My Music Row Story: Downtown Music’s Emily Stephenson
Emily Stephenson. Photo: Ebru Yildiz
The “My Music Row Story” weekly column features notable members of the Nashville music industry selected by the MusicRow editorial team. These individuals serve in key roles that help advance and promote the success of our industry. This column spotlights the invaluable people that keep the wheels rolling and the music playing.
Emily Stephenson serves as Downtown Music’s President of Publishing, overseeing all publishing efforts under the division, including Downtown Music Publishing, Songtrust and Sheer. Collectively, Downtown Music Publishing services over 360,000 songwriters and manages nearly five million copyrights globally.
Prior to her current role, Stephenson served as Downtown Music Publishing’s Vice President of Business Operations and, during her 12+ year tenure at the company, has been at some point responsible for each aspect of publishing administration and client services for Downtown’s songwriter and publishing clients, including Spirit Music Group, Ryan Tedder, Big Yellow Dog and the John Lennon Estate. Since her appointment as President in 2023, Stephenson has been instrumental in leading all publishing efforts, resulting in key signings including Grammy-nominated songwriter and award-winning artist, Raja Kumari, Laurie Anderson, Josh Ramsay and notable indie rock band The National.
MusicRow: Where did you grow up?
I grew up just south of town in Franklin. My parents both graduated from Vanderbilt and never left. They were both athletes at Vanderbilt—my dad played football and my mom played tennis—and then dad became a physical therapist and mom was a math teacher. I had a wonderful childhood. Franklin was an amazing place to grow up. I’m the oldest of four siblings, so our house was always full of life.
How did music become part of your story?
There’s no real musicality in our family, but growing up in the area, I was around it. Our community was full of songwriters and musicians, so I was hyperaware of the creativity that was and is so core to Nashville.
Photo: Courtesy of Stephenson
What was college like?
I went to Auburn University and studied Communications with a minor in Spanish. I started as a Math Education major because I wanted to do what my mom did, but that was very hard. [Laughs] I switched to Communications and I loved it. During my time at Auburn, I was an athletic tutor for the public speaking course that everyone had to take, which was fun.
As part of the Communications program, you had to do a full semester internship. I knew I wanted to go into music—at that point I had started getting my hands on demos that were being passed around had become obsessed with music discovery. Since there were no music internships in Auburn, Alabama, I came back to Nashville during my last semester of college and did an internship at an artist management company.
What was that internship like?
I already had a feeling I wanted to go into publishing—I wanted to support songwriters and their work. But looking back, the artist management firm was a great overview into the full picture of the music industry. I got a glimpse into what it takes to make and release an album, prepare for a tour, write a treatment for a music video, and all the in-betweens.
What happened next?
After graduation, I moved home to Nashville and waited tables at the J. Alexander’s in Cool Springs for a few months while I was job hunting, and then got a call one day from Bluewater Music Group because I had been recommended for a position. I went there and worked for Jessica Myers, who taught me so much. Something that makes Bluewater really unique is their global collection strategy. Bluewater was a really great way for me to understand and make connections with international collection societies and learn the landscape in different territories. I was there for about a year.
Photo: Courtesy of Stephenson
Then what happened?
That first year out of college in Nashville was a blast. I was in a group of friends who were all getting our feet wet in the industry. Many of us are still working in publishing and the songwriters have gone on to have really successful careers.
Although I loved my friends and family in Nashville, I knew I wanted to move to New York. I was starting to look for jobs in the city and found Downtown Music. I really liked their roster and how they were approaching publishing. I applied for open role in publishing administration, specifically for international collections. I knew I was qualified because of my work at Bluewater, but I wasn’t hearing back from Downtown.
One day I was so deep down the research rabbit hole of this company that I found the then-President, Justin Kalifowitz’s, personal website. He had his personal email address on his website, so I emailed him. I said something to the effect of, “I want to work for your company and I think what you guys are doing is amazing. I’ve applied for this job and I haven’t heard back, but next time you’re in Nashville, let me know. I would love to take you out for coffee.” He replied, “I’ll be in Nashville next week. Let’s get coffee.”
We met a few times over the course of the next several months. One day he called me and said he was in town and had a job he wanted to talk to me about. We went to lunch and about two weeks later, I moved to New York. That was 12 and a half years ago.
Tell me about your time in New York.
I was in New York 2012 to 2018. I was hired in under our Songtrust division, which had just recently launched. Songtrust is a publishing offering where anybody can sign up. When I joined, we could only administer catalogs in Canada, the U.K. and the U.S., so I came in and did several society affiliations, a couple of sub-publishing deals and just really expanded the territory of our offering. It was a really small shop at the time, so I was doing royalty processing, copyright registrations, label copy, client services, finance and tax forms and more. At the time we hadn’t built the technology we have now, so everything was done manually and I learned how to do so much.
Songtrust grew substantially and we had a lot more volume, so I grew that operations team. About three years into it, the leadership team approached me about doing global expansion for the Downtown Music Publishing catalog.
What did that entail?
It wasn’t exactly the same because they already had a relationships in place. It really was more about overseeing international relationships, so I moved over to Downtown and led what we called International Administration. It was a great way for me to get to know the clients and get to know the catalog.
At the time, Downtown was aggressively buying catalogs and signing deals. The Downtown office in New York had one of the top studios in Manhattan in the back, and so you might ride the elevator up with A-List, Grammy winning artists or run into current chart toppers in the kitchen. It was really fun. We were building something exciting and everyone was invested, engaged and happy.
Photo: Courtesy of Stephenson
What else sticks out from that time?
I came in at such early stages of Songtrust, and even when I moved over to Downtown, I realized I could change the way things are done in a really positive way. The leadership was so open to that, so I wanted to seize that moment. I did a lot to take establish trust within Downtown. I was responsive on email, I was showing up early and staying late—I wasn’t overworking myself, I was just excited. I realized I was at this company that was going to go on to do great things and I was in early.
What was next for you?
Downtown wanted to start a Client Services department so that songwriters could reach someone who is not A&R or their creative contact, but can talk royalty, copyright, deal and licensing matters. I was well positioned given my history to do that, so we created that department and brought on a co-head to lead it with me. I was talking to our clients every day and creating a really good rapport with them.
In 2018, I moved back to Nashville because I had my first baby. Being in our Nashville office was so awesome because I was back to hearing songs being written on the other side of the wall and seeing writers come in and out every day. It was a jolt back to the basics.
Then in 2022, my role changed again to a Business Operations role, which was a launching pad to take a larger leadership role at the company. That’s how I got integrated into how management worked—finance, HR, legal, etc.
How did you become President of the company?
I was nine months pregnant with my third baby and our CEO Andrew Bergman was visiting Nashville. We went to dinner and he said, “We want you to take your maternity leave and enjoy your time off, but when you come back, we want you to run the publishing company.” I was dumbfounded. I came back from maternity leave in January of 2023 in this new role. It’s been a lot of work, but so much fun.
What were your goals when you started out?
At the time we had sold our owned assets and were shifting focus to an admin-only business. My main goal was to figure out how to make this company successful and compelling for rights-owners on an administration margin. I also did a lot of work initially to assess how we’re structured, who we have doing what and what types of deals we’re going after, and fully committing to us being an admin business. Our staff, clients and prospective clients needed to understand what it is that we can do for them and how that’s unique. One big initial task was to put Downtown Music Publishing and Songtrust to sit under one management.
I do feel like we accomplished the goals that we set out to do early on, and did it pretty quickly and aggressively. I also wanted to be transparent with our team. I host quarterly town hall meetings with the company where I share financials, business plans, our yearly goals and objectives and how we’re thinking about things because I want people to come to work and feel like they’re connected to the work they’re doing and the vision of the company.
What would you say is your favorite part of your job?
The people. Over half of our management team has worked together for over a decade. When I was coming into the role as President, I was really nervous because there were so many people that I had worked with for so long. My colleagues have put a lot of trust in me. The people I get to work with every day are wildly smart and creative.
Our clients are the exact same way. Getting to work the clients we support is so rewarding. Not only do they have incredible catalogs – they’re just good people.
Who have been some of your mentors?
The leadership at Downtown has been so good to me over the years. Justin thinks about music in a way that’s so out of the box, and through all of his successes has always remained accessible. Andrew finds the perfect balance between challenging me but also respecting when I push back. Generally the leadership at Downtown has always been really good to me.
What moment have you had that your teenage self would think is so cool?
I just told this story to someone. We signed Colbie Caillat at the end of 2022. She was my ringback tone in high school. Her music has meant so much to me through different seasons in my life, and years later I was sitting in a room with her signing a deal. I feel like it’s important to not stop getting starstruck. There’s nothing wrong with being a fan.
