ole reaps early benefits from musicnow

ole's new musicnow online song-search engine is paying dividends early.

The service — which makes the company's entire catalogue of more than 40,000 songs accessible via a powerful search engine — has given a notable boost to the catalog of Jody Williams songs, which ole recently acquired.

Williams, Vice President of writer/publisher relations for BMI in Nashville, has been touting ole's new Musicnow search engine, which offers easy access to and previews of the company's holdings.

"A few weeks ago writer/producer Kye Fleming came to see me with a new trio she is working with called Eden's Edge, who were very, very good," Williams says. "After hearing a few songs, it occurred to me that there was a Liz Rose/Maia Sharp song (from the catalog I sold to ole) that would be great for them. I remembered that I could access the ole catalog through their Web site so I proceeded to find the song and played it for them right then and there, no waiting. And they loved it. It was effortless. It just goes to show that if you can act quickly on a spontaneous idea you can place songs much more efficiently. ole has a great tool that will definitely increase their activity."

When ole acquired the Williams catalog, Chief Creative Officer, Gilles Godard, felt the collection — which featured Taylor Swift — would "explode on a global scale." True to that vision, Williams' catalog of 3,300-plus songs is a gift that "keeps on giving," Godard enthuses. "We're getting cuts monthly."

Founded in 1999 by Williams as a joint venture with Sony ATV Publishing, the catalog includes hits from the 3.2 million-selling debut album by Swift. The teen country sensation has scored big with Williams' songs, including the hit singles "Tim McGraw," "Picture To Burn" and "Teardrops On My Guitar."

ole is promoting the new system with a vengeance, as well. "We've been reaching out to our contacts, letting them know we have this new system where they can search for music," Spear says. "Some people have requested little demos of how it works, and some have already followed up with requests for music."

The service lets music supervisors, artists, and producers register at no charge to find, organize, download and share music for any number of projects, making it easier than ever for users to license the work of ole songwriters and composers.

Musicnow — launched May 4, 2009 — offers two search engines, each optimized for the end user:

• Syncnow is targeted at music supervisors looking to license material for film and video projects, etc.
• Greatsongsnow is for A&R personnel looking for material for their recording artists.

The secure system protects the songwriters' intellectual property while allowing potential customers to easily audition material. Registered users can create projects and download high resolution audio tracks at 192kb or higher; nonmembers can stream music for audition purposes, but cannot access high-resolution audio or download material.

"Whether you're looking for music for your film, TV show, ad campaign, movie trailer, video game, ringtone or other broadcast media production you'll find what you need fast," Spear says. "If you're working on an ongoing film, for example, you can keep coming back to add songs for various scenes."

See Musicnow in action in this online tutorial