TuneCore CEO Andreea Gleeson has told Music Week the company is focused on serving as a "plan A" for artists as it finds innovative ways to boost emerging talent.
The Believe-owned independent digital music distributor, publisher and licensing service has helped jump-start the careers of Ed Sheeran, Jelly Roll and Chance The Rapper, to name but three, and announced in June that self-releasing artists on the platform had surpassed $4 billion in earnings worldwide.
"We're an important part of the ecosystem," said Gleeson. “I think the majors have us to thank for a lot of big artists that are on their roster, because we did that initial resumé-building. We are always thinking about how we evolve with the new needs of the market and be additive to make it a dynamic, diverse, thriving part of the industry, making sure that we don’t forget that these artists do need to get their start.
“We’re focused on making sure that great music is identified and rises to the top, and that we are that destination for an artist, so this is their plan A."
Servicing that ambition, the company pivoted to artist development in 2023 by launching TuneCore Accelerator – a “powerhouse” programme designed to drive discovery of artists’ music, build audiences and promote deeper fan engagement.
“We officially launched Accelerator last year, but had been working on it for three years,” said New York-based Gleeson, speaking in our latest issue. “It’s founded on what TuneCore’s DNA has been from the beginning, but it’s an evolution. Because the barriers to entry have reduced – partially, because of our own doing – the ability to build meaningfully is harder because of the sheer amount of content making it onto DSPs.
“The amount of creators participating in the market has outgrown the listenership growth and it’s hitting that inflection point,” she adds. “There’s only so much music A&Rs can listen to and the new digital ecosystem demands new solutions. The great thing is that technology can bridge that.”
It is enabling us to be much smarter about what we listen to
Andreea Gleeson
Accelerator features four development levels, customised to serve artists at different stages of their careers, each of which have increased artist discoverability. By opting in to the initiative, artists gain access to programmes such as Spotify Discovery Mode and YouTube Creator Music.
To date, over 250,000 independent artists have signed up for the programme, with tracks within the scheme gaining one billion new listeners and generating nearly 10 billion new streams.
“We are able to identify tracks with potential, move to the next phase, and then layer in the A&Rs in a more qualified way to listen to the music, because there’s no substituting that,” said Gleeson. “You can never completely remove the listening, because you’ve got to have the ear for the music. But it is enabling us to be much smarter about what we listen to.
“It is so different from what everyone else is doing, so it takes everybody a minute to understand what it is. But once we have walked them through it and shared the results, it cancels any scepticism."
Promising case studies include Detroit rapper Baby Smoove and Los Angeles-born singer Meg Smith (pictured with Gleeson). Smoove, who joined TuneCore in 2017, saw his tracks within the programme earn over 20 million streams in H1 2024 and also increased his reach internationally.
“Obviously, these are artists that have amazing talent, and it’s about giving them exposure,” reflected Gleeson. “With Smoove specifically, he has more than doubled his share of streams coming from India, driven by exposing his tracks to new audiences through the programme. It’s the usual life cycle of discovery and then expansion where you’re seeing the right indicators, and then deepening that further with those audiences, so we’re able to do the full cycle.”
It’s almost like the music industry has lost that ecosystem for how to develop an artist, because the audiences have moved to digital, but the mechanisms to develop artists have not
Andreea Gleeson
Tracks on Smith’s recent Emotional Affair EP have accrued over two million total streams, more than half of which were gained as a direct result of TuneCore Accelerator, with the initiative also increasing Smith’s exposure overseas
"She’s been in the TuneCore Accelerator programme since last summer and we’ve been able to place her in over 100 editorial playlists during that time, so she’s having traction algorithmically,” noted Gleeson. "We’re able to speed up that cycle of discovery and help music that has really great potential rise to the top."
Adding that artists on TuneCore today will become the “superstars of tomorrow”, Gleeson addressed the industry's ongoing challenges around breaking acts.
“It’s almost like the music industry has lost that ecosystem for how to develop an artist, because the audiences have moved to digital, but the mechanisms to develop artists have not," she concluded. "That is why we partnered with the DSPs very early – to find programmes that are going to help them rise.
"How we’re measuring success is when we’re able to get an artist from zero to their first 1,000 streams, and then from 1,000 to 10,000 and 10,000 to 100,000, and so on and so forth. We don’t want to just have viral moments where the artist doesn’t really progress; we want to create artist development.”
Subscribers can read the full interview with Gleeson here.
