Power 50 - #36: Dan Rosen

Usually, it’s only during “the grand final of Australian music”, as Dan Rosen called the ARIA Awards to Mediaweek, that the work of the Australian Recording Industry Association and its busy CEO comes into sharp focus.

The 2017 Awards saw shifts in broadcasting across all platforms. On television, the awards returned to original home Channel 9, garnering solid ratings. On the internet, Twitter live streamed the red carpet and the event received a social media bump mostly due to the presence of Harry Styles and his huge following.

The ARIAs also saw the attendance of Apple’s Beats 1 DJ Zane Lowe, who not only presented at the ceremony, but spoke at the ARIA Masterclass and broadcast his show out of Sydney. And did you notice how officially it was known as the ARIA Awards with Apple Music? It’s a coup for Rosen as he’s claimed that the ARIA Awards are the first event anywhere in the world Apple has sponsored without producing the event themselves.

ARIA also integrated streaming as part of its Album Charts, two and a half years after the Singles Chart has been running with it. While the argument flared up this year about the lack of Australian presence in the Singles Chart, so far the albums don’t seem to have been impacted as much, as Paul Kelly, Gang Of Youths and Anthony Callea all managed to top the album charts since streaming was included.

And when it came to the end of year charts, the Top 100 Albums were nearly one quarter Australian, compared to just nine in the Singles Chart. Streaming as a whole helped propel the 2016 ARIA wholesale figures to a growth of 5.5 percent.

When released in March 2017, it showed streaming accounted for 38.5 percent of the overall music market by value, growing by 90.5 percent over the year. “The continued growth that we have seen in 2016 is a testament to the ongoing creativity and resilience of our local industry,” Rosen said at the time – an adage he will continue to work towards as the industry continues on a period of growth again after digital disruption.