For five days in September, world-class songwriters from the US, UK and Canada converge at Hollywood’s Musicians Institute for the 3rd annual ole Pop/Urban Songwriter camp. Their mission - make hit records. Ole’s West Coast Creative Director Qiana Conley has worked tirelessly with Creative Coordinator Tony Crago, to formulate an efficient and productive environment that generates at least one song per day.
Each morning the masterminds from Ole L.A mix pop, urban and country writers into teams. Shortly after, A&R’s arrive to the song camp to pitch their song requests and discuss the direction of the artists project. Now that writers have been served the song on a platter, they go directly into the studio to make magic with help from engineers and demo vocalists provided by the Musician Institute.
The 2009 cycle invites 24 new and returning writers: Rupert Gayle (Shiloh, Keshia Chante), Steven Lee Olsen (Westlife, Steven Lee), Dru (DRU, In Essence), Rosemarie Tan (Danity Kane), Beau Dozier (Joss Stone, Omarion) and Bluetooth (Chris Brown, Jordin Sparks).
L to R: Nashville writer Steven Lee, Hip-Hop production duo "The Runners"
“This camp is so good because it paired up people who might not normally work together”, said 2008 participant Dru Harr, one half of the production duo The Runners. He continued, “When people don’t branch out they end up writing with the same crews over and over again. At camp, I learned that Nashville writers do a great job of putting substance into records and we can took that with us to future sessions with urban acts.”
Several of these “odd couples” birthed hits, and Ole writer Tebey penned the energetic “Cause A Scene” which was cut by Tierra Marie & Flo Rida. Top line writing crews have an additional advantage from participating in a program like the Ole song camp. When forced to split apart, it often results in multiple song credits and learning techniques from other writers, strengthening the skill and exposure of the group.
This year Ole’s L.A team proudly welcomes Jamie Fox’s Foxx King Publishing as a co-presenter along with momentum from new sponsors Red Bull and Puma. Performing rights organizations SOCAN and American PRO’s have also acted as official sponsors, and in the past the Department of Canadian Heritage assisted with a generous grant to encourage Ole’s support of the Canadian writers involved.
The relationships and networking potential for writers during the song camp are priceless and by weeks end all writers can be sure that the songs created will be in good hands. Ole’s Sean Mulligan (General Manager/Director US Film Television & Media) and David Weitzman (Director of Business Development) take up the task of aggressively pitching the end product to labels, Music Supervisors and licensing personnel for synch licensing for Films, T.V and Video Games.
Last year, Barbara Kane, VP/General Manager of BMI visited the writers and best explained the far-reaching benefits of the annual Ole Songwriters camp. “Without this, the collaboration wouldn’t have existed and the creation wouldn’t have happened and the artist wouldn’t have heard it. This is a very important vehicle to offer to writers.” *
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