Musical Chairs: February 16

SCA SOCIAL MEDIA DIRECTOR CHRIS LEDLIN DEPARTING

After a near-18 month stint at Southern Cross Austereo (SCA) as its Director of Social Media where he put together an impressive strategy and team, Chris Ledlin is signing off from mid-March.

He’s returning to Nine Network, this time as Head of Content Strategy and Commercialisation where he will overlook the network’s content distribution strategy across its assets.

He reports to Group Content Strategy Director Lizzie Young who says: “Nine’s mission is to deliver our content to audiences on their terms.

“That requires a focused approach to studying audience behaviour and integrating our distribution strategy to maximise engagement with our audience and our advertisers.

“Chris has broad experience across content creation, social and strategy making him the perfect candidate for this role.”

Ledlin worked at Nine from 2010 and 2012 in various roles including Social Media Manager to Digital Producer on The Today Show.

He was three years at Twitter before then, and a PA to Jackie O (Henderson) during TheKyle and JackieShow’s days at 2DAY FM.

NEW HEAD OF URBAN AT INTERSCOPE GEFFEN A&M

Interscope Geffen A&M has brought in longtime entertainment attorney Nicole Wyskoarko to fill the newly created role of EVP of Urban Operations at its Los Angeles headquarters.

In between stints at entertainment law firms, she was in Business & Legal at Universal Music, working with acts as Kanye West, Alessia Cara and Justin Bieber.

COHEN AT NONESUCH

Dan Cohen is new VP of marketing at Warner Music imprint Nonesuch Records, based at its New York headquarters.

He was previously VP of Marketing at Republic Records for the past two years, working on campaigns for Lorde, John Mellencamp, Jack Johnson and Phantogram.

KYLIE GETS HER VOICE BACK

As tipped by TMN previously, Kylie Minogue is returning to The Voice UK on ITV channel as a mentor on Tom Jones’ team.

“It’s so great to be back amongst The Voice family as a guest mentor for Tom Jones,” she said.

“I love working with Sir Tom and have been blown away by the talent in his team this series.”

Our Kylie was a coach on the show in 2014 when it was on the BBC.

FRESH 92.7 FM ANNOUNCES NEW BREAKFAST TEAM

Fresh 92.7FM Adelaide’s new breakfast team is Loz & Thomo. Loz (Laura O’Callaghan) has been co-hosting Wavelength on Monday nights. Thomo (Mark Thomas) has been beavering away doing a weekly breakfast slot on Hills Radio after graduating from Australian Radio School.

Their breakfast show, which begins on Monday (February 19) will be different to that of previous brekkie presenters.

At 6 am they’ll start off with a 20-minute “mini mix” from Adelaide and Australia-wide DJs.

Meanwhile, presenting breakfast on Saturday mornings (8-10am) are Thom & Laura (Thom Lion andLauraAntoniazzi).

He’s a singer and producer with very dry humour and penchant for sport and music, she met Ellen DeGeneres once and never lets anyone forget it.

EVENT ENTERTAINMENT LOSING GROUP PR

Event Hospitality & Entertainment, whose portfolio includes the State Theatre and Event Cinemas, is losing its Group PR Director Stephen Howard after five years.

In early March he departs to hotel and serviced apartments company Ovolo Hotel as Marketing Director, working across Hong Kong and Australia.

NEW ED FOR BUNBURY REC

Bunbury Regional Entertainment Centre (BREC) in WA gets a new Executive Director from April.

Fiona de Garis comes from an arts background in Perth, formerly Senior Producer at Performing Lines WA, serves on the Board of CircuitWest, and was this year selected for the Australia Council’s Arts Leadership Program.

She worked with many of West Australia’s major arts organisations including the Perth International Arts Festival.

PAUL FRIEDMAN PROMOTED AT SONY PICTURES

Paul Friedman, who’s been at Sony Pictures Entertainment for 16 years handling the music needs for its biggest hits (including the Spider-Man and The DaVinci Code franchises), is now made Executive VP of Music Business Affairs and Administration.

In this new role, he’s responsible for all original music for Sony’s film and TV projects, including the acquisition, publishing and sale of music rights and properties.

He will also oversee Madison Gate Records, SPE’s soundtracks label.

SPOTIFY EXEC SWITCHES TO UNIVERSAL MUSIC

Ulf Zick, Director of Spotify’s Artist and Management team in Berlin for the last five years, is joining Universal Music Group as Managing Director, International, from March 1.

NEW A&R CHIEF FOR WARNER CHAPPELL SPAIN

Javier Dean, President of A&R at Sony / ATV didn’t need much coaxing to Warner/ Chappell Spain to be A&R Director.

In his new role, he meets up again with Santiago Menéndez-Pidal, who took over as Managing Director last October from Sony, and was Dean’s mentor when both worked at EMI Music Publishing.

BRIGHTWELL JOINS PODCASTONE

Sarah Brightwell takes over as Senior Account Manager at Southern Cross Austereo’s PodcastOne Australia, effective March 7, covering the Melbourne market.

She was Account Manager at Adshel in Sydney and Melbourne.

FORMER SCA/ PANDORA EXEC NEW ROLE

Rachael Townsley, who previously worked at Pandora (Head of Trade Marketing and Communications) and Southern Cross Austereo (National Trade Marketing Manager) is now Head of Marketing for Quantcast for the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region, based in Sydney.

HOT 100FM BREAKFAST TEAM

Hot 100FM Darwin’s new breakfast team sees it team up relative newcomer Taz Eriksen with established station breakfast presenter Sarah Passalick from March 5.

Eriksen joined Mix 104.9FM as drive announcer almost a year ago.

Meantime Tiffany ’Tiff’ Rouge is new drive show host, replacing the syndicated Hamish and Andy.

SCA’S ADLER MOVES ON

SCA’s Chief Engineer Steve Adler has been made redundant and finishes up next month.

NEW PUBLISHER FOR ALLURE

Allure Media, whose titles include Gizmodo, Lifehacker and Kotaku, has brought in as their publisher Chris Harrison, former Opinion Editor at the Huffington Post.

EVENTBRITE ADDS TWO

After what its CEO Julia Hartz calls “a banner year of growth and momentum”, ticketing platform Eventbrite added Omer Cohen as Chief People Officer and Brian Irving as Chief Brand Officer to intensify its appeal as a global workplace.