THE ANCHOR 2020 BOARD

After the application deadline for ANCHOR 2020 on 22 July, it is the turn of the ANCHOR Board, a prestigious group of international insiders from live, publishing and recorded music as well as music media representatives, to choose the six Nominees from all applicants.

Please meet our ANCHOR 2020 Board members: 

Feline Moje (GER) – Director Recorded Music GSA

Feline Moje, who joined BMG in September 2019 as Director Recorded Music GSA, is responsible for A&R for new recordings and plays a key role in the company’s developing merchandise business in Germany. BMG GSA is the home of artists like Seeed, Adel Tawil, Aloe Blacc, Stefanie Heinzmann, Kontra K, Balbina, and Max Giesinger. Before joining BMG, Feline has been working for Irrsinn Management as an artist manager promoting the careers of several bands including BMG-signed artists AnnenMayKantereit, Trettmann, and KitschKrieg.

Bjørn Rogstad (NOR) – Managing director, Universal Music Group Norway

Bjørn Rogstad is a Norwegian record director. Since 2013 he has been with Universal Music Norway where he played a fundamental role in driving the business forward. Moreover, he was responsible for signing artists such as Astrid S and Seeb. As a result of his hard work, he got promoted to General Manager of Universal Music Norway in 2017. Prior to joining Universal, Rogstad served as the director of EMI Music Norway and A&R Director and Coordinator of Nordic Repertoire.

Helen Smith (GBR) – Executive Chair, IMPALA Music 

Helen Smith is originally from Scotland, now based in Brussels and is IMPALA’s Executive Chair. She drives the organization’s key strategies with the board on a political, commercial and promotional level. Helping put thousands of independent companies and artists on the map of Europe by leveraging the collective strength, IMPALA’s milestones are an impressive read, from Europe’s first-ever class action court case on a merger and its tough stance on digital platforms who don’t play ball, to its various action plans and awards schemes.

Christopher Beanland (GBR) – Journalist

Christopher is the author of two novels and several non-fiction books and has written about music and festivals for the BBC, Euronews, Guardian, Independent, Metro and various magazines around Europe.

Jasmina Zammit (GER) - General Manager BMG Brasil

Jasmina Zammit was one of the original three people who launched the new BMG in October 2008 when she served as assistant to the CEO. Eleven years on and she is running one of BMG’s most dynamic operations as General Manager of BMG Brazil. Her route to her executive role took her In 2010 to BMG’s Synch & Licensing department. Running the hub between BMG’s local offices and sub-publishing partners, she was responsible for the international exploitation of master and publishing signings in regards to synch and marketing as well as supporting the creative integration of newly acquired catalogs. She relocated to São Paulo in March 2018 to take up her new role where she has focused on the development of BMG Brazil’s local publishing and recordings roster as well as overseeing the local creative departments. Among others, she has signed Brazilian artists Ego Kill Talent and Zeeba.

Jan Wiele (GER) – Editor at Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

Jan Wiele is an editor at Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and responsible for pop music coverage in the culture section. Born in Bad Salzuflen, Germany, the city from which a large part of the ‘Hamburger Schule’ is known to originate, he soon came to enjoy good music and is still hoping to hear more of it. His focus is on song lyrics, and he oversees the „Pop Anthology" on Faz.net, which is dedicated to the interpretation of these.

Maria Amato (AUS) - General Manager and CFO, The Australian Independent Record Labels Association

Maria is the General Manager and CFO of the Australian Independent Record Labels Association and has worked in the Arts and not-for-profit sector for over 25 years specialising in finance and business management through her own consultancy firm, Results Management. Maria has held former positions as Chair of the Creative Industry Advisory Board/ member of the board of directors for the Australian Institute of Music, CEO/CFO of the Melbourne International Film Festival and board member of Music Victoria.

Justin Sweeting (HKG) – Director of Music at Magnetic Asia 

Born and raised in Hong Kong, Justin Sweeting has over seventeen years of music industry experience, centred within Asia. Justin is co-founder and Music Director of Magnetic Asia who run festivals & events: Clockenflap, Sonar Hong Kong, YourMum, Ticketing, and offer further agency services to a broad reach of clients including digital marketing, PR, production and consultancy. Connecting the dots between Asia and the global industry at large, Justin enjoys spreading the word on the region’s music potential and is actively involved in its positive evolution.

Maria Gironas (USA) – Director of Digital Platform Strategy

Maria Gironas is an artist development professional with over 10 years of experience in the music industry, doing everything from being a signed artist to cultivating national publicity or social media campaigns for artists and brands like Fender, Emo Night Brooklyn, Taking Back Sunday, Bear Hands, Noah Gundersen, Pierce The Veil, and many more. Most recently at YouTube she served as a Strategic Partner Manager on the Artist Development team, partnering with artists like Lauv, Julia Michaels, Tenille Arts, Neffex, Moss Kena, and more to develop unique content strategies on the platform. Now, at Q&A, she serves as the Director of Digital Platform Strategy, focusing on building artist narratives through platforms like YouTube, Tik Tok, and more.

Laurent Marceau (CHE) – Manager of Euroradio Eurosonic 

Laurent Marceau has been working in the radio industry for almost 40 years now. After being a senior producer at the BBC, leading, for instance, the music department (BBC Africa), his career took its course at the EBU (European Broadcasting Union).  In his position as Manager at Eurosonic (pop/rock music exchanges), Marceau directs the radioactivity of the EBU in that area. Besides developing joint projects with artists and record companies, he takes care of the acquisition of radio rights for the transmission of major events and festivals, concerts of Artists and Bands, such as Coldplay, Radiohead, Oasis. Being both Manager and Music Lover, Laurent Marceau coordinates the annual Eurosonic festival and passionately represents Radio towards international bodies, such as the European Commission ("Creative Europe"), Media Festivals and Competitions (Prix Europa, Prix Italia).

Ruth Barlow (GBR) - Director of Live Licensing, Beggars Group

Ruth Barlow has been employed in the music industry since 1998. Starting out as a music producer at much loved London based radio station Xfm before joining the Beggars Group of labels (4AD, Matador Records, Rough Trade Records, XL Recordings and Young Turks) in 2002. Initially working National Radio, she then took on an r&d role concerning the live industry. Her current role, Director of Live Licensing, sees her policy-making, developing and managing the numerous and varied deals surrounding live streaming and live recordings of the Groups artists for third parties globally. Including radio, tv, festivals and digital services etc. Ruth regularly represents Beggars at festivals and conferences around the World and in 2014 was invited by Martin Mills to join the Beggars Group board in the UK.

Max Dax (GER) - Publicist, journalist, photographer and musician

Max Dax is a German writer investigating art, music and pop culture. As editor-in-chief to the magazines Alert, Spex and Electronic Beats, Dax has shaped pop journalism in Germany for more than three decades. As a curator, he organized the recent museum shows Hyper! A Journey into Art and Music in Hamburg’s Deichtorhallen (2019) and Black Album / White Cube in Rotterdam’s Kunsthal (2020). As a photographer, he has published two books about the South Italian cities Naples and Palermo. As an author Dax has released numerous books about art and music, among them the oral histories No Beauty Without Danger – 25 Years of Einstürzende Neubauten, Hands on the Table about CAN, and Scooter – Always Hardcore. As a music producer he compiled the albums Il Canto di Malavita – La Musica della Mafia, Invisible Republic – The Music that Influenced Bob Dylan and Maria Callas: Drama Queen. As a musician, Max Dax is an active member of both the band Transhuman Art Critics as well as the art/music collective LAWBF. Together with Luci Lux, he is running the Santa Lucia Gallery of Conversations. His first novel Dissonance – A Replaceable Year is due to be released in Autumn 2020.

Zan Rowe (AUS) – Host of Double J Mornings and National Music Correspondent for ABC, Australia

For twenty years, Zan has worked as a  broadcaster and music journalist, championing the discovery of new music; whether at worldwide festivals and conferences, or on her daily national radio program. For more than a decade, Zan was a key broadcaster with triple j, before launching a new Mornings show on sister station Double J. She is the host of ABC TV’s high rating New Years Eve broadcast concert, and a regular correspondent on morning television’s ABC News Breakfast. Zan has chaired panels and MC-ed events internationally, been part of the official Australian Eurovision Jury, and was the first Australian juror for the ANCHOR Award in 2019.

Max Domma (GER) – Founder smply.agency, A&R consultant, Music Manager 

Max has been working in the industry for the last 10 years. In his role as Head of Booking, he was responsible for Reeperbahn Festival’s music program and international showcase program (LA, NY, Beijing, Accra, SXSW) in 2013 - 2019. In 2018 he co-founded SMPLY - a Hamburg and Cologne-based agency for music consulting. With clients such as Universal Music’s domestic division Vertigo/Capitol, several newcomer artists and music festivals Max now uses his expertise as freelance A&R scout, artist manager, project manager and music programmer.