AEG Presents’ Milly Olykan is to join the Country Music Association (CMA) as VP of international relations and development.
As AEG’s VP of live music and major arena events, Olykan (pictured) developed in-house commercial content programmes for The O2 in London and was the founding festival director and co-promoter of the Country To Country festival. She also helped launch events such as BRITs Week, Hola! London and Country Music Week.
Olykan, who will be responsible for furthering the CMA's global expansion initiatives, will be based in Nashville and will begin her new role in mid-May.
“Expanding the reach of country music globally has long been our focus at CMA,” said the organisation’s CEO Sarah Trahern. “We created this role to help focus and escalate these efforts on behalf of our industry. Our staff, community and board of directors have worked closely with Milly since the inception of C2C in 2013. We’re thrilled to welcome her to CMA, where she will no doubt hit the ground running and continue to expand Country Music to an even larger global audience.”
Olykan has served on the CMA board since 2014 and was awarded the Jo Walker Meador International Award in March, which recognises outstanding achievement by an individual in supporting country music’s marketing development in territories outside the US. Prior to AEG, she worked in artist management, promotion, and tour management, where she produced festivals for IMG Artists and booked tours for Universal Music.
CMA has also appointed Falon Keith from the YMCA of Middle Tennessee as grant associate. Keith will continue to support and grow CMA’s philanthropic arm, the CMA Foundation.
Read Music Week's recent interview with Olykan about The O2's on-going success in bringing site-wide, genre-specific experiences to the masses here.
