Porter’s Call Receives $15,000 Grant From Record Union Initiative
Digital music distributor Record Union is donating $30,000 to boost projects that aim to prevent or treat mental illness among music makers. After more than 200 projects were submitted through the initiative The 73 Percent, three projects have now been selected to receive the donation.
Nashville-area service Porter’s Call was among the three chosen, and will receive a $15,000 donation to aid in its proactive strategies to help prevent mental illness. Porter’s Call offers free counseling for full-time, touring artists. The organization has a proactive strategy to help artists learn management strategies to handle the pressures of their career. As part of this “prehab” strategy, the organization is planning a boot camp program where musicians will be trained for a career within music.
Forty-five projects out of the initial 200 submitted were chosen for the public to vote on. The 10 projects with the most votes were pitched to a panel of experts in Stockholm for two days in mid-June. Porter’s Call (prevention), What’s Your Story (research) and The Crash and Ride podcast (awareness) were chosen as the recipients.
“To meet the people behind the finalist projects together with the expert panel was a truly amazing experience. I was so impressed by the panel’s richness in perspectives and expertise, yet it was still difficult to decide what projects to award with the donations. I truly wish we could have given money to all projects, but we had to make a decision. So, we landed on Porter’s Call, What’s Your Story and The Crash and Ride podcast. Our hope is that the combination of the three will have a widespread impact on the music climate in terms of prevention, research and raising awareness,” says Johan Svanberg, CEO of Record Union.
By The 73 Percent initiative, Record Union is hoping to put the state of artists’ mental health on the agenda before streams and commercial success, and also to have a long-term impact on the music climate.
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