Ashley Gorley, Emily Bear & Abigail Barlow Offer Career Insights At ASCAP 2025 Membership Meeting

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Pictured (L-R): ASCAP Foundation Executive Director Nicole George-Middleton, Ashley Gorley, ASCAP Chairman of the Board and President Paul Williams, ASCAP CEO Elizabeth Matthews, Abigail Barlow & Emily Bear. Photo: Ryan Lash for ASCAP

ASCAP held its 2025 Membership Meeting last Thursday (Feb. 27) in Manhattan.

The event began with a performance by songwriter and National Poetry Slam champion IN-Q. Then, ASCAP Chairman of the Board and President Paul Williams, along with ASCAP CEO Elizabeth Matthews gave the ASCAP State of the Union address. They celebrated the PRO’s 111 years of supporting music creators, highlighted the outstanding achievements of ASCAP members in 2024, and shared the organization’s record-breaking financial success over the past year. In 2024, ASCAP generated $1.835 billion in revenue and distributed $1.696 billion in royalties to its songwriter, composer and publisher members.

“In 2024, ASCAP continued to navigate both the potential and the disruption of AI by staying true to our creator-first, future-forward DNA,” explained Williams. “We advocated for the rights and royalties of human creators while exploring opportunities to innovate for and with our members. Working together is how we take care of our own. As music creators, our community is built on a foundation of compassion, connection and a sense of purpose. That is our bedrock, where we always land, where we always begin.”

“We’re only here because of you— we were founded by you; we’ll continue to exist because of you,” added Matthews. “We’ve been around for 110 years, and will be around another hundred years because of you.”

“Right now, there are 4 million students in the US who lack access to music education in their schools,” noted ASCAP Foundation Executive Director Nicole George-Middleton. “And 1.3 million of these students are in elementary school. That’s why the work we do at The ASCAP Foundation is so critical right now. And why we’ve spent so much of our recent time and energy identifying ways to reach as many of these children as we can.”

The meeting was followed by a panel and Q&A featuring ASCAP songwriters Ashley Gorley, Emily Bear and Abigail Barlow. Moderated by ASCAP VP of Marketing and Creative Director Erik Philbrook, the panelists shared their storytelling techniques and offered advice on navigating the industry’s highs and lows. During the discussion, Gorley shared how he got started in songwriting as a Belmont University student, where a teacher introduced him to ASCAP. Bear spoke about the lessons she learned from her mentor, Quincy Jones, particularly his lifelong approach to learning in the music industry. Barlow emphasized the importance of building community and finding allyship within the songwriting world.

Madison Hahnen
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