{"id":4705,"date":"2026-04-12T18:49:04","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T18:49:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2026\/04\/12\/michigan-music-business-club-hosts-fourth-annual-conference\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T18:49:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T18:49:07","slug":"michigan-music-business-club-hosts-fourth-annual-conference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2026\/04\/12\/michigan-music-business-club-hosts-fourth-annual-conference\/","title":{"rendered":"Michigan Music Business Club hosts fourth annual conference"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.themmbc.com\/\">University of Michigan Music Business Club<\/a> held the fourth annual <a href=\"https:\/\/www.themmbc.com\/conference\">Michigan Music Business Conference<\/a> Saturday. The event hosted a range of music industry figures from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.levenkalimusic.com\/about\/#\/\">Leven Kali<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.grammy.com\/artists\/leven-kali\/51875\">Grammy-nominated<\/a> producer and songwriter, to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/people\/jacqueline-saturn\/\">Jacqueline Saturn<\/a>, president of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.virginmusic.com\/\">Virgin Music Group North America<\/a>. The conference offered recruitment hours, workshops and other opportunities for students to have one-on-one conversations with professionals from the industry.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>During opening remarks, LSA and Music, Theatre &amp; Dance senior Jackson Manfredi and LSA senior Erika Petterson, co-vice presidents of the conference, reflected on the mission of MMBC and said that while the University does not have a music business program, the club seeks to connect interested students to the field.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Michigan Music Business Club was built on the mission to empower, educate and prepare the next generation of executives, tastemakers and power players in the music industry, and that\u2019s why we\u2019re here,\u201d Manfredi said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Manfredi said the conference is critical to bridging this gap.\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-1    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cWe wanted to start the conference to build a bridge between the University of Michigan and the entertainment industry \u2014 specifically, the music business industry \u2014 and we want to provide an easy pipeline for students who are interested in going into that,\u201d Manfredi said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>A keynote panel followed, featuring Saturn and <a href=\"https:\/\/hernsdorf.com\/jenna-park-adler\">Jenna Adler<\/a>, a music agent from the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.caa.com\/about-us\">Creative Artists Agency<\/a>. They discussed their early years in the music business world, how their careers have evolved and their experiences as women in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2018\/01\/26\/580933886\/recent-grammy-nominees-overwhelmingly-male-study-says\">male-dominated<\/a> field.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Saturn said her love of music production has been consistent throughout her career, but she discovered a deep passion for developing and promoting new artists along the way.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I think back to how it all started, it feels exactly how it is now, really just based on passion and love for music,\u201d Saturn said. \u201cThat feeling of what it\u2019s like when you identify something so early and you really believe in it, and you watch sort of the path grow \u2014 there\u2019s nothing better than that feeling. So it\u2019s all really based on the love and belief in artists.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Later in the panel, Adler said she felt satisfied seeing the music industry evolve into a more diverse profession.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-2    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cThe agency world was all male-dominated, so that\u2019s why for me, it\u2019s so important to champion the next generation of diverse executives and agents,\u201d Adler said. \u201cNow, to see our hallways in our offices, to be so diverse and to have so many women and young moms, and all of it roaming the hallways gives me so much joy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>During an afternoon panel, Grammy-nominated artist <a href=\"https:\/\/www.quinnxcii.com\/\">Quinn XCII<\/a> and producer <a href=\"https:\/\/www.everythingisayokay.com\/\">Ayokay<\/a> discussed how their music careers evolved from a college hobby. Ayokay is an alum of the University and shared how his time in Ann Arbor shaped his craft.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe people I met in Ann Arbor, in the creative space, are the first ones that showed me the music I would like,\u201d Ayokay said. \u201cI really fell in love with music when I was in Ann Arbor.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In an interview with The Daily, Engineering senior Arinjoy Das, MMBC co-president, said the conference is not limited to only club members, but anyone with an interest in music or business.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNow, finally, we\u2019re going into our fourth year, and we\u2019re bigger and better than ever before, bringing artist keynotes as well as industry professionals that a lot of students haven\u2019t heard from,\u201d said Das. \u201cIt\u2019s an opportunity for students in general, whether they\u2019re coming from a business background or for the love of music and the industry; the MMBC conference is the perfect place to host that.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-3    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>In an interview with The Daily, LSA sophomore Sanaa Devgan, a conference attendee, said the event gave non-members, like herself, a valuable networking opportunity.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think it\u2019s super important for students in general, especially those that aren\u2019t exactly connected to (School of Business) resources, since this is an event that\u2019s open to everybody at Michigan,\u201d Devgan said. \u201cIt\u2019s nice to have those opportunities to network and to interact with people in the industry.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><em>Daily Staff Reporter Micayla Horwitz can be reached at <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/news\/campus-life\/michigan-music-business-club-hosts-fourth-annual-conference\/mailto:hmicayla@umich.edu\"><em>hmicayla@umich.edu<\/em><\/a><em>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<aside>\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p><h3 class=\"jp-relatedposts-headline\"><em>Related articles<\/em><\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The University of Michigan Music Business Club held the fourth annual Michigan Music Business Conference Saturday. The event hosted a range of music industry figures from Leven Kali, Grammy-nominated producer and songwriter, to Jacqueline Saturn, president of Virgin Music Group North America. The conference offered recruitment hours, workshops and other opportunities for students to have [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4706,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[3191,245,2132,637,691,325,222,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-4705","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-annual","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-club","11":"tag-conference","12":"tag-fourth","13":"tag-hosts","14":"tag-michigan","15":"tag-music"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4705"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4705\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4707,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4705\/revisions\/4707"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}