Carlsbad - Sunset Sessions
The 14th Annual Sunset Sessions event at La Costa Resort & Spa in Carlsbad, CA, was a refreshing reminder (for all of us somewhat cynical music industry folks) that great singer/songwriter-driven music is alive and well.
This unique event offers new and established artists the opportunity to perform for select AAA radio programmers from around the country, as well as some high-profile music supervisors, and provides them intimate exposure to key people in the industry. The AAA radio format has a more diverse and eclectic playlist; with musical selections on the fringe of mainstream pop and rock.
What makes this conference so cool is that it’s really music driven; each meal and evening centers around artist/band showcases. This year’s Sunset Sessions showcased an incredible line-up of talent; primarily independent artists but some major acts too: Parker Ainsworth, Chris Amodeo, Cody Bebe & The Crooks, Eric Berdon, Bushwalla, Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears, Blame Sally, Crystal Bowersox, Alex Cuba, Francis Dunnery, Everest, Frentik, Cas Haley, Emily Hearn (with Mark Bryan of Hootie & The Blowfish), Incan Abraham, Iron & Wine, Laura Jansen, Mads Langer, Daniel Lanois’ Black Dub, Benny Marchant, Mike Mills (of R.E.M), The Alternate Routes, The Belle Brigade, The Makepeace Brothers, My Radio, Ximena Riviera, Sarah Lee & Johnny, Lucy Schwartz, April Smith & The Great Picture Show, Sia, So & So, Jason Spooner, Tori, John Waite and The Woods Brothers. If you’re not familiar with some of these artists, their music is definitely worth the discovery.
Performance highlights included Vanessa Carlton (whose acoustic version of “A Thousand Miles” revealed the timeless beauty of the song), Latin crooner Alex Cuba (53rd GRAMMY Awards Nominee for Best Latin Pop Album and 11th Annual Latin GRAMMY Award winner for Best New Artist), k.d. lang (who still sings with such melodic, vocal clarity it’s incredible), Mads Langer (an unexpectedly soulful, quirky singer/songwriter from Denmark), Daniel Lanois & Black Dub (their rocked out rendition of Tenor Saw’s dancehall classic “Ring The Alarm” was smokin’). In an intimate setting, rock legend Stevie Nicks (of Fleetwood Mac fame) played songs from her upcoming album, “In Your Dreams,” and took questions from the audience. Later in the evening, Stevie performed a moving duet of “Carousel” with Vanessa Carlton.
There were some interesting panel discussions in the morning hours throughout the event. A Radio PPM (Portable People Meter) panel, moderated by KFOG’s Dennis Constantine, revealed the fascinating results of a non-Arbitron study on the effectiveness of this radio listener monitoring system.
Interactive panels helped to keep the audience engaged. The music supervision panel, moderated by Lifetime Network’s VP, Music, Marianne Goode, showed clips from various movies and television commercials; then offered up three different songs for each clip. The audience (divided up by radio programmers, music supervisors and radio listeners) then picked which songs they felt best suited the clips and voted on them. It was interesting to see the disparity between the groups and who did or didn’t identify with a particular song.
The Chapter would like to extend a special thanks to the event’s founder and producer, Michele Clark, for inviting us to participate in Sunset Sessions 2011 and for all the fantastic music showcased throughout the event.
June 2-5 2011, Sunset Sessions will present its first Sunset Sessions Rock event, focused on alternative rock, at a host venue to be determined. For more information, visit: www.sunsetsessions.org.