnight. The trickle-down effect of shutting down worldwide travel and concert venues was immediate: the live musicians that suddenly found themselves out of work and scrambling to survive may have received the most public attention, but the behind-the-scenes workers were equally devastated.

Around St. Patrick’s Day,  promoters, agents, venues, airlines, hospitality, transport, merchandisers, suppliers, ushers, box office employees all could have used the luck of the Irish, as their income disappeared as the bills kept rolling along.

Thankfully, unlike our neighbours down South,  the Federal, Provincial and Municipal governments - along with large corporations - have stepped up with funding to help us get by, although the scale is relative, in terms of how much it is helping. Some Toronto venues, for example, were given a property tax break that had been in the works for a while and whose appearance happened to thankfully coincide with the pandemic’s arrival. But not only have they been hurt by the forced lack of patronage due to various health restrictions, but by a merciless insurance industry that decided not to renew the liability policies of many venues. Some have closed; others are hanging on by a thread, rightfully concerned about a virus that is still running rampant through the world as 2020 belches its way in 2021 with no end date in sight and no timeframe in which to expect it to end.

As we're all praying for the just-arrived vaccines to work their magic - their true effectiveness may not be known for a few months thanks to the need for double-dosing, here are some other reasons 2020 sucked; the passings of Rush drummer Neil Peart; CKOC visionary Nevin Grant, innovative guitar rocker Eddie Van Halen, A&M/Virgin/PolyGram record exec Doug Chappell; local impresario Denise Jones...and others mentioned below.

Anyhow, please enjoy the synopsis of a rather unforgiving year below - and let's all hope the sun shines a lot more brightly for the music industry - and especially the live music industry -  in 2021.

JANUARY

Vancouver alternative weekly The Georgia Straight sells to Media Central for $1.25M...Pegi Cecconi to receive the Walt Grealis Award...Nettwerk Music Group recapitalizes...Producer Brian Ahern and EOne’s Darren Throop among those named to Order of Canada...Hasbro completes a $3.8B acquisition of Entertainment One...Justin Bieber announces 50-date tour…Suzane Landry appointed Vice-President, French-Language Content Development and Programming for Bell Media...Jann Arden named to Canadian Music Hall Of Fame...Drake, LeBron James and former Sportsnet president Scott Moore sign an “exclusive” partnership with Bell Media for their Uninterrupted content brand...Polaris Music Prize founder Steve Jordan jumps to CBC...Linda Noelle Bush upped to Cadence Music Group VP...Doug Putman buys For Your Entertainment retail chain For $US10M...Rogers Communications and the University of Waterloo forge a multi-million dollar partnership in an effort to launch the first 5G-smart campus in central Canada...Jessie Reyez, Carly Rae Jepsen and Daniel Caesar booked for Coachella...George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” enters the public domain...UMC partners with e-Sports Co. OverActive Media, whose investors include The Weeknd...The Supreme Court of Canada overturns the CRTC decision allowing Canadian TV viewers to watch U.S. commercials during Super Bowl...Toronto's Colin Linden wins Grammy for producing The Best Americana Album, Keb’ Mo's Oklahoma...

Corus reports Q1 profit and revenue up to $467.9M from the year-ago total of $467.5M, while television revenue rose to $43M from $42.6.M. Radio revenue declined to $37.9M from $41.3M...Over at Shaw, overall revenue in the quarter ending November 30 was $1.38B, up from $1.35B last year. Net income came in at $162M or 31 cents per share for Q1, down from $186M or 36 cents per share a year earlier...Alessia Cara tops Juno Nominees, named Host...FACTOR invests $350K in Keychange Women’s Mentorship Program...The New York Times hits US$800M worth of online subs a year ahead of goal, has  5M-plus overall subscriptions..Federal Digital Report released...New BMG International branch office opens in Toronto with Senior Director Matthew Smallwood and Co-ordinator Beth Ward...Maritimes legend Matt Minglewood is this year's inductee to The Casino Nova Scotia Music Hall of Fame...Pharrell Williams, author of the mega-hit “Happy,” is designing a Toronto condominium near Yonge + Eglinton...Neil Young now a US citizen, also retaining his Canadian ties...The CBC's National drops four-host format...Bell Media taps Tyson Parker to head podcasting division...Jesse Kumagai named CEO Of Massey Hall/Roy Thomson Hall...Sumo Cyco inks new record deal with Napalm Records....R.I.P.: Rush drummer and lyricist Neil Peart, singer Kelly Fraser, producer Nick Blagona, pianist Norm Amadio, Monty Python's Terry Jones, basketball legend Kobe Bryant.

FEBRUARY

Darcy Gregoire jumps from UTA to Feldman Agency...Jann Arden announces new tour, Greatest Hits...Rogers 2019 by the numbers:$14.1B contributed to the Canadian economy; $2.8B invested in capital expenditures; $2.1B invested in people and culture; $1.1B paid in taxes and government fees; $683M invested in Canadian content and programming; $60+M contributed to local communities; 25,000 volunteer hours; 25,000+ employees working in every major Canadian city...The Toronto Star reassigns most full-time entertainment section staff to other positions...AEG's Debra Rathwell to be inducted into CMW Music Industry Hall Of Fame... Broadcaster Erin Davis is the 2020 inductee into the Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame...SOCAN Foundation launches Her Music Awards with winners Leela Gilday and Haviah Mighty...Buffy Sainte-Marie to receive the Allan Slaight Humanitarian Award...Lennon Stella, Daniel Caesar, Alexandra Streliski, Alessia Cara and Tory Lanes among confirmed Juno Awards performers...BCE Inc. announces "first" 5G partner Nokia, hikes dividend 5% as Q4 operating revenue of $6.32B also increases 5%....NuVOODOO Ratings Prospects Study finds 86% of Millennials and 54% of Boomers are "addicted" to their smartphones. 51% of Millennials and 33% of Boomers say the same about their favourite FM station...Carlos Benevides now nationally hosting  Rogers' noon-hour show, JACK Up the ‘80s...

Google opens offices in Toronto, Montréaland Waterloo...Kim Mitchell named to the Songwriters Hall Of Fame...Brett Kissel to host Juno Gala Dinner & Awards... Promoter Michael Cohl returns with CTS Eventim...The Weeknd After Hours world tour to kick off June 11 at Vancouver's Rogers Arena...Stingray Country - a music video channel - launches...Randy Bachman and Burton Cummings reunite for 'Together Again' through a Live Nation tour. They'll also perform a free concert on June 27 in front of Winnipeg's provincial legislature to celebrate Manitoba's 150th anniversary....Roger Ashby is back on the air on 16 Bell Media stations with Oldies show...Telus Corp. threatens to cut $1 billion of spending and 5,000 jobs over the next five years if the CRTC requires Canada’s wireless companies to open their facilities to virtual network operators....SOCAN collections top $405.5M...Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault says Netflix and Facebook will pay sales taxes in Canada....Barenaked Ladies’ Kevin Hearn accidentally bought a fake Norval Morrisseau painting and made a documentary of his ordeal...Tom Wilson launches Indigenous Scholarship in partnership with McMaster University...Bruce Cockburn announces a 50th-anniversary North American tour...At the 2020 Credit Union Music P.E.I. Week kickoff, Tara MacLean and Andrew Waite share SOCAN Songwriter of the Year honours....

Tim Baker and Wintersleep lead the 2020 East Coast Music Award nominations with seven each...Indigenous indie-rock band nêhiyawak wins 2019 $10K Edmonton Music Prize...Classical pianist Angela Hewitt loses her Fazioli concert grand piano when it's accidentally dropped by movers...China’s Tencent Holdings Ltd, which owns 9.1% of Spotify, purchases 10% of Universal Music Group...Taylor Swift signs with the Universal Music Publishing Group, ending a 15-year Sony/ATV relationship...Sarah Harmer releases her first album in 10 years, Are You Gone? With the No. 1 debut of Changes on Billboard's Top 200, Justin Bieber is now the youngest solo artist to have seven chart-topping albums, beating Elvis Presley for the title...Six Shooter turns 20 this year and celebrates with the launch of Know & Tell, a free consultation mentorship program...Anthem signs Gord Bamford to a recording and publishing deal, which includes buying his previous Cache Entertainment...Funky Montréaloctet Busty and the Bass signs to Arts & Crafts...R.I.P.: former Céline Dion agent Paul Levesque, National Post writer Christie Blatchford, journalist Anne Kingston, keyboardist, Lyle Mays, Willie Nelson drummer Paul English,  Toronto venue Clinton's, Evanov Communications founder Bill Evanov.

MARCH

Slaight Family creates a $15M global initiative for women and girls...Bell becomes an exclusive Canadian partner for Jeffrey Katzenberg's bite-size mobile platform  Quibi,...Stingray acquires 30% of The Podcast Exchange (TPX), while TPX signs Terry O’Reilly’s Apostrophe Podcast Company...Legendary radio programming guru Lee Abrams relaunches consultancy as MediaVisions and says the focus will be a new radio format...Michael Wekerle hosts an El Mo walkthrough...Hugh’s Room Live seeks a new location after a 37% rent increase...Shawnee wins CBC Searchlight...Toronto's The FLOW 93.5 imports The Breakfast Club as the station's new morning show...CNN reports that the Dead Sea Scrolls housed at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC, are forgeries...BMG Production Music expands operations in Canada, overseen by Anna Andrych and Matt Cansick...Emergency measures go into effect immediately with regard to the Covid-19 pandemic; live music in Canada and around the world ends overnight...Austin, TX cancels SXSW...Juno Awards cancelled at the last minute...Canadian Live Music Association reacts to pandemic alert...FACTOR issues Covid-19 cancellation policy...Canadian Folk Music Awards cancelled...SOCAN scratches March 30 Awards...CMW reschedules Conference to September...CLMA sends a letter to Gov’t asking Feds to cushion pandemic effects on live music biz...ECMAs cancelled..

Liberty Media Corporation, which owns 69.6 million shares of Live Nation common stock, fully repays a Live Nation margin loan using $130M cash...Claire Deganais new ED of Polaris Music Prize...Canadian  Songwriters Hall Of Fame postpones inductions...Unison enacts $500K Covid-19 Music Industry Relief Program.....In response to the pandemic, the National Arts Centre and Facebook Canada, with the support of Slaight Music, launch a $100K partnership aimed at providing financial relief to performing artists. Applicants receive a $1K grant in exchange for a 45-60 min. livestream performance during the last 11 days of March..Slaight tops up the NAC program by $100K...Burton Cummings calms fans with Facebook shows...,The federal government reports 500,000 applications for employment insurance compared to 27,000 for the same week a year ago. Major employers announcing cuts include Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group laying off 4,679 employees.  Hotels are reporting a 10% occupancy rate...Netflix launches a $100M coronavirus relief fund for out-of-work creatives...Shawn Mendes donates $175K to Sick Kids Foundation...Canadian Folk Music Awards go virtual....YouTuber Nastya Radzinskaya, age 6, raked in US18M last year, being at the helm of 10 channels... As reported by the Toronto Star, the Interactive Advertising Bureau finds that Canadian businesses spent $8.5B on digital advertising in 2019, with $7.4B flowing to mostly Facebook and Google. Netflix made $1.6B more...

Streaming accounts for nearly 80 percent of 2019 US music revenue, says RIAA...Julien Christian Lutz wants to throw in the towel on his Director X moniker...Warner Music Group delays IPO, due to stock market Coronavirus fears...The Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame (CSHF) and East Coast Music Awards to induct the late Newfoundland folk singer-songwriter Ron Hynes into the CSHF...IFPI reveals 2019's Top 10 best-selling global artists.Taylor Swift: #1; Drake # 8...Genesis - Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford and Tony Banks - will reunite for UK stadium shows...Brett Kissel plays a relief concert in Edmonton to help those affected by the Nashville tornado...Vancouver's The Pack AD pack it in, for now...Nashville-based Oshawa native Lennon Stella sets April to release her debut solo album Three. Two. One...The Weeknd's After Hours, breaks the all-time record for pre-adds on Apple Music, surpassing 975,000 globally... Manitoba Music launches a $20K emergency financial relief fund...Lemon Bucket Orkestra's Mark Marczyk creates URGNT, a live-streamed concert series in Toronto...Elton John hosts iHeart star-studded “living room concert” for coronavirus relief featuring at-home performances by Billie Eilish, Mariah Carey, Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong, and others...R.I.P.: Canadian telecom pioneer JR Shaw, founder of Shaw Communications...Larry Ray Steinman, a founder of Canadian Telecommunications Network (CTN),  Crowbar guitarist Rhéal Lanthier, singer-songwriter Laura Smith, jazz pianist McCoy Tyner, country and pop superstar Kenny Rogers, pianist Wray Downes, jazzman Ted Moses, country star Joe Diffie, soul legend Bill Withers, live concert tours, at least through 2020, due to Covid-19.

APRIL

Feds offer a $30m pandemic license fee benefit to broadcasters...Slaight Foundation donates $3M to food banks....Music biz collectives call Gov't for urgent help...Lou Ragagnin named President and CEO off Re:Sound...SOCAN implements a $2M emergency relief fund.... Ontario Live sets up a $300K MusicTogether fund for Ontario musicians... SOCAN Foundation’s Charlie Wall-Andrews named Trudeau Scholar...Johnny Reid restores legendary Nashville studio Soultrain Sound...Canadian music labels go virtual during pandemic...Home promoter business models change midstream...CMRRA adds Janet A. Maclean as Director, Human Resources... SOCAN CEO Eric Baptiste abruptly resigns; Jennifer Brown named SOCAN Interim CEO...Drake, The Weeknd rule US Billboard charts...Meghan Patrick, Reklaws lead CMAO noms...Major labels pledge millions in the pandemic fight...Artistscan Ensemble releases “Lean On Me” for Red Cross...Stronger Together raises $6M for Canadian Food Banks...The first of five Junos 365 Songwriters Circle episodes air on Gem May 1...Unison receives support from three major labels....The CRTC okays Bell Canada's $20M purchase of Québec’s V network and Leclerc Communication’s $4.9M purchase of radio station CJPX-FM Montréalfrom Musique ClassiQ. CJPX-FM changes formats from specialty classical to mainstream music... 

The Jim Pattison Group donates $500K to feed kids in distress through Sav-On-Foods... 100% East Coast. Canadian Style is Stingray's newest music channel in alliance with the East Coast Music Association,....Bell Media airs a virtual concert to honour front-line workers hosted by Lady Gaga and including Kelly Clarkson, Paul McCartney, John Legend, Stevie Wonder, Eddie Vedder, Lizzo and others...Torstar eliminates 85 positions, reduces executive pay as ad revenue drop....The Canadian Jewish News closes after 60 years...630 CHED Broadcasting legend Bob Layton celebrates 50 years in the industry....RBC and Sirius XM add $400K in support to NAC relief fund for Canadian performers...Prime Minister Justin Trudeau declares that the Canadian economy won’t return to normal for a year...Sportsnet lands 3-hour weekly The Joey Vendetta Show...Parliament passes a $73B wage subsidy bill, intended to encourage companies to rehire workers by offering a 75 percent wage subsidy over three months....Ipsos poll finds 3 in 10 Canadians couldn’t pay bills if they lost a job due to coronavirus, while 40 percent of Canadians under 55 would have one week or less of savings to cover food and rent...CBC launches $2M fund to support Canadian creators during coronavirus...

Myers Report says advertising budgets could take a $3B hit over coronavirus...iHeart expects to save US$250M in 2020 through pandemic-related expense reductions, salary cuts and furloughs...Bell donates 1.5M face masks to critical agency workers worth $7.5M...Apple, Rogers offers iPads to Ontario low-income students, with free cellular internet access for the school year...Disney furloughs 100K theme park and hotel workers amid coronavirus shutdown, saving $500M a month in salaries...Rogers braces for worse Q2 after reporting a $352M net profit for the first three months of 2020... Stingray Music partners with CIMA to launch a dedicated “Canada’s Independent Artists” channel...April marks the 15th anniversary the first-ever YouTube video was uploaded by platform co-founder Jawed Karim. It's an 18-second video, "Me at the zoo," which has logged over 90M views. A year later, the platform sold to Google for US$1.65B...Postmedia announces  layoffs of 80 employees and permanent closure of 15 community publications....SiriusXM reports an increase in Q1 Net Income to $293M in the quarter compared to $162M in the prior year. Its Pandora music-streaming service added 51,000 net self-pay subscribers...El Mo, Wheat Sheaf robbed of grand reopenings...Two of Montréal's flagship summer events, Les Francos de Montréal and Festival International de Jazz de Montréal, are cancelled...

Bars, lounges and the country’s hard-hit cannabis sector will now have access to $40B in new credit...The concert industry faces up to a $9B loss from pandemic...Apple Music instigates a $50M advance fund for indie labels hit by Covid-19 impact...Lady Gaga and advocacy organization Global Citizen raise US$35M to fight the coronavirus and benefit The World Health Organization... New London Music Hall of Fame inductions: three London brothers from the big band era - Bert, Joe and John Niosi -  and R&B singer Grant Smith .....Covid-induced cancellations include the Mariposa Folk Festival, Canmore Folk Music Festival, Salmon Arm, Vancouver Island MusicFest, and Edmonton Folk Festivals..Jason McCoy kicks off We Are 1World project...Avril Lavigne updates the track Warrior as We Are Warriors, for The Avril Lavigne Foundation and Project Hope. All net proceeds will provide PPEs...Folk Alliance International (FAI) Executive Director Aengus Finnan announces cancellation of 2021  fest and conference... Bandcamp waives Friday revenue share to help musicians impacted by the covid-19 pandemic....R.I.P.: Canadian broadcaster Bill Anderson, Radio Caroline founder Ronan O’Rahilly, trumpeter Wallace Roney, singer-songwriter John Prine, arranger/producer Hal Wilner, ex- BCE Inc. and Bell Canada Chair Thomas Charles O'Neill, guitarist Bucky Pizzarelli, Fountains of Wayne's Adam Schlesinger,  educator Ellis Marsalis, jazz saxophonist Lee Konitz, Statler Brothers' Harold Reid, Kraftwerk's Florian Schneider.

MAY

Canadian Music Week cancels the 2020 Conference...CMRRA quarterly payouts hit $14M...Veteran Toronto promoter Gary Topp publishes graphic novel autobiography...Slaight Foundation gifts $450K for Canadian Music Docs Fund...Drake gets his 10th No. 1 album With Dark Lane Demo Tapes, a surprise release,  14-track project that includes the chart-topping Toosie Slide...SOCAN launches Encore! -  payments for online performances by the PRO's members...50 years ago, The Guess Who made history as the first Canadian rock band to earn the #1 position on the Billboard Hot 100. American Woman reigned atop the Billboard and RPM Weekly charts for three consecutive weeks. It made #3 on Billboard’s 1970 year-end best singles list...Brett Kissel sells out six Edmonton shows at The Drive-In For Charity...Graham Henderson resigns from Music Canada..Edgar Bronfman Jr. is FuboTV’s new Executive Chairman. FuboTV, 300-400K subscribers deep, focuses on channels that distribute live sports...Spotify’s Q1 reports sales of 1.85B euros with a loss of 0.20 euros per share. Spotify’s first-quarter gross margin was 25.5%...MarketingLand says Google removed 2.7B "bad ads" in 2019...Canadian newspapers publish full-page ads in Saturday editions to urge the government to immediately force digital giants like Facebook and Google to share advertising revenues with Canadian media companies....

CBC NewsRadio officially turns 100 this year...Stingray acquires Marketing Sensorial México. MSM specializes in digital signage content production, among other things...Media Central Corp. marks a 405% increase in ad impressions after purchasing Toronto's NOW Magazine in November 2019.  Ditto for their purchase of Vancouver's Georgia Straight...Postmedia Network Canada Corp. says it expects to qualify for at least $20.3M in covid-related emergency wage subsidies from the federal government...Stingray Radio launches a $15M free ad program to local businesses in the form of $1000-$100K radio advertising "stimulant grants"...Canada Post issues stamps celebrating 100 years of Canadian radio...Analysts predict TV ad spend drop of between 22% and 29% for 1st half of 2020...Spotify strikes $100M+  deal with podcaster Joe Rogan...Michael Enright leaves The Sunday Edition to host a new CBC Radio program...Torstar agrees to $52M sale to NordStar Capital, controlled by Jordan Bitove and Paul Rivett and wholly owned by the Bitove and Rivett families....Postmedia to lay off about 40 employees after unions reject salary cuts...Alessia Cara plays the character Jane Willoughby in the Netflix's animated feature The Willoughbys....Both Guelph's Hillside Festival and Ottawa's RBC Bluesfest are the latest Covid casualties...

Canadian blues veteran Sue Foley named Best Traditional Blues Female Artist at the 2020 Blues Music Awards... Bruce Cockburn's True North - A 50th Anniversary Box Set includes vinyl debuts of The Charity of Night and Breakfast in New Orleans, Dinner in Timbuktu...Yorkville Sound engages in an open-source ventilator design project with Starfish Medical...Emm Gryner's new single, Stronger Someone, supports the Bluewater Health Foundation and its Covid-19 fund...Grimes and Elon Musk welcome a new baby boy with the tongue-twisting name X Æ A-12 Musk...Warner streaming revenues hit $586M in Q1, down 2.8% year-on-year...Live Nation posts first pandemic-era earnings:  Revenue down 20%, but fans are keeping tickets...Quincy Jones vs. Michael Jackson estate: Court strips Jones of $9.4 million in royalties...Corey Hart updates hit, rechristened Never Surrender (Angels) and reconfigured as a pandemic-themed remake... Red Cat Records' second Vancouver location, on East Hastings Street, closes permanently....Stuck With U, the new joint single from Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande, releases a video that includes Michael Bublé and Chance The Rapper, alongside Emma MacKley, a Grade 12 student from Dartmouth, NS... The Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) in Toronto is the latest Covid casualty..U.K.'s live music lockdown leaves 140K performers, agents, promoters and technicians without a steady income since the end of March. 82% of the country's live venues are at risk of closing...

The City of Toronto's Music Advisory Committee (TMAC) unanimously approves a motion to expand the Creative Co-Location Facilities Property Tax Subclass Designation to cover live music venues, allowing venue operators to access a 50 percent reduction of their commercial property taxes...Drake ,The Weeknd and Jessie Reyez may be victims of cyberattack upon New York-based media and entertainment law firm Grubman Shire Meiselas & Sacks....Diane Warren signs with BMG ahead of 'historic' new album...Another Covid casualty: Toronto's Beaches International Jazz Fest...Primary Wave acquires majority stake in Ray Charles’ pre-1964 publishing catalogue..."Levon (Helm) didn't write songs. I gave him credit": Robbie Robertson on The Band's disputes and the new documentary "Once Were Brothers"...The Toronto Blues Society's annual national Maple Blues Awards show is going virtual on Feb. 1, 2021...Exclaim!, Editor in Chief James Keast leaves the company after 25 years...R.I.P.: rock 'n roll legend Little Richard, "Mr. CKOC" Nevin Grant, music supervisor David Hayman, Stranglers' keyboardist Dave Greenfield, Was (Not Was) singer Harry "Sweet Pea" Atkinson, Pretty Things vocalist Phil May, singer Millie Small, Malo guitarist Jorge Santana, singer Betty Wright, Venues: Hamilton, Ontario's This Ain't Hollywood, Toronto's Club 120

JUNE

Jake Gold re-signs The Tragically Hip to his Management Trust..June 2 is designated Black Out Tuesday by many global music industry companies as a statement of solidarity in response to the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis...Rogers family donates $60M to charities....Kim Mitchell signs to El Mocambo Records...Jessie Reyez pitches the need for diversity at major labels on CTV...Downchild hosts streaming fundraiser for Unison...The Weeknd gives $500K each to MusiCares and the Scarborough Hospital Network...Alessia Cara, Shawn Mendes and Avril Lavigne are among 2020 Juno Award winners revealed during June 29 online ceremony on CBC Gem....VMedia launches Canada's first live and on-demand streaming TV platform, RiverTV....Stingray reports an $8.5M loss as covid hits radio revenues. For the full-year, Stingray earned nearly $14M or 18 cents per share on $306.7M of revenues....Ad spend tracker Standard Media Index now available in Canada,..TV host Wendy Mesley suspended by CBC for use of a “word that should never be used”... Bell Media pulls Jessica Mulroney series after Black influencer says she threatened her career...

International movie theatre chain Cineworld PLC calls off deal to buy Cineplex Inc. for $2.8B....Facebook provides $1M to The Canadian Press for a one-year fellowship initiative to hire, train, equip and provide salary and benefits for reporters in newsrooms across the country...Tiny Foundation invests $1M over three years in Jesse Brown’s news site Canadaland and corresponding podcast network....Corus reports a $752M quarterly loss in the three months ending on May 31, due to a $786.8-million non-cash charge placed on its operating statement for "broadcast licences and goodwill impairment"...Elon Musk applies to the CRTC for permission to provide rural Canadians with fast satellite internet service...Canadaland workers unionize, while Postmedia print room workers courted for union certification...Mark Zuckerberg loses US$7.2B as a flurry of companies pull advertising from Facebook...

Show Pony, the new six-track Orville Peck EP,  features a duet between the masked country act and Shania Twain...The Weeknd bestows $500K to Black Lives Matter, Global Network, Colin Kaepernick's Know Your Rights Camp and National Bail Out...Michael Bublé pledges $100K to the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union)...Howard Shore wins Best Original Score and Best Original Song for The Song Of Names at the virtually-presented 2020 Canadian Screen Awards...Tencent invests $100M+ in Warner after injecting $3.6B in Universal...EMI Records relaunches in the UK...Neil Young unearths “lost” album Homegrown...UMC drops Canadian country singer Chad Brownlee for sharing an anti-Semitic image on social media...Toronto’s The Royal Conservatory of Music forges ahead with its 2020-21 concert season at Koerner Hall...The Winnipeg Folk Festival cancels physical event, but goes virtual with a July 11 livestream featuring Arlo Guthrie, Bahamas, City and Colour, The Sadies and Kurt Vile, Brandi Carlile and others...

Drake leads nominees with six at the 2020 BET Awards, celebrating its 20th anniversary... Festival International de Jazz de Montréal cancels public concerts but presents an online edition instead...SaskMusic's June 20th National Indigenous Peoples Day Concert features Angus Vincent, Aurora Wolfe, Donny Parenteau, Gypsy Moonbird and others...CBC launches This Is Not A Drake Podcast, a five-part limited-run series exploring the history and evolution of hip-hop, R&B and Black culture through the lens of Drake...Edmonton pop singer Ruth B releases If I Have A Son, with 100% of the proceeds donated to four charities: Campaign Zero, Black Youth Helpline, Hope Ethiopia and True North Aid...

K-Pop superstars BTS' June 14 pay-per-view BANG BANG CON breaks the record for the highest-paid online concert, banking close to (US) $20M in ticket sales and attracting 756,600 concurrent viewers...TO Live, the Toronto agency that operates Meridian Hall (formerly the Sony Centre), St Lawrence Centre for the Arts; and the Meridian Arts Centre (formerly Toronto Centre for the Arts) lays off 115 full-timers in addition to the 480 unionized, part-time and casual staff already furloughed.... Ottawa’s RBC Bluesfest pairs with the National Arts Centre (NAC) for a weekend drive-in concert series at the RBC Bluesfest Drive-In. Featured acts include Marie-Mai, Donovan Woods and The Opposition, Neon Dreams, Terra Lightfoot, Julian Taylor, Kellylee Evans and others...North by Northeast (NXNE) pulls the plug for 2020... Hamilton's Arkells reschedule Tim Hortons Field show for June 19, 2021... 2020 Western Canadian Music Awards nominees include the National Music Centre,  Nuela Charles, William Prince, and the West End Cultural Centre....Mariposa hosts a free online concert series, including a 20-minute video homage to folk legend and Mariposa veteran Gordon Lightfoot....Toronto's Senator Restaurant inaugurates the live  Senator Serenade from their Balcony with jazz vocalist Ori Dagan... Mother Mother, Said The Whale, and The Beaches pull out of a virtual Canada Day celebration in Surrey, BC, alleging the city’s lack of commitment to dismantling systemic racism... BC government renews $7.5M  investment in Amplify BC to boost the province’s music industry...Pandemic woes lead to CMW's current $1.5M debt via cancellation...

The Canadian Independent Venue Coalition (CIVC) launches #SupportCanadianVenues campaign...Heading towards a $50B market cap, Spotify is worth double what it was three months prior...Over 500 UK music venues write an open letter to the government for £50M to “hibernate” them until October...Calgary's Hotels Live repurposes some hotels to serve as concert venues...The $500K SOCAN Foundation Relief Fund issues $250 grants for SOCAN members who have earned more than $500 in royalties in the four most recent SOCAN distributions.....R.I.P.: Pukka Orchestra singer Graeme Williamson, Juno-winning trombonist Hugh Fraser, CMW and ex-London radio station program director Greg Simpson...conductor Victor Feldbrill, producer Rupert Hine, singer Dame Vera Lynn, arranger Johnny Mandel. Venues: Oshawa's The Music Hall, Montréal's The House of Jazz by Oliver Jones.

JULY

Slaight Music signs an admin deal with Reservoir...Canadian Heritage announces a $500M fund aiding music industry...Sony/ATV Music Publishing Nashville signs Karen Kosowski...Wintersleep's four ECMA Awards tops winners list...RBC Walk Of Fame Talent Program offers $100K in prize packs...Polaris Music Prize Shortlist includes albums by previous winners Caribou, Kaytranada and Lido Pimienta...Shawn Mendes commits $250K to Global Citizen Academy...Durham Radio beats back Ransomware attack...Tenille Townes' six nods leads CCMA noms...Brampton’s Wondagurl lands major publishing deal...Jessie Reyez’s Far Away wins Prism Prize in an online ceremony....SJC Media appoints Ken Hunt President and Publisher, overseeing St. Joseph's Communications' magazine fleet: Maclean’s, Chatelaine, HELLO! Canada and Quill & Quire...Netflix shifts US$100M cash into Black-owned banks that serve the Black community...Sirius XM buys podcast host Simplecast for full-on podcast distribution and a monetization system for podcast creators...

Canada's most valuable company? Ottawa-based e-commerce titan Shopify - at a $121B market capitalization...Postmedia Q3 revenue down more than 25%...NordStar raises bid for Torstar ownership to $60M...Community Radio commits nearly $500K to advertising and promotion to support local businesses...Toronto's G98.7-FM to be sold after being placed in "investigative receivership”...Since Chatham Asset Management took over Postmedia, Canada’s largest newspaper chain, 1,600 employees have been laid off and over 30 papers shut down. Over two years, Postmedia booked losses totaling about $40M in Canadian dollars and spent nearly $127M on debt payments...

Billionaire John Malone now controls Live Nation, iHeartRadio, SIRIUSXM, Ticketmaster, and Pandora...Q magazine folds after 34 years...Declines in ad revenue and the shifting audience trend to OTT prompts the Corus-owned Global Television Network to lay off 70 journalists and pivot away from non-news...Netflix calls for Canadian content pitches...Vancouver-based Destiny Media Technologies Inc. (DSNY) reports fiscal third-quarter profit of $55,000...For sale: Halifax radio stations CKHZ, Hot Country and CKHY by HFX Broadcasting parent Evanov Communications...TikTok launches a $200M fund to pay US creators for their videos...Ontario court approves NordStar takeover of Toronto Star...Monica Song replaces Peter Grant as broadcasting arbitrator at Dentons Canada’s communications law practice and as head of its federal regulatory group in Ottawa...Impresario Charles Khabouth opens CityView Drive-In, an all-new downtown drive-in theatre and outdoor concert venue adjacent to his Rebel Nightclub.  Monster Truck kicked off the festivities on July 16...Cirque du Soleil files for bankruptcy...The Big Wreck, Headstones, Moist and The Tea Party tour is bumped to 2021...Acclaimed composer and trans artist Beverly Glenn-Copeland issues 'his' first piece of new music in 15+ years with the single, River Dreams...

Country singer/songwriter Tenille Townes raises $89K during her virtual Big Hearts For Big Kids fundraise. All proceeds benefit Sunrise House (a Grande Prairie youth shelter and Girl Scouts of Middle Tennessee’s Troop 6000. Over 11 years, Townes has raised over $2M, mainly on Sunrise House's behalf..  After winning a Juno for Instrumental Album of the Year for Inscape, Montréal pianist/composer Alexandra Stréliski was presented with a platinum record for selling 80,000+ copies in Canada and a silver ticket — certified by ADISQ —  for selling more than 25,000 concert tickets throughout Québec...After allegations of racially discriminatory behaviour at Toronto's The Drake Hotel, company’s founder Jeff Stober retires as CEO. The criticism prompted the Polaris Music Prize to cease using the venue...Stony Plain Records head and veteran broadcaster Holger Petersen receives  the Alberta Award of Excellence for  lifetime  achievement...Halifax Pop Explosion director resigns as the music fest gets called out for systemic racism...UK government outlines a $2B funding package for the arts...Hipgnosis Songs Fund revenues top US$80M so far this year..Kiwi band L.A.B's sold-out concert draws fans turned to New Zealand's first major music gig since the Covid-19 lockdown...Kanye West declares 2020 US presidential run..

Ryan Adams publicly apologizes for relationship harm he's caused following accusations of sexual misconduct and emotional abuse...Dine Alone Records and Dallas Green (City and Colour/Alexisonfire) raise $175K together with celebrity friends via a special raffle. Proceeds to charities in support of Black Lives Matter...Spotify announces its RADAR emerging artists' program in Canada, spotlighting Toronto R&B act Emanuel and his first EP, Session 1: Disillusion...The business portion of Toronto club The Rivoli is for sale for $499K....Ex-WMC VP Steve Waxman posts Season Two of his podcast The Creationists...On Global Forgiveness Day (July 7), rising Canadian country star Lindsay Ell releases, make you, a song that addresses surviving sexual violence. Ell also launches the Make You Movement, a charitable fund earmarked to assist organizations that support at-risk youth, domestic abuse and sexual assault survivors...The Comedy Records Presents 10 Years album features comedians Arthur Simeon, Clare Belford, K Trevor Wilson, and more...Montréal's Simple Plan parts ways with bassist David Desrosiers following claims of sexual misconduct by Desrosiers were vented on social media.. Sexual allegations aired against Québec singer-songwriter Bernard Adamus on Instagram prompted his record label, Gross Boite/Dare to Care to drop him...

Britney Spears is a fan of world music guitarist/composer Jesse Cook, playing his music while she practices yoga on the beach...Canadian vinyl sales decrease to 311,000 units in the first half of 2020, compared to 420,000 in the first half of 2019....East Coast Music Awards featured female winners in only four of 27 award categories....Toronto rapper Tory Lanez may have been arrested in LA for the felony of carrying a concealed weapon in a vehicle, but Twitter can't stop talking about his height...Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino unveils a $10M initiative to promote greater diversity...SiriusXM acquires podcasting platform Stitcher for $325M....Google invests $4.5B in JioSaavn parent Jio Platforms for a 7.7% stake...Sony sells Syco TV formats to Simon Cowell, but retains the music catalogue...Advance, Canada’s Black Music Business Collective, is a new non-profit formed to provide a unified voice and create change for Black people working within all sectors of the Canadian music industry.. July Talk announces a pair of drive-in shows August 12-13 in Newmarket promoted by Live Nation...SOCAN reveals the immediate departure of Jeff Price from wholly-owned Audiam. SOCAN COO Jeff King assumes Audiam CEO duties.... DJ Khaled releases the first two singles, Popstar and Greece, in advance of his 12th studio album,  Khaled Khaled. Both feature Drake... Music Canada certifies a platinum album for After Hours and a quintuple platinum single Blinding Lights for The Weeknd. Señorita, the smash from Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello, registers 7x platinum.. Daniel Caesar, Jessie Reyez, Justin Bieber, and Y2K & bbno$ also score certifications...The Hamilton Urban Precinct Entertainment Group wins city council approval to undertake a multimillion-dollar revamp of the city’s downtown entertainment venues, including city-owned FirstOntario Centre, FirstOntario Concert Hall and the Hamilton Convention Centre -  an estimated  $400M-$500M investment...Morning Music Limited marks 50 years in the biz. Incorporated in 1971 by Stompin’ Tom Connors, his manager Jury Krytiuk and Mark Altman, the publisher - now solely owned by  Altman,  boasts over 3,000 domestic copyrights...Red Bull cuts ties with the entertainment industry with the exception of the U.S..-based Red Bull Records ... Sony Music Canada signs BC country band Tim & The Glory Boys....Unison Benevolent Fund launches #WithoutMusic, a collaborative social media campaign that encourages participants to detail the positive and lasting impact of music in their lives...

Toronto-based LyricFind expands with two new remote teams in India and South Africa....Spotify and Universal Music Group ink a new global licensing deal...Burt Bacharach, 92, releases Blue Umbrella, his first new batch of songs in 15 years, collaborating with Grammy-winning writer/producer Daniel Tashian...Sony Music Canada drops Toronto's Langston Francis after multiple sexual misconduct allegations...Veteran Aldo Nova returns with When All Is Said And Done from his forthcoming rock opera The Life And Times Of Eddie Gage... Alyssa Reid, reinventing herself as ASHS, now an in-demand writer for bülow and Virginia to Vegas.... Toronto's Choir! Choir! Choir! and Rufus Wainwright team up to film the Beatles classic, Across The Universe with 1500 singers... Drake sets new record for scoring the most Top 10 singles - 40 -  in the history of the US Billboard chart, overtaking previous record-holder Madonna, who had held the record since 2008... CES (Consumer Electronics Show) in Las Vegas is cancelled over covid concerns....

Tory Lanez is the subject of a petition to have the US government deport him back to Canada amidst unanswered questions about an alleged fight with fellow rapper Megan Thee Stallion. Megan ended up shot in each foot before Lanez was arrested on a concealed firearms charge...The Canada Council for the Arts taps Indigenous broadcaster/writer Jesse Wente as the new Chair of its Board for a 5-year term...,  Shania Twain to partner with Reel World Management and two executive producers of Netflix series Virgin River to adapt author Debbie Macomber’s Heart of Texas novels as a TV series. R.I.P.: Former CAB President and CFO Michael McCabe, George Elroy Boyd, Canada's first black newscaster...spaghetti-western film composer Ennio Morricone, country star Charlie Daniels, Canadian broadway actor Nick Cordero, Matthew Good bass player Rich 'Rock' Priske, SNFU founder and frontman Chi Pig (Kendall Chinn), Glee star Naya Rivera, jazz singer Annie Ross,  Fleetwood Mac co-founder Peter Green, Venues; Montréal’s  La Vitrola, Toronto's Orbit Room, Waterloo's Starlight Social Club, Toronto's N'Awlins Jazz Bar & Grill.

AUGUST

Paul Farberman now manages CZN... Meghan Symsyk replaces Duncan McKie as FACTOR CEO at year’s end...Feldman launches IP firm with New Metric Media...Three Alan Thicke songs inducted into CSHF...Black music professionals get $2M boost with T.O./Slaight initiative...Robert Ott resurfaces to publish Storytellers...CMAO Awards proceed as Drive-In event in October...CRTC orders shutdown of Montréal country music radio station CJMS 1040 after failing to meet the requirements of its licence since its 1999 launch...The day after their U.S. Congress grilling, four of the biggest American tech companies saw their combined market value soar by US$250B thanks to earnings that shocked Wall Street....Dave Charles launches Covid ‘At Home Studio’ system with Glenn Prins that offers broadcasters a cost-effective, hi-fi option to keep on-air safe at home while delivering professional quality audio streams...Stingray introduces 10 free music channels with six new US partners...Separately, Stingray Group Inc. says Q1 fiscal revenue fell 35 percent to $52.3M due to pandemic impact...BCE Q2 results: operating revenue was $5.354M, down 9.1% from 2019....CRTC to spend $750M to connect 51 communities with broadband in the N.W.T., Yukon and northern Manitoba - 10,100 households in all...

George Stroumboulopoulos - "Strombo" - joins Apple Music Radio’s rebrand Apple Music Hits as daily on-air host...The Canadian Association of Broadcasters (CAB) releases "The Crisis in Canadian Media and the Future of Local Broadcasting," projecting the possible closure of 50 radio stations within four-to-six months and a further 150 radio stations in the following 18 months. The news isn't good for TV either: closures of 40 or more of Canada's 94 private local TV stations within the next 36 months...Toronto's The Weeknd earns six nods, Justin Bieber earns three and Drake gets two, for the 2020 Video Music Awards. 17-year-old Calgarian pop sensation Tate McRae is nominated for Push Best New Artist...The Kingsway Music Library,  a boutique sample library created by Toronto producer Frank Dukes, launches the new Kingsway Collaborations series with veteran Canadian producer David Bendeth, CVRE and Brandon Leger...19-year-old Brampton experimental hip-hop and hardcore artist Dear-God signs with Dine Alone Records.... Winnipeg's Indigenous roots artist William Prince wins the 2020 English SOCAN $5K Songwriting Prize for The Spark...Vocal superstar Michael Bublé is the newest member of the Order of British Columbia...Smile, the collaboration between late US hip-hop star Juice WRLD and The Weeknd, is out on Grade A/Interscope Records...Toronto's Jazz Bistro re-opens for performances with  Colin Hunter and the Joe Sealy Quartet...

Kathleen Edwards releases Total Freedom, her first album in five years, with a livestream performance from her Ottawa cafe, Quitters Coffee... Metallica plays its first show of 2020 for the Encore Drive-In Nights series, shown at hundreds of drive-in and outdoor theatres across the US and Canada.Three Days Grace opens...The Weeknd's smash hit Blinding Lights posts an unprecedented 21st week at No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot R&B Songs chart - breaking the previous record of 20 tracks shared by Drake’s One Dance, featuring WizKid and Kyla, The Weeknd’s own Starboy, featuring Daft Punk, and Bruno Mars’ That’s What I Like...Universal signs two major deals in China and launches JV label with Tencent Music...US-based internet service provider Cox Communications asks a federal court to significantly reduce, by US$243M, the US$1B copyright infringement fine awarded to Sony, Universal and Warner and others in Dec. 2019  ...Songwriters dealt blow in Spotify royalty battle as streaming services granted 'procedural victory' in US appeals court, preventing a 44% increase to streaming royalty rates paid to songwriters.... Jazz great Oscar Peterson is at the centre of Montréal street renaming debate...  The video for Laugh Now, Cry Later, the first single from Drake's upcoming Certified Lover Boy album, was filmed entirely at Nike world corporate headquarters in Beaverton, Oregon...The legendary Buffy Sainte-Marie headlines 2 Rivers Remix, B.C.’s debut fest of contemporary Indigenous music, with Snotty Nosed Rez Kids and Kinnie Starr...

Beggars Group, home to indie labels such as XL Recordings, Matador, 4AD and Rough Trade, generated £63.1m ($83.4m) in total turnover last year...The Weeknd donates $300,000 to Global Aid for Lebanon to assist victims of the devastating Aug 4. explosion in  Beirut.....The Weeknd donates $2.15M to coronavirus relief, Black Lives Matter and social justice organizations in just over two months....The Sadies kick off the Horseshoe Tavern's live-streaming concert series... Toronto-based management company and indie record label Jayward Artist Group, headed by executive Jill Snell and artist/songwriter Tebey, sign PunkWithAnF to the label...Ex-President Barack Obama's annual summer playlist features Canadians Drake, Andy Shauf and PartyNextDoor...BC Arts Council will administer a $2M Arts Infrastructure Program that will providing grants up to $7.5K  for improving arts and culture spaces, including acquisitions or renovations, or $40K for purchasing special equipment for arts programming to arts and cultural organizations, including Indigenous groups... Donna Lidster upped to Vice President, Marketing – Canada at Big Machine Label Group....Toronto Mayor John Tory identifies 45 city music venues that will receive a combined $1.7 million in property tax relief. The Cameron House, The Garrison, The Dakota, Lee's Palace, The Rivoli, The Rex, The Phoenix, Horseshoe Tavern, Burdock, and Lula Lounge are among the beneficiaries...Danny Kenyon, cellist in the popular Regina folk/bluegrass band The Dead South, departs the group after online allegations of sexual misconduct.... The Tragically Hip sells Courage facemasks for $15 to raise money for Unison... Megan Thee Stallion blames Toronto's Tory Lanez for allegedly getting shot in the feet in the Hollywood Hills. Her post on Instagram Live: “Yes ... Tory shot me. You shot me and you got your publicist and your people going to these blogs lying.”...During the pandemic, major labels generate $1M+ hourly via streaming...The Rolling Stones open an exclusive flagship store in London...135 English music venues receive £3.36m in grants from the U.K.'s 1.57B Culture Recovery Fund...

Britney Spears' father Jamie remains in control of her conservatorship until 2021, a judge determined in L.A. court...SOCAN’s new Encore program distributes royalties from Facebook/Instagram online concerts. In the first payout round, the org processed 937 submissions for a total sum of $130K+. Approximately $200K is available quarterly until March 7, 2021. Each online concert is eligible for $150...SCENE, a Canadian entertainment loyalty program, is partnering with Universal Music Canada to showcase artists through interactive programming... POP Montréal forges ahead in a revised hybrid form with fewer shows in socially distanced venues and outdoor locations. Lineup includes Polaris winners Backxwash and Lido Pimienta...The Weeknd nabs two MTV Video Music Awards for Blinding Lights - Video of the Year and Best R&B Video, for Blinding Lights. Justin Bieber won in the new Best Music Video from Home category for his collaboration with Ariana Grande for Stuck with U...Dance music hitmaker Calvin Harris and The Weeknd have joined forces on a new track, Over Now (via Columbia Records).... Legendary Toronto venue The El Mocambo officially reopens Sept. 10 with a livestream concert by Big Wreck...Singer Kasha Anne splits from Edmonton roots-rock band The Orchard....R.I.P.: Canadian stage actor Brent Carver, singer Salome Bey, Brighton Rock singer and Isotope Music and Precision Pressing head Gerry McGhee, Toronto promoter Ron Gaskin, classical guitarist Julian Bream, UFO's Pete Way, singer and songwriter Justin Townes Earle, media magnate Sumner Redstone, Canadian columnists Richard Gwyn and Allan Fotheringham.

SEPTEMBER

Men Without Hats, for "Safety Dance" and "Pop Goes The World," and The Rankin Family, for "Fare Thee Well, Love" enter CSHF...FACTOR support for music industry totals $25.2M over past year..UMC's B.L.A.C.K. Label Coalition creates $250K scholarship fund...TD partners with The Weeknd’s Hxouse incubator to form Black Hxouse...Paquin Entertainment Group opens Nashville office, hires three new agent execs...Shawn Mendes leads SOCAN Awards with five wins, including SOCAN International Achievement Award, presented in a virtual ceremony...Honey Jam celebrates 25th anniversary live from the El Mo......Rogers offers to buy Cogeco in partnership with American cable company Altice USA for $10.3B...Apple now valued at $2.3T (yes, that's trillion)...The province of Manitoba orders end to print, newspapers, magazine and periodical subscriptions for government orgs, including schools....Nielsen announces $1B debt offering...TekSavvy wins appeal, demands millions from Bell, Rogers as a key CRTC decision concerning the wholesale rates that the large carriers charge is not overturned....According to the CRTC, Canada’s broadcaster revenues declined by 1.3% between 2018 and 2019.  The biggest drop in revenue was from CBC conventional television, as it collectively reported a decrease of $116M.. Commercial radio stations reported annual growth of -3.9%, the largest year-over-year decrease since 2015. Over 700 commercial radio stations reported revenues of $1.453M in 2019, compared to $1.513M in 2018. Commercial TV stations reported revenues of $1,554M in 2019, a year-over-year increase of 0.8%.

While satellite service providers report the largest subscription drops of the three television service provider segments, they continue to have the highest profitability: 28.1% (satellite); 17.6% (cable); and 4.5% (IPTV).... RIAA: streaming currently 85% of U.S. recorded music revenue...US Disney+ viewers on track to surpass Hulu by 2024:..Global newspaper advertising is set to decline by $8B in 2020, with global circulation revenues down $6.5B...Michael Hollett announces ‘Next’ magazine venture...Penske Media pays US$225M for majority ownership of PMRC...PMC will bring Variety, Rolling Stone and Music Business Worldwide together with MRC’s The Hollywood Reporter, Billboard and Vibe under the PMRC umbrella. Day-to-day operations will be led by PMC...Vancouver rockers Marianas Trench announce two hometown virtual performances from The Commodore Ballroom on Oct. 15... The SOCAN Foundation today introduced the launch of the Black Canadian Music Awards, in partnership with SiriusXM Canada. The Awards will recognize and celebrate the artistic merit demonstrated by Black music creators (songwriters, composers, producers, etc.) in all genres. Five winners will each receive $5K...Live Nation Canada starts a drive-in concert series, presented by the AIR MILES Reward Program, at the Edmonton Inn and Conference Centre, featuring Corb Lund, Electronic DJs and producers The Funk Hunters... Columbia Artists Management Inc., a popular agency representing classical artists, closed its doors this week due to the "prolonged pandemic environment.” Among those the agency has represented: Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein and James Levine...The video for DJ Khaled's Popstar features Drake and Justin Bieber... Live Nation Canada, in partnership with  DNA Live, announces Dean Brody  as part of the Budweiser Zero Concert Series at the Wesley Clover Parks drive-in venue.

The Darcys sign to Warner Music Canada...The Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame (CSHF)  inducts the breakthrough Rough Trade hit, High School Confidential, written by group founders Carole Pope and Kevan Staples...Shawn Mendes performs at the 2020 TIFF Tribute Awards - and also partners with the film festival and his own Shawn Mendes Foundation to sponsor a new $10,000 award in support of civic-minded cinema. The Shawn Mendes Foundation Changemaker Award will be given to a festival film that tackles issues of social change....Liability insurance tough to find for live music industry...Once border restrictions with the US ease, musicians from Canada face a steep 50%+ increase in visa application fees..An O visa, applying to “Individuals with Extraordinary Ability or Achievement,” increases 53% from $460 to $705.. The P visa, which can be used by related family members to the applicant, will increase to $695. ..Céline Dion has announced next year’s rescheduled dates for the North American leg of her Courage world tour, originally postponed in March due to Covid. She begins in Winnipeg on Aug. 16 and ends in Pittsburgh on Sept. 24... London Music Week events proceeded in virtual form, including a keynote address from Ken Caillat, the man behind Fleetwood Mac's Rumours...The late Neil Peart was honoured by The Modern Drummer Festival tribute concert featuring Mike Portnoy, Carl Palmer, Stewart Copeland, Taylor Hawkins and others. Proceeds benefitted to brain tumour research at L.A.'s Cedar-Sinai Medical Center....

Joni Mitchell opens her vault for the Joni Mitchell Archives, a new series of box set releases that will span the next few years...The Burlington Performing Arts Centre (BPAC)  returned to live performance with a max of 50 patrons per show for hometown faves The Spoons and songwriter Chantal Kreviazuk... Montréal music veteran Keith Brown publishes his memoir, Truly Unfamous.... Award-winning Canadian bluesman Steve Strongman signs a multi-faceted deal with Linus Entertainment...Toronto's The Dakota Tavern threatens closure due to insurance woes...Musicians hold a second fundraiser at the Ironwood Bar & Grill to help Calgary music venues hit hard by the pandemic...Paradigm permanently lays off 180 employees...TIDAL partners with Facebook for VR concerts....Country singer Mickey Guyton, the first black woman to perform at ACM Awards, sings What Are You Gonna Tell Her, co-written by Canadians Victoria Banks, Emma-Lee and Karen Koswoski as her TV number...Despite public protests to the contrary, Kanye West already owns some of his masters, Universal contracts reveal...Blur’s The Great Escape turns 25...Steve Earle to record an album of his late son Justin Townes Earle’s songs...Seattle’s Anita ‘Lady A’ White files lawsuit to block country stars’ use of name...Live Nation’s members-only venue Lake House, a restaurant, bar and patio built on the backstage rooftop of Toronto’s Budweiser Stage, held a social-distanced soiree with food, drink, and three acoustic songs from The Sheepdogs. The rock band later played onsite at the OLG Play Stage Drive-in at Ontario Place, live-streamed for the guests...Brett Kissel, Tenille Townes, Dallas Smith win three major CCMA Awards each, including TD Entertainer of the Year Award for Smith...

Tenille Townes claims the ACM Award for New Female Artist of the Year, topping a category that included fellow Canuck Lindsay Ell. Townes also shared the award for Music Event of the Year, as part of a group of female artists supporting Miranda Lambert on Fooled Around and Fell in Love...CARAS appoints four new Board members: Alexandra Bellamy: Managing Director, Head of Assurance and Advisory, CPP Investment; Sky Bridges: Chief Operating Officer, APTN; Helen Britton: President & CEO, Six Shooter Inc., and Miro Oballa: Partner, Taylor Oballa Murray Leyland LLP... Drake, an executive producer of HBO teen drama  Euphoria, had a taste of Emmy glory when the show's lead, Zendaya, won for Best Actress in a Drama Series... Western Canadian Music Award (WCMAs)  winners include Gerry Atwell, presented with the 2020 Heritage Award, and William Prince, a triple victor for  Recording of the Year.....English soul singer-songwriter Michael Kiwanuka wins the 2020 Mercury Prize for his third album Kiwanuka .R.I.P.: Singer Lucille Starr, jazz bassist Gary Peacock, reggae singer Toots Hibbert, singer Bruce Murray, Elvis Presley drummer W.S. "Fluke" Holland, singer and songwriter Mac Davis, and singer Helen Reddy.

OCTOBER

CSHF inducts Shirley Eikhard's Bonnie Raitt hit, “Something To Talk About”...Bernie Breen is on a mission as new Chair of Unison...Meghan Patrick Tops CMAO Awards with three wins...Allan Slaight Juno Master Class long lists finalists with Abigail Lapell and J.J. Shiplett among those making the cut... Darryl Hurs takes Indie Week virtual....CMRRA reports $12M Q3 payout to members...Bandzoogle paid out $5M to musicians since pandemic...Randy Lennox announces Bell Media departure...Unison launches GoFundMe campaign with Slaight support...Sunrise Records owner re-brews tea chain...Broadcasters unify with ‘HireBIPOC’ initiative in a plan to “eradicate systemic racism in the media and entertainment industries.” With 500 members registered, the online roster includes 20+ Canadian media organizations....Québec announces $50M bailout plan for theatres, other venues...Google trumpets the Canadian launch of Google News Showcase, a new “news experience” that will partner them with online publishers like Village Media, Narcity and 200 publications across Brazil, Germany, the UK, Argentina and Australia. Google says it will pay US$1B+ to publishers that create and curate content for first three years...Influencer marketing agency Takumi indicates that 73% of businesses are directing more financial resources into influencer marketing now than prior to the pandemic...

Toronto’s FLOW 93-5 says goodbye to The Breakfast Club, a ratings boondoggle. Local hosts Blake Carter and Peter Kash return to mornings...National Post’s Toronto newsroom staff votes to unionize...Howard Stern closing in on blockbuster deal with SiriusXM worth US$120M annually...A Federal Court of Appeal ruling states that Copyright Board-approved tariffs aren't “mandatory” for parties that use unlicensed content, even though that has been the practice. The ruling undermines the fundamentals of copyright collectives in Canada that license member content...The Global Podcasting Market  expects to reach $41.8B in value by 2026... A $21m federal wage subsidy program helped pump Postmedia’s balance sheet to a Q4 profit of $13.5M profit. Unfortunately, there's a deficit increase to $16.2M as of Aug. 31, compared with $6.3M in fiscal 2019, according to its annual report. Revenue dropped nearly 18 percent to $508.4M...Toronto is getting a massive new hub for movie studios and digital media — 8.9 acres of it to be exact — on the waterfront...Toronto is looking for a production company to help run the Basin Media Hub..., Cogeco 'definitively' rejects Altice takeover bid...Neeti P. Ray is the new owner of G98.7FM... Quibi’s billion-dollar short-form video platform craps out...Rogers Communications reports a healthy recovery from the early months of the pandemic, earning $512 million or $1.01 per diluted share for the quarter ending Sept. 30...Corus Q4 profit rises, earning $33.2m or 16 cents per share, up from an adjusted profit of $27.9 million or 13 cents per share a year ago....Corus radio saw revenue drop 43 percent to $19.3 million from $33.7 million....Netflix Q3 numbers reveal that the streamer added 2.2 million subscribers for the quarter and reached 195.15 million global subscribers in total by September 30...Penske Media & MRC announce data joint venture to align their data businesses. The newly formed company will combine MRC Data, formerly known as Nielsen Music, Alpha Data, formerly known as BuzzAngle, and Variety Business Intelligence, with control and ownership over the combined entity shared by MRC and PMC...

Cuban-Canadian singer/songwriter Alex Cuba earns two 2020 Latin Grammy nods for his 2019 album Sublime with fellow Canadians John 'Beetle' Bailey and Harry Hess named for Best Engineer...Another Canadian nominee, Polaris Prize winner Lido Pimienta, is cited for Best Alternative Album for Miss Colombia...Award-winning manager Louis O’Reilly resurrects On Ramp Entertainment artist management company with longtime clients Brett Kissel and Cory Marks, as Kissel signs with Nashville label Verge Records....Toronto rock band Kiwi Jr. signs to US indie label Sub Pop Records...Hamilton Music Collective HQ reopens as The Gasworks after a $2.5M. transformation...The Weeknd, Justin Bieber, and J. Balvin invest in animated concert-streaming company Wave...Backxwash wins the 2020 Polaris Music Prize for her gothic rap-metal album “God Has Nothing to Do With This Leave Him Out of It.” Backxwash is the first transgender female artist to win the Polaris...Vivendi, the Universal Music Group parent turned over $1.14B in streaming revenues in the three months ending in September, up 22.6% from the prior-year quarter. Vivendi confirms that UMG will launch an IPO in 2022...WMG Acquisition Corp raises $250M in additional Senior Secured Notes via a private offering... BMG announces its entry into the live music business,  acquiring a majority stake in Undercover GmbH, an independent German promotion company and event agency...Warner Music Group executives shared a $593M incentive plan stock value jackpot following the firm’s IPO listing on Nasdaq in June...Debbie Harry, 75, announces a Blondie U.K. tour in 2021...

Only 41 songs in history have been certified diamond in the US:. Baby by Justin Bieber featuring Ludacris comes in at No. 2...The Friends of Canadian Broadcasting debuts new YouTube video interview series The Chesterfield, hosted by songwriter and performance artist iskwē and former Toronto Star music scribe Ben Rayner... Bandzoogle launches new integrated options for videos and live streams to help independent musicians maximize control and revenue.....Tory Lanez, charged with assaulting a woman believed to be Megan Thee Stallion, faces a possible maximum sentence of 22 years and eight months in prison...Noted Canadian indie label 604 Records (home of  Carly Rae Jepsen, Marianas Trench, and Dallas Smith) signs pop singer/songwriter Madisyn Gifford...In 2020, the Unison Benevolent Fund has seen a 29% increase in demand for counselling services and a 61% increase in urgent mental health crisis intervention cases. An emergency GoFundMe campaign (with a $50K goal) to aid music workers during the pandemic has been initiated...BC rock singer/songwriter Paul Hyde (Payola$, Rock & Hyde) premiered his Montréal art exhibition, Because I Say So, at the city's BBAM! Gallery...Wonder, a new documentary about singer/songwriter Shawn Mendes, debuts ahead of his fourth studio album ,also called Wonder...Juno-winning Hamilton roots-rocker Tom Wilson (Junkhouse, Lee Harvey Osmond, Blackie and the Rodeo Kings) is arrested during a protest against a housing development in Caledonia that has angered the local Indigenous community...Prolific Canadian documentary filmmaker, singer-songwriter and Abenaki Nation member Alanis Obomsawin is the 13th Glenn Gould Prize Laureate...Marking the third anniversary of Gord Downie's passing, Ottawa station CHEZ 106.1 transformed itself into GORD FM for 12 hours, raising funds for local cancer research....

.Electronic music band Bob Moses partners with Twitch, which will serve as the sole destination to catch future Bob Moses branded livestreams...Noted Canadian journalist/author Michael Posner has just published Leonard Cohen, Untold Stories -The Early Years, the first of a planned trilogy of oral biographies about the bard of Montréal published by Simon and Schuster...Montréal’s avant-garde outfit Bell Orchestre returns and signs with British independent label, Erased Tapes...Carroll Baker, Canada’s First Lady of Country Music, is now the proud owner of the historic Port Medway Baptist Church in Nova Scotia... Live Nation Canada/Shocap Entertainment  resurrect Vancouver’s historic Palomar Supper Club with a Jill Barber and her Phantom Jazz Band immersive concert combining virtual reality with XR technology...Drake teases the release of a new album, Certified Lover Boy, for Jan. 2021....Folk Music Ontario Award winners include The Pairs (Songwriter of the Year), and Abigail Lapell (Recording Artist of the Year). The Estelle Klein Award, a lifetime achievement honour, went to veteran singer/songwriter Tannis Slimmon....On the 40th anniversary of The Kings’ hit This Beat Goes On/Switchin’ to Glide, the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame (CSHF) honoured the mash-up song...The Weeknd and Roddy Ricch top the nominations for the 2020 American Music Awards, each with eight....Mav Karlo (the solo project from Menno Versteeg of Hollerado), releases a debut album, Strangers Like Us, on his Royal Mountain imprint...Fast-rising  R&B singer-songwriter Emanuel's song Black Woman has streamed almost 500K times...Québec singer Éric Lapointe received a sentence this week for pleading guilty to assaulting a woman last year.  If he follows the conditions of his probation, he will have no criminal record...

Céline Dion will be featured alongside Sam Heughan and Priyanka Chopra Jonas in an upcoming Sony Screen Gems romantic drama, tentatively titled Text for You., written and directed by Jim Strouse...Toronto blues-rock guitarist/singer Anthony Gomes' album, Containment Blues, debuts at No. 1 on the Billboard Blues chart...R.I.P.: Singer Johnny Nash, guitar legend Eddie Van Halen; recording engineer Donald C. Hahn,  Canadian soprano Erin Wall... King Crimson singer Gordon Haskell, country legend Billy Joe Shaver, James Bond actor Sean Connery, Venues: Collingwood, ON's  CROW  Bar and Variety

NOVEMBER

Slaight Foundation adds $5M more to Massey Hall renovation project...CRTC Chair Ian Scott addresses ISP Summit 2020...SOCAN releases 2019 Annual Report that include record-setting domestic collections of $315.1M....2020 Slaight Family Polaris Heritage Prize winners revealed, including Beverly Glenn-Copeland's Keyboard Fantasies...Walk Of Fame Initiative names Dancehall duo Allydice as grand prize winner...Bieber, Drake, Kaytranada head Canadian Grammy nominees. Notably absent: The Weeknd...Show & Hospitality Coalition presses Feds for immediate help....The federal government tables changes to the Broadcasting Act that will require online streaming services to contribute as much as $830M yearly towards Canadian content by 2023. Bill C-10 would expand the authority of the CRTC to include such services as Crave, Netflix and Disney Plus...The cost of the U.S. Presidential election won by Joe Biden is expected to hit nearly US$14B, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. The total cost of the 2016 presidential campaign was $2.4B...Broadcast Dialogue creates the Canadian Radio Awards...TikTok quietly making inroads into Canada, setting up a Toronto office and hiring 50. The TikTok app surpasses 2.5B downloads globally...:LinkedIn announces $100M glitch, overcharging over 400K advertisers for two years based on inflated video metrics...Apple reduces 30% take of new subscribers’ payments to 15%...Rogers Sports & Media cuts staff and axes Breakfast Television Calgary and BTVancouver, as well as the JACK 96.9 (CJAX-FM) Vancouver morning show...Castlepoint Numa Inc. sells minority interest in Pinewood Toronto Studios to majority shareholder Bell Media...Bell Media and Grandé Studios announce partnership...Sunrise Records owner Doug Putman acquires most DavidsTea outlets, rechristening them as T. Kettle...BuzzFeed buys HuffPost...

Shawn Mendes forms Permanent Content with manager Andrew Gertler;  a company that will focus on scripted and documentary projects that reflect issues important to young people...France is taxing big tech companies...Zoomermedia increases 2019-2020 income to $4.6M from $2.9M the year previous...Affected by COVID-19, the tourism sector registered 11,020 closures in April...Paul Larsen buys Kelowna’s 103.9 CKOO-FM for $500K....The Ongoing History of New Music hits 10M downloads...Jack de Keyzer, JW-Jones, Samantha Martin and Delta Sugar, and Downchild lead 24th Annual Maple Blues Awards nominations. Winners will be announced online from four cities over four nights –Feb. 1, 8, 15, and 22...  BC's Alex Cuba performs on the Latin Grammy Awards, Nov. 19... Glass Tiger releases first Christmas album, Songs for a Winter’s Night, featuring Nova Scotia fiddler Natalie MacMaster, Roch Voisine and Lebanese-Canadian soprano Isabel Bayrakdarian as guests. Gordon Lightfoot makes a brief appearance to read Ode for a Winter’s Night... Toronto's famous Colonial Tavern, once one of North America's top music clubs, is now commemorated with a granite disc etched into the sidewalk at its former site of 203 Yonge Street. with the names of many of the stars who played in the club...Singer-songwriter Emm Gryner releases her first-ever jazz album, Just for You, dedicated to her father....Hipgnosis Songs acquires 42 catalogs, comprising more than 33,000 songs pennedy by 1500 songwriters, from Kobalt Music Copyrights S.à.r.l. for $322.9M...Spotify confirms plans to allow artists and record labels to flag tracks that are a particular priority for them via a ‘Discovery Mode’ feature…

TikTok signs a new licensing agreement with Sony Music Entertainment...The Grammy Awards change the name of the best world music album category to best global music album...With little advance fanfare, chart-topping rapper and producer Nav releases a new mixtape, Emergency Tsunami....Radio Starmaker Fund 's Board of Directors creates a new program to support music creation Canadian musicians who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour. This is be a "stepping stone" program that recognizes the systemic barriers that prevent otherwise eligible applicants from qualifying for the established Starmaker programs... As Chief Membership and Business Development Officer Michael McCarty departs SOCAN,  Robert Bennett joins the company as CFO...The Weeknd teams up with Maluma to release a remix of global hit, Hawai, marking the first time he has sung in Spanish...Vancouver's Commodore Ballroom celebrates its 90th birthday with Colin James performing two shows as part of the venue's Live From Inside streaming series...Round 2 of First Up with RBCxMusic includes 27 emerging musicians and recording artists. Those artists along with nine alumni from Round 1 will receive a $1K stipend to perform a short virtual set hosted on the artist’s personal Instagram channel, with media and promotional support from RBCxMusic...Artist ambassadors include Ali Gatie, DVSN, and Tenille Arts, while The Remix Project will help host virtual community workshops...CMW announces CZN as the 2020 National Champions of the Jim Beam National Talent Search...The TSO partners with Against the Grain Theatre for a new, innovative version of Handel's Messiah, entitled Messiah/Complex.... Walk Off The Earth joins Brett Kissel in the video for his hit song A Few Good Stories that features pets...The Weeknd headlines the Super Bowl Half-time Show February 7...Canadian pop star Johnny Orlando takes home a 2020 MTV Europe Music Award (EMA) for Best Canadian Act for the second year in a row... FACTOR awards $90,525 to Grimes’ Canadian record company, Crystal Math Music, drawing some public derision due to the fact that the singer and songwriter is partnered with uber-rich entrepreneur Elon Musk...Acclaimed Canadian roots singer/songwriter Tami Neilson makes a major mark in her current base of New Zealand, with Hey Bus Driver winning Country Song of the Year at the New Zealand Country Music Awards.. 

Toronto pop singer/songwriter Scott Helman debuts as video director for his latest single Lois...Indie Week's virtual conference draws more than 1000 participants, with over 357,049 sponsor impressions... Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Canadian Heritage, announces the final recipient for the third cohort of the Creative Export Canada program, Alberta's Byta Internet....The RBC Launchpad music entrepreneurship program is a new platform dedicated to supporting and empowering local emerging artists, music creators, and entrepreneurs...Hard rock legend Alice Cooper sings on the title track of children’s entertainer duo Splash ‘N Boots’ latest album Heart Parade...Céline Dion and her attorney speak out after California Labor Commission attorney David Gurley ruled against the singer and ordered her to continue paying her former agent Rob Prinz of ICM Partners commissions on a $489 million touring contract he negotiated...UK trade paper Music Week ends 60-year run as a weekly publication...Warner Music Greater China CEO, Andy Ma, exits after seven months....Managers Irving Azoff and Jon Landau are inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame..The Weeknd wins three American Music Awards, for Favorite Soul/R&B album (After Hours), Favorite Soul/R&B Song (Heartless), and Favorite Soul and R&B Artist., Justin Bieber also wins three - one  as Favorite Male Artist - Pop/Rock. and two for his hit collaboration with Dan + Shay, 10,000 Hours...Shawn Mendes’ fourth studio album, Wonder, features Monster, a collaboration with Bieber....

Rapper Lil Berete, hailed by some major US mags as Toronto's most important new MC on the scene, teams up with Louisville rapper 2KBABY on his latest single Murda...The tragic death of Scott Johnson, a member of Radiohead's tech crew at Toronto's Downsview Park prior to a 2012 show returned to the news last week. The Discipline Committee of the Association of Professional Engineers of Ontario held a hearing into the actions of Domenic Cugliari, the man responsible for the design and approval of the stage for that concert.  During the hearing, Cugliari “acknowledged…his catalogue of errors and the negligence on his part that led to the stage collapse and Scott’s death,” the band said.... Live Nation, Optex Staging and Cugliari were charged with 13 offences under Ontario's provincial health and safety laws. Those charges were ultimately stayed after the defendants successfully argued that the case had faced unreasonable delays...Canadian pop/rocker Avril Lavigne buys seriously snazzy house in  Malibu, CA. for $7.8 million...London’s landmark music venue Call the Office is closing its doors indefinitely amid the pandemic,...Bertelsmann acquires U.S. publisher Simon & Schuster from ViacomCBS for more than US$2B...SoundCloud achieves first-ever profitable quarter in Q3 this year, posting €147.6M (US$165.7M) in revenues, up 37% year-over-year....Def Jam announces London-born twin brothers Alec and Alex Boateng as co-Presidents of newly-launched frontline UK label 0207 Def Jam...

Governor General, Julie Payette, announces 114 new appointments to the Order of Canada, including Christina Petrowska Quilico, Lara St. John, and Marietta Orlov. Renowned Québec luthier Robert Godin also made the list...The first Music Publishers Canada and the Association of Independent Music Publishers (AIMP) joint virtual songwriting camp deemed a success. Create 49 from the 49th involved Serena Ryder, Begonia, Dave Sampson, Rob Wells & Shobha, Dennis Ellsworth, Jillea, Brian West, Thom D'Arcy, Melissa McClelland, Zaki Ibrahim, and CARYS...Veteran Canadian prog-rock band Saga releases new studio album, Symmetry, through earMusic on March 12...Liam Docherty, 13, is nominated for New Artist of the Year in the Maple Blues Awards....Drake calls for Grammy Award to be replaced as The Weeknd and Lil Uzi Vert are excluded from contention...Eric Clapton joins Van Morrison in protest of the British lockdown to stop Covid from rising.with the single Stand and Deliver...R.I.P. Canadian Jeopardy host Alex Trebek, hockey analyst Howie Meeker, former head CBC TV Current Affairs, William (Bill) John Morgan, music therapy pioneer Fran Herman,  former PolyGram Records Canada President Peter Erdmann, Midnight Oil bassist Bones Hillman, Michael Jackson producer Bruce Swedien, country star Hal Ketchum, Venues: Toronto's The Mod Club

DECEMBER

Pharis & Jason Romero and William Prince lead the 2021 Canadian Folk Music Awards nominations....Junos 50th Anniversary set for May in Toronto...CIMA President Stuart Johnston waves goodbye...Loverboy’s hit debut album gets a 40th anniversary reissue...Canada’s music industry mourns the loss of Doug Chappell... Ruth B. performance raises $160K for MusiCares...New Broadcasting Act bill tabled by Canadian Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault’s bill removes any reference to Canadian ownership and control in the law...Being a news anchor is still a lucrative career. In 2019,  the top 5 U.S. salaries topped US$100M...CBC issues new guidelines on criticized branded content category Tandem, noting "advertising content on its digital platforms must be clearly identified so that it cannot be confused with journalistic content....Ratings: CBC Radio One delivers a 16.9 % share for A12+, as well as  the #1 spot with females 25-54 and an 11.3 % share.   Radio One holds the #1 spot for males 25-54, posting a 12.9% share... CBC Radio One leads the way for M18-34 with 18.1%.... for F18-34, Q107 leads posting a 19.7% (up from 17.3%).  In Vancouver: CKNW grabs the #1 spot for A12+ with a 14.6% share of hours tuned (up from 13.5%)...Edmonton:  UP 99.2 takes #1 with A12+, posting an 8.1% share of hours tuned (flat with the last book). NOW! Radio takes the top spot for F25-54, delivering a 17.2% share (up from 13.9 %)...Calgary: New Talk 770 leads the way for A12+ with a 9.6% share (up from 8.3%) 101.5 Today Radio is popular with females, taking the #1 spot for F25-54 delivering a 15.9% share (up from 14.5 %). Montréal:  CHMP 98.5FM is #1 for A12+ (Franco) with a 20.4% share (down from 21.8%).  For A12+ (Anglo) CJAD 800 is #1 with a 29.8% (up from 28.7%). Anglo), CHOM is #1 at 25.1% (down from 28.5%)...

Gordon Lightfoot performs his first-ever streaming concert at The El Mocambo on Dec. 18...Country trio The Washboard Union wins Entertainer of the Year, Album of the Year for Everbound, Group of the Year and Roots Artist of the Year at the BC Country Music Association Awards... Bad Bunny tops the Spotify 2020 list as the most-streamed artist of the year, with Drake in second place and The Weeknd in fifth. The most-streamed song of 2020 is The Weeknd's Blinding Lights with almost 1.6 billion streams, and his album After Hours was the second most-streamed, following Bad Bunny... SOCAN hires Michael Asante to the role of A&R Representative, Rap and R&B... Montréal’s OSHEAGA Music and Arts Festival has announced that its 2021 Festival Headliners:  Foo Fighters, Cardi B, and Post Malone...The Weeknd recruits Spanish pop star Rosalía for a Blinding Lights remix....Québec band Harmonium gets the symphonic treatment from OSM... Drake launches a line of five scented candles through Better World Fragrance House...City of Vancouver proclaims Dec 3 as Commodore Ballroom Day in honour of venue's 90th birthday. ...Opera Atelier premieres a new season with a streamed production and superstar soprano Measha Brueggergosman..

Bob Dylan’s entire song catalog has been acquired by Universal Music Publishing Group. The Nobel Prize-winner’s catalog encompasses six decades and more than 600 song copyrights....Hipgnosis Songs Fund is worth $1.7B and on course to generate $120M-plus this year... Sony Music acquires LA-based Human Re-Sources, founded by J. Erving in 2017 and merged with Troy Carter's own distribution and services startup, Q&A. The company will become part of The Orchard...Stevie Nicks sells an 80% stake in her song catalogue to Primary Wave...  Variety names Wissam (Sal) Slaiby 'Manager Of The Year...Early Music Vancouver appoints Suzie LeBlanc as its new Artistic & Executive Director, the first woman to hold this position...Donovan Woods, signs to Concord Music Publishing...Canadian director Michael Cavanagh is the new artistic director of the Royal Swedish Opera, in a five-year engagement beginning summer 2021...Canada's Walk Of Fame honours the impact of Allan Slaight with Dec 18. CTV Special... Massey Hall now integrated into Allied Centre...The Winnipeg native has been one of Canada’s most in-demand opera directors throughout his 20-year career...Emanuel signs to Motown…Catharine McLellan lands eight 2021 P.E.I. Music Award noms.. Harmonium's Harmonium Symphonique -  Histoires Sans Paroles is certified gold just weeks after its release...Michael Hollett debuts his free music mag Next Magazine. Investors include Gary Slaight and Michael Cohl...Penguin Eggs says goodbye...Radio Disney is done...Justin Bieber's first concert since 2017 is televised live New Year's Eve...Side Door Access reaches $1M in ticket sales...Billie Eilish says Michael Bublé's Haven't Met You Yet helped cure her depression....R.I.P: Québec pianist, composer and arranger Andre Gagnon, former A&M, Virgin Canada president Doug Chappell, Jamaican music and manager-promoter Denise Jones, ambient composer Harold Budd, country music legend Charley Pride, Chad & Jeremy singer Chad Stuart, Crowbar bassist Roly Greenway, RCA Canada A&R exec Jim Fotheringham, Mountain guitarist Leslie West, bluegrass artist Tony Rice.