Did You Hear?

Music and Film and Motion Offers Artist Assistance Programs

Additional info found at: http://www.thinknorth.ca/mfm-en/content.asp?articleid=73

On Thursday October 6th, Music and Film in Motion (MFM) announced the creation of two exciting new programs that will assist Northern Ontario musicians and filmmakers. These announcements, which were released at the October session of Taking it to the Stage and Screen, also included an outline of the newly restructured professional development series.

The first announcement introduced the Think North Distribution Program now available to MFM members. This program will create an online distribution outlet for Northern Ontario music and film products. The website is an exciting tool which reaches beyond geographical boundaries and traditional hours of operation, and gives the public a chance to purchase products from Northern Ontario musicians and filmmakers. This program will also assist artists by having a third party handle the time consuming and costly aspects of online sales and distribution.

“Having musicians and filmmakers selling their product from one central location allows them to work as a collective; strengthening their distribution opportunities as each artist drives traffic to the site” MFM Executive Director, Dennis Landry states.

The newly announced Northern Ontario Music Development Program (NOMDP) provides assistance to artists/music businesses in all career stages (emerging mid-career and established) in the form of direct, hands on support and planning. Artists can apply to one of the three program streams: Marketing and Publicity Support, Touring and Logistical Support, or Project Development and Planning Support. Full guidelines and application forms can be found on the MFM website www.thinknorth.ca. The application period is now open and MFM will be accepting applications until the deadline on November 30th, 2005.


“Artists are artists. Creating is what they do best,” says Landry. “That being said, the music industry is a business. That’s where we come in. NOMDP will provide us with a structure that will allow us to support music artists and businesses where we excel: marketing/PR, planning and logistics.”


Also announced was new registration structure for MFM’s popular Workshop Series. Previously offered in Spring and Fall sessions, the workshops will now be offered throughout the year, through pre-registrations via a waiting list system. These changes will help to accommodate more participants from more communities throughout Northern Ontario.


“We’ve wanted to host workshops in other communities for a while, but we had to find the right mechanism” says Landry. “By going to a waiting list system, we can monitor where the highest interest is coming from, and once we hit a minimum registration level in any one community. We know that the demand is there, and now we have a system that will allow us to tap into it.”

All nine workshop descriptions will be posted online as of Tuesday October 11th and potential participants will be able to register for any and all workshops in which they have interest. Once enough participants are registered, a mutually acceptable date will be selected, and the session will run accordingly. This system will allow MFM to see where the strongest demand for the workshops exists and run the programs in those communities.

For more information on any of these programs please fell free to contact Music and Film in Motion at 45 Durham St, Suite 105 or by calling (705) 674.9954 or by e-mail at [email protected] .

MFM is a non profit organization whose mandate is to foster and promote the development of the film and music industries in Northern Ontario.