Playing up artists

Playlists. There’s one for every mood, season and taste. But these are more than a collection of songs. They can highlight lesser known artists and help listeners discover new music, which is why editors for companies like Apple, Spotify, YouTube and Amazon create playlists.

Conor Ambrose ’14 works with these streaming services as the senior director of streaming and creative marketing at Interscope Records, where he works under Executive Vice President and Chief Revenue Officer Gary Kelly. “He had the foresight to say, ‘context in the streaming space is becoming more and more important,’” Ambrose says, leading Interscope to create the role. “With tens of thousands of songs being released every week, playlist strategy and real artist development are essential in driving discovery.”  

In his role, Ambrose collaborates with the editors and marketing leads at the streaming plat-forms to find new and exciting ways to help break artists. His aim is to find champions for art-ists who will help feature their music on playlists across these different platforms to build their audience. Even before Ambrose moved to Los Angeles and began his first professional job with Interscope, he showed an aptitude for spotting and highlighting musical talent. As a first-year student at Elon, he started a music blog with a couple of friends about up-and-coming artists they liked. “We didn’t have any money, so we were writing reviews on a free web template and taking advantage of Facebook’s organic reach. Artists we were supporting started backlink-ing to our site and it grew pretty quickly throughout the college network.”

Building on the blog’s success, Ambrose broadened the scope of the services he provided. “I started promoting shows, managing artists and distributing their music digitally,” he says. Am-brose was acting like a kind of label service for artists. He proved to be good at predicting which artists would make it. “When a lot of labels were signing artists based upon blog cover-age, they reached out to a number of the artists who we were featuring and they ended up getting record deals.” Ambrose’s keen eye for talent didn’t go unnoticed.

Warner Bros. Records reached out to Ambrose and his college roommate, Sam Ferro ’14, also an Interscope employee, with internship opportunities. “They gave Sam and I our first real shot in the industry,” Ambrose says. “We drove across the country with zero expectations and ended up creating relationships that have lasted five years.” But this entrepreneurial spirit alone didn’t get Ambrose to where he is today. His education played a major role helping him achieve success. “I think continuous learning—both formal and the kind you can’t get in a classroom—is the most important contributor, single-handedly, to success in life,” Ambrose says, adding he believes traveling to meet people from diverse backgrounds and cultures is crucial. “The time I spent in Asia and South America through Elon programs really expanded my perspective on the world and that has shaped my ultimate goals.” He is grateful to Assistant Professor of Com-munications J McMerty ’00 for keeping him on track academically during his time in the Elon in LA and Sundance Film Festival programs. 

Looking ahead, Ambrose expects the streaming sector of the music industry will continue to grow and is enthusiastic about the leadership team running Interscope. “I am extremely fortunate to be able to learn from executives like Executive Vice President of Interscope Joie Manda, our Head of A&R on the pop/rock side Sam Riback and our Chairman and CEO John Janick every day.”