UNIFIED Music Group has announced a new accelerator program, Ground Floor, designed to support the careers of emerging homegrown artists.
Announced today with the kickoff of BIGSOUND 2025, the six-month program will see four rising acts get strategic mentorship from senior leaders across Community Music, a global distribution alternative for independent and DIY artists.
The acts chosen for the program will also have access to educational workshops on media training, touring, sync, legal and finance, priority marketing, and DSP pitching for their next release via Community Music and The Annex, as well as a live performance opportunity at a UNIFIED or Community Music event.
“There’s been this narrative, that’s been getting a lot of traction over a long period of time, around how hard it is for new artists to get going,” UNIFIED CEO and founder Jaddan Comerford told The Music Network.
View this post on InstagramLove Music?
Get your daily dose of metal, rock, indie, pop, and everything else in between.
“We thought, how do we make it easier for them? How do we actually create a pipeline that will allow us to support? And that’s really the idea of Ground Floor came from.”
Ground Floor is a fresh iteration on the UNIFIED Grant, which first launched in 2016 to help creatives “unlock entrepreneurialism” and drive impact in the Australian music industry. This time however, the focus is on artists.
“The artists need help more now than ever,” Comerford noted.
He hopes the mentorship element will be impactful, adding: “We essentially want to bring artists into the ecosystem that we can hopefully turn into match-fit artists so we can, in an ideal world, work with them for many years to come.”
The initiative is part of Community Music’s $10 million pledge to support the development of local artists in building long-term, global careers. It is supported by UNIFIED Artist Management, Lonely Lands Agency, The Annex, Sound Story, and the Bush Music Fund.
Read more on Community Music at communitymusic.net/ground-floor.
Mentor group:
Ash Hills – General Manager, UNIFIED Artist Management
Caleb Williams – Senior Artist Manager, UNIFIED Artist Management
Chelsea Donoghue – Senior Lawyer, UNIFIED Music Group
Coco Eke – Founder, Bush Music Fund
Dan Nascimento – Senior Artist Manager, General Manager, Community Music
Elinor Williams – Director of Marketing, The Annex
Francesca Caldara – Vice President, Community Music
Harry Moore – General Manager, Lonely Lands Agency
Jack Parsons – Founder, Bush Music Fund
Jaddan Comerford – CEO and Founder, UNIFIED Music Group
Kate McCabe – Sound Story
Mardi Caught – Managing Director, The Annex
Steve de Wilde – Senior Artist Manager, UNIFIED Artist Management
Will Cuming – Artist, Head of Product Development, Community Music
