We’re updating the NOLA MusiCon schedule daily as new sessions and speakers are added, so check back often to see what’s new! We’re still putting the finishing touches on everything, so please note the schedule is subject to change.
NOLA MusiCon 2026 Schedule
AI Is Sampling: What Music Licensing Can Teach Tech
Generative AI may feel new, but many of the rights questions at the center of today’s debate are familiar to anyone who has worked with sample clearances. This session explores what AI companies and rightsholders alike can learn from the way the music industry turned sampling from a legal gray area into a licensed creative economy. The conversation will look at consent, compensation, attribution, training data, rightsholder trust, and why licensing should be treated as infrastructure for innovation rather than a barrier to new creative tools.
From Second Lines to Screens: Making New Orleans Music Sync-Ready
New Orleans is one of the most musically identifiable cities in the world. Its sound is a cultural language, a tourism engine, a storytelling asset, and an under-leveraged export product. But for many artists, labels, publishers, estates, and community catalogs, the music is not always prepared for how modern sync licensing actually works. This session will explore how cities with strong sonic identities can make their music easier to discover, clear, license, and monetize across film, television, advertising, sports, games, trailers, branded content, and digital media. Using New Orleans as the central case study, the discussion will cover the practical steps that help local music move from cultural asset to export-ready catalog, including stronger metadata, clearer master and publishing ownership, searchable catalog organization, pre-cleared licensing terms, rate guidance, and better storytelling around songs, artists, scenes, and traditions. The session will also examine how sync readiness can support cultural preservation. When historically significant regional music is properly organized, credited, licensed, and tracked, it can reach new audiences and new revenue channels without stripping away its authenticity. Attendees will leave with a clearer understanding of what sync buyers need, what rightsholders should prepare before pitching music, and how cities with strong sonic identities can build more sustainable pathways from local culture to global media.
Lunch Break
Food Truck of the Day: Wolf’s Burgers
What is The Mechanical Licensing Collective?
If you write songs and release music, The MLC may play an important role in how you get paid. Learn what The Mechanical Licensing Collective does, how digital mechanical royalties work, and what songwriters need to know to make sure their music is properly registered and they’re getting the royalties they’re owed.
What Goes Around Comes Around: How Artists and Heirs Can Reclaim Music Rights
In New Orleans, music often carries both cultural and family value that is intrinsically tied to legacy and the potential for generational wealth. Termination rights give artists and their heirs the ability to reclaim control of songs and recordings that carry this weight, but the process is time-sensitive, often misunderstood, and deeply tied to contracts, catalog value, and estate planning. This panel will break down what termination rights are, why they matter now, and how creators, families, managers, and catalog owners can begin planning before key windows open or close. The conversation will explore how reclaimed rights can affect publishing income, sync licensing, brand opportunities, documentaries, catalog deals, and the ability to protect how music is used.
Give the Drummer Some
*description coming soon*
Importance of Independent Labels, Presented by A2IM
*description coming soon*
The Festival is the Easy Part
Festivals may only last a few days, but pulling one off takes months of planning, coordination, and problem solving. Go behind the scenes with the people who make festivals happen and get a better understanding of what’s happening on the other side of the stage.
Lunch Break
Food Truck of the Day: Wolf’s Burgers
The Music Industry's AI Problem Isn't AI
AI is everywhere in music conversations, but most music businesses and creators are still wrestling with more basic problems. Chief among them, they cannot always see, explain, or trust the data that determines how songs are identified, licensed, reported, and paid. Generic AI hype can make these problems worse. Instead, the focus should be on the practical infrastructure that has to exist before new technology can create real value. This session will explore that infrastructure as it stands today, examining why publishing and royalty data remains fragmented; how that fragmentation affects artists, songwriters, publishers, managers, and rights teams; and why better transparency is now central to both artist empowerment and business growth. Attendees will leave with a clearer understanding of the questions they should be asking about their catalogs, the warning signs that rights or royalty data may be creating hidden risk, and the practical steps music companies can take before investing in AI tools or artist-facing reporting systems.
Beyond Halftime: The Hidden Power of Music in Sports
Music and sports have always gone hand in hand, but the opportunities for artists go far beyond the halftime show. From pregame and in-game entertainment to fan events and other experiences surrounding the game, live music plays a big role in creating the energy fans remember. Learn how music fits into the sports world, where the opportunities are, and how artists can position themselves to land more of these gigs.
Authenticity in the Age of AI
*description coming soon*
Language, Culture and Collaboration
What happens when artists create and collaborate across languages and cultures? This session explores how bilingual and multilingual music, cross-cultural collaborations, and choices around language can shape artistic identity, storytelling, audience growth, and brand opportunities—while approaching the work with intention, respect, and authenticity.
It Take a Village
New Orleans has always had a way of producing incredible talent, but that doesn’t happen on its own. We’ll take a look at the people and programs helping young musicians find their path, where support is still needed, and how music education can better prepare students for a future in the industry.
Lunch Break
Food Truck of the Day: Wolf’s Burgers
Radio Still Matters
Radio still plays an important role in helping artists get heard and reach new audiences. Hear from DJs and programmers across traditional and digital radio about how they find new music, what gets their attention, and what artists should know about getting their music on the air.
Trends, Nostalgia & What Connects
Nostalgia isn’t just memory—it’s a market force reshaping music, fashion, and culture. From Gen Z discovering sounds and styles from past decades to artists and brands finding new ways to tap into them, this session looks at why old trends keep becoming new again, how social media is speeding up those cycles, and what makes nostalgia connect with audiences without feeling forced.
Sync Strategy
Getting your music placed in film, TV, advertising, and other media takes more than just having a great song. This session looks at how sync really works, what makes music stand out, and what artists should know before pitching. Hear from industry professionals about how opportunities come together, what they look for, and how artists can better position their music for placement.
Copyright and Contract Fundamentals for Artists, Writers, and Producers
Performers, Writers, Producers – you create copyrights every time you write a new song, record a new track, or produce a beat. So what are you doing to protect them? This question gets a lot more complicated when you’re working with collaborators. In this talk, we will discuss the fundamentals of copyright law that musicians, songwriters, and producers need to know. We’ll also cover some important concepts about contracts, and dispel some of the fear and concerns that creatives frequently have around using and signing contracts. By the end of the talk, you will have the vocabulary and the concepts you need to hold intelligent conversations with your manager, attorney, label, and business partners about how you want to manage your copyrights and use your music to earn your place in the industry.
Built to Rise
The music industry has changed—today’s artists are expected to be creators, entrepreneurs, marketers, and business owners all at once. Whether you’re just getting started or looking to reach the next level, this interactive workshop will help you identify the biggest opportunity in your career, uncover what’s holding you back, and create a focused action plan for sustainable growth. Participants will leave with practical tools, a personalized career assessment, and a clear roadmap for their next 90 days. The music industry has never offered artists more opportunity—or demanded more from them. Today’s independent musicians are expected to be creators, entrepreneurs, marketers, and business owners, often without a roadmap. In this interactive workshop, Brittany Mondrinos, founder of Lunascend and creator of the Built to Rise™ Artist Development Program, will guide artists through a practical framework for evaluating their careers and identifying what to focus on next. Through a guided career assessment and hands-on planning exercises, participants will uncover the biggest gaps in their artistic and business development, define their priorities, and create a personalized 90-day action plan. Whether you’re an emerging artist building your foundation or an established musician looking to break through to the next level, you’ll leave with greater clarity, practical tools, and a strategy for building a sustainable creative career.
Lunch Break
Food Truck of the Day: Wolf’s Burgers
Tax and Finance Basics for Musicians
*description coming soon*
Funding Your Music Business: Choosing the Right Support for Your Creative Passion
Money is one of the most confusing parts of building a music career, and most artists navigate it without a roadmap. Join Austin Breckenridge, Executive Director of The A&R Foundation, for a practical breakdown of the funding options available to independent artists. Whether you’re trying to record your next project, hit the road, or grow your business, the right capital can change what’s possible. The session covers the full spectrum, from traditional lenders like banks, credit unions, and CDFIs, to music specific options like label advances, royalty based financing, grants, sponsorships, and crowdfunding. You’ll learn how each option works, what it costs, what it requires, and how to decide which path makes sense for where you are in your music career. No finance background required! Just bring your questions.
Between the Gig and the Grant
New Orleans music is treated as a public good, a tourism engine, a cultural inheritance, a charitable cause, and an industry, depending on who is talking and who is getting paid. This session will examine what happens when artistic and cultural work is increasingly routed through nonprofit structures, philanthropic funding, and project-based support instead of stronger labor protections, ownership models, fair contracts, collective bargaining, and industry infrastructure. Philanthropy can support important artistic work, but it cannot replace the power and protections that organized labor, fair pay, ownership, and shared economic infrastructure can provide. Drawing on fundraising practice, arts administration, music education, professional performance, nonprofit leadership, and current research into the history of musicians’ labor organizing in New Orleans, this panel will ask a direct question: what does the nonprofitization of culture solve, and what does it quietly leave untouched? The conversation will bring together leaders who understand New Orleans music from different but connected angles: working musicianship, youth music education, arts education, nonprofit fundraising, cultural economy research, and the lived realities of building institutions around artistic labor. Panelists will explore how charitable framing shapes the way artists are paid, how cultural labor is valued, and how New Orleans continues to market music as a defining economic asset while many working musicians and culture bearers are excluded from the full benefits of that economy. The goal is not to dismiss philanthropy. Grants can fund projects, build capacity, and support important work. But grants alone cannot create a just cultural economy. This session will push attendees to think more honestly about what artists, music organizations, funders, and industry leaders need to build beyond one-off funding opportunities. Key themes or takeaways: New Orleans music is not only culture. It is labor, business, education, and economic infrastructure. Philanthropy can support artistic work, but it cannot replace labor protections, ownership, fair pay, or organized power. Nonprofit structures can create access to funding while also reinforcing the idea that arts and culture are charitable work rather than industry work. Artists and culture bearers need more than project grants. They need infrastructure that supports long-term economic participation. Music education organizations play a critical role in preserving cultural knowledge and creating pathways for young people, but they also sit inside the same funding systems and economic tensions. Funders, nonprofits, and industry leaders need to understand the difference between supporting culture and extracting value from it. Attendees will leave with clearer language for discussing artistic labor, philanthropic funding, cultural economy, and the limits of grants as a solution.
Thinking Outside the Box: Marketing & Brand Partnerships
Explore creative ways artists can work with brands, from developing music for campaigns to building partnerships that feel authentic. The conversation will also look at how artists can create opportunities without losing sight of their own identity.
Medication Management - Ask a Pharmacist
*description coming soon*
Growing a D2C Model for Independent Artists
*description coming soon*
Lunch Break
Food Truck of the Day: Panchita
The St. Aug Effect
For generations, St. Augustine High School has helped shape some of New Orleans’ most accomplished musicians. Hear from St. Aug alumni to explore the training, discipline, mentorship, brotherhood, and musical tradition that have made the school such an important part of the city’s music story—and how that legacy continues to influence new generations.
Beat Retreat
New Orleans music has never stood still. Today, young producers and artists are taking the city’s influences in new directions and creating sounds that reflect New Orleans right now. Hear from some of the people behind that music about what’s inspiring them, how the city shapes their work, and what they see coming next.
The Checkup You Keep Putting Off
Irregular schedules, lack of insurance, cost, and life on the road can make routine healthcare easy to postpone. Learn about preventive care, recommended screenings, common health risks, and practical ways music professionals can find affordable care and stay ahead of potential problems.
Built for the Long Haul
A career in music can take a real physical toll. This session looks at how musicians can better care for their bodies, prevent common health problems, and protect their ability to keep performing and working for years to come.
Lunch Break
Food Truck of the Day: Panchita
How to Keep Going Without Running Yourself Into the Ground
A sustainable career requires more than talent and determination. Hear about realistic strategies for managing demanding schedules, travel, creative work, day jobs, caregiving, and recovery—without treating exhaustion as the price of success.
From Club to Stadium
Actionable strategies for scaling live careers—from DIY local gigs to international festivals and stadium runs. This session will cover booking tactics, tour planning, revenue streams (tickets, merch, syncs), team-building, budgeting, and tips for sustaining growth while retaining independence.
| Topics | Speakers | Time | Venue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lunch Break | Vocals/Woodwinds | ||
| Between the Gig and the Grant |
|
Vocals/Woodwinds | |
| Thinking Outside the Box: Marketing & Brand Partnerships | Louis Prima | ||
| Medication Management - Ask a Pharmacist | Louis Prima |
| Topics | Speakers | Time | Venue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Growing a D2C Model for Independent Artists | Main Stage | ||
| Lunch Break | Main Stage | ||
| The St. Aug Effect |
|
Main Stage | |
| Beat Retreat |
|
Main Stage | |
| The Checkup You Keep Putting Off | Louis Prima | ||
| Built for the Long Haul | Louis Prima | ||
| Lunch Break | Louis Prima | ||
| How to Keep Going Without Running Yourself Into the Ground | Louis Prima | ||
| From Club to Stadium |
|
Vocals/Woodwinds |