Warner Music Nashville has signed Gabby Barrett. SiriusXM’s The Highway has already tapped the singer/songwriter and American Idol alumna as a “Highway Find” artist, and her first single “I Hope” claimed the No. 1 spot on the station’s Hot 30 Countdown.

The song has 35 million on-demand streams to date. Barrett is currently in the studio with producer Ross Copperman working on her debut release. Barrett will join the Warner Music Nashville/WAR radio team and is represented by Red Light Management and William Morris Endeavor.

MusicRow Magazine is pleased to reveal a new trophy for the expanded 31st Annual MusicRow Awards, presented first at tonight’s (June 26) event at the War Memorial Auditorium. The concrete award was crafted by Santana Matlock at Abstrakt Concrete in Nashville, Tennessee.

The concrete trophy will symbolize MusicRow as the cornerstone of the Nashville music industry, and each trophy includes a small sample of soil taken from the grounds of historic Music Row. Matlock is a local artisan who specializes in the custom design and production of concrete countertops, sinks, fire pits, and other products.

CMA CEO Sarah Trahern is being honored with the Spirit Of Music Award at the upcoming 44th Annual T.J. Martell Honors Gala in New York on Oct. 15 at Cipriani 42nd Street.

Michael Kushner, EVP Business & Legal Affairs/General Counsel Atlantic Records, and Mike O’Neill, President & CEO of BMI are also being honored at the event, which will include a cocktail reception, silent auction, seated dinner, and special entertainment. Kushner will receive the Lifetime Music Industry Award, while O’Neill will be honored with the T.J. Martell Foundation Legacy Award.

More information on the upcoming event can be found at HonorsGalaNewYork.org.

NPR and Edison Research has released the Smart Audio Report 2019, which reveals how smart speaker user behavior and perceptions are evolving as owners ‘settle in’ with their devices and the market matures out of its introductory phase.

According to the survey, seven in 10 smart speaker owners use their device daily despite common concerns around security and privacy, and those same factors are leading reasons non-owners have not acquired a device.

“We are starting to see more pragmatic usage of these devices,” said Tom Webster, SVP of Edison Research. “The longer people have these devices, the less experimentation they do with them — but the more ingrained into everyday life these devices become.”

Among the over 53 million smart speaker owners 18 and up in the U.S.:

• 69% of smart speaker owners use their device daily, and households with children are even more likely to use them daily
• Smart speaker owners who have owned the device for 2+ years use an average seven (7) skills per week, compared to an average 12 skills per week among those who have owned the device for less than three (3) months
• 66% of those who own a smart speaker with a screen say the screen has made it easier to discover new content, and the same number say having a screen makes the smart speaker “easier to use”

“We continue to see those that have voice assistant devices love them, using them every day to get the news, listen to podcasts, live stream radio stations and more,” said Joel Sucherman, NPR Vice President, New Platform Partnerships. “The latest data suggest we’ve moved into a maturation phase in this space, in which earning and maintaining the trust of potential smart speaker buyers, while also demonstrating new functionality, may be a key to continuing dynamic growth.”

While almost half of smart speaker owners are planning to acquire another device, the report also finds a slowing interest among non-owners in acquiring their first smart speaker. Among people who do not own a smart speaker and are interested in acquiring one, the top two reasons they have not are concern that hackers could use a smart speaker to gain access to their home or personal information, and worry that smart speakers are always listening. 

The Smart Audio Report Spring 2019, part of the industry’s longest-running public research series about smart speaker consumer behavior in the U.S., is available now at npr.org/smartaudio.

 

The Metro Planning Commission will hold a public hearing before considering the adoption of the Music Row Vision Plan Thursday, June 27, 2019, beginning at 4 p.m. in the Sonny West Conference Center in the Howard Office Building, 700 Second Avenue South.

The 87-page plan aims to offer preservation for the buildings that make up the character of Nashville’s Music Row area, while also balancing opportunities for development in the area. 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 draft of the plan 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).

See the full draft of the Music Row Vision plan here.