Spotify has added three to its Nashville team, MusicRow has confirmed.

Alison Junker, James Clauer and Jen Hoogerhyde have all joined the Spotify’s Nashville operation.

Junker has been named Manager, Artist & Label Marketing, Nashville, where she sits at the center of artists’ and labels’ relationships and campaigns with Spotify. She joins from Warner/Chappell’s A&R team. This role was previously held by Laura Ohls, who recently moved to Spotify’s Music Culture & Editorial team as a Senior Editor, focused on American music.

Clauer joins as Creative Producer to develop creative content, and direct Hot Country editorial and live performances. James was previously at CMT.

Hoogerhyde will serve as Creative Manager, Country, working cross-functionally across the development and implementation of creative content in the country genre. She also joins from CMT, and will work alongside Spotify’s Paul Logan, who has been promoted to Lead, Content Experiences.

Pictured (seated, L-R): Wide Open Music’s Ash Bowers, Matt Stell, RECORDS’ Barry Weiss, Sony Music Nashville’s COO/EVP Ken Robold. Standing (L-R): SMN’s EVP A&R Jim Catino, RECORDS’ Sara Gil, Wide Open Music’s Brendan Rich, Good Company Entertainment’s Jamice Jennings, SMN’s VP Sales & Streaming Caryl Atwood and EVP, Promotion & Artist Development Steve Hodges, Arista Nashville VP Promotion Josh Easler, Good Company Entertainment’s Keith Gale, RECORDS’ David Enriquez, and Matt Stell SMN marketing lead Liz Cost.

RECORDS, a joint venture between Barry Weiss and Sony Music Entertainment, and Sony Music Nashville have announced a new partnership surrounding singer-songwriter Matt Stell. Arista Nashville’s promotion and Sony Music Nashville’s marketing and media teams will become actively involved with promoting Stell’s music.

Arista Nashville will re-ship Stell’s debut single, “Prayed For You,” on May 6, with its official impact date set for May 28, continuing to work alongside Keith Gale and his Good Company Entertainment team. Making his debut Saturday on the Grand Ole Opry stage, Stell performed this song, which he co-penned with Ash Bowers and Allison Veltz. “Prayed For You” has already garnered over 44 million on-demand audio streams and over 374,000 consumption units.

Stell was brought to RECORDS by Ash Bowers and his Wide Open Music management team. Stell, a 6’7″ Arkansas native, played college basketball for Drury University for four years, and was later accepted into Harvard University’s Extension School Pre-Med program. Instead, he followed his passion for music, teaching himself to sing and play guitar. He moved to Nashville in 2014, and inked a publishing deal with Wide Open Music and a record deal with Weiss’ RECORDS/Sony Music Entertainment.

Metro planning officials have released a draft version of an 87-page “Music Row Vision Plan,” which aims to offer both preservation for the buildings and character that make the Music Row area of Nashville, as well as opportunities for furthering development in the area, reports the Nashville Business Journal.

The plan notes that 9.7 billion dollars in estimated annual value comes from the music industry located in Nashville-Davidson-Murfreesboro in Tennessee. An estimated 200 businesses operate in the area that identify the majority of their operations being music-related, with 1,839 people employed by music-related businesses on Music Row.

The draft offers a “Music Row Character Area Map,” which establishes a framework for the desired characteristics of land use, development pattern, etc. The plan outlines four character areas, including “Music Row Center” (which serves as a gateway to the Gulch, Midtown, and Downtown Nashville), “Music Row Core” (north of Grand Avenue, primarily along 18th and 19th avenue south, and extending west to include Warner Music, BMI and Best Western Plus), “Music Row Village” (Primarily between Horton and Grand Avenues) and “Music Row Neighborhood” (Primarily located between Horton and Wedgewood Avenues).

The plan notes that 12 different multi-family residential developments have been built in the Music Row area since 2010, with 3,274 residential units added to Music Row between 2010-2019.

There has been an 176% increase in property values on Music Row between 2010 and 2019, nearly two-and-a-half times that of Davidson County as a whole, and just trailing Downtown Nashville at 228% increase in property value. The plan notes that consequently, Berry Hill has emerged as a secondary music industry node in Nashville, due to the smaller-scale built environment being more conducive to the creative process, while property values are eight times less per acre.

Approximately 53 buildings were demolished on Music Row between 2008 and 2018, the plan notes. Nearly 70% of those demolitions took place north of Grand Avenue and west of Music Square East. According to National Trust, 43 music-related buildings were demolished within that 10-year period.

Among the plan’s recommendations for the area are to create a private business association to represent local interests, manage tourism in the area and promote affordability. The plan also recommends implementing a Transfer of Development Rights program to incentivize preservation and to designate Nashville’s Music Row area as a cultural industry district.

A final draft is slated to be released on June 3, before recommendations are to be presented at Metro Planning Commission’s June 13 meeting.

Luke Combs, Brothers Osborne, Alison Krauss and more will join the lineup for the second leg of Willie Nelson‘s Outlaw Music Festival Tour 2019. The additional tour dates kick off in Gilford, New Hampshire, on Sept. 6 and wrap Sept. 22 in Cincinnati, with additional dates and cities to be added.

The lineup includes Willie Nelson & Family, Robert Plant & the Sensational Space Shifters, Luke Combs, Bonnie Raitt, The Avett Brothers, Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats, Alison Krauss, Gov’t Mule, Brothers Osborne, and Lukas Nelson & Promise Of The Real with more to be announced in the coming weeks.

Tickets for the general public go on sale Friday, May 3, and VIP packages will be available. Citi is the official pre-sale credit card of the Outlaw Music Festival Tour, and Citi cardmembers will have access to purchase pre-sale tickets beginning April 30th until May 2nd through Citi EntertainmentSM.

“Family. That’s what this touring group of artists, fans, and friends are when we come together for our annual Outlaw Music Festival Tour. We are thrilled to announce the second leg with Willie and this extraordinary group of artists” says Keith Wortman, CEO of Blackbird Presents.

Last year, the Outlaw Tour hosted more than 200,000 fans in amphitheaters and arenas all over the country.

TuneCore artists earned $83 million in the first quarter of 2019, the company just announced. The total marks a 21% increase over the first quarter of 2018, and brings total distribution revenue to $1.5 billion, all of which was paid to TuneCore artists. Distribution income for artists reached $308 million in 2018, marking a 28% year-over-year increase.

Publishing administration royalties collected for TuneCore artists also grew 42% in 2018 as well as YouTube Monetization, which delivered significant new income for TuneCore artists, growing 48% over 2017.

The platform enables artists to distribute their music to over 150 digital stores and streaming services worldwide including iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon, Deezer, and Google Play and that reach helped make TuneCore independent artists a major factor influencing the growth of genres, markets and geographies.

Total streams and downloads of music by TuneCore’s 250,000 worldwide artists hit 199.3 billion in the past year, an 83% increase over 2017.

In 2018, the fastest-growing genres worldwide were:

• Heavy metal – 154% increase
• J-Pop – 133% increase
• R&B/Soul – 68% increase
• K-Pop – 58% increase
• World music – 57% increase
• Instrumental – 42% increase

In 2018, streaming growth varied worldwide:

• Africa – 146% growth
• Asia – 52% growth
• Oceania – 38% growth
• Europe – 35% growth
• South America – 32% growth
• North America – 31% growth