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Steve Tramposch

Amplifier. Accelerator. Facilitator.

Steve Tramposch is an award-winning, creative and forward-thinking innovator with over 25 years experience launching groundbreaking campaigns for some of the world’s leading talents and companies in music, tech, social media, TV and publishing, from major corporations to startups, agencies and as a consultant.

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His experience features successful titles as a senior A&R executive for several of the world’s largest music companies, including Capitol Records, Virgin Records, Elektra Records, Eleven Seven, Billboard and more, where he’s been instrumental in the early discovery of numerous artists signed across genres that would later result in the worldwide sale of tens of millions of albums.

Some of the music companies Steve's worked for as an A&R / talent exec:

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Steve is also frequently contracted as an executive, advisor, and more at music companies and tech startups, including VP A&R for a record & publishing company, Managing Director for a music-based marketing platform, Industry, Business Development & Strategic Relations Lead for a mobile tech and streaming content platform and more.

Launchpad was created in 2004 between Senior A&R positions at Elektra and Virgin as a management and production company, and quickly grew into a success. Among other successes, Steve managed, developed, signed, A&R’d, and co-produced Launchpad’s first project to an award-winning 3x Platinum debut, with record-breaking radio plays, worldwide festival headlining appearances, major department store ad campaigns, a clothing line with Tony Hawk, numerous film/TV syncs and licenses, major media appearances and much more.

A pioneer in the use of data in the A&R process (aka "A&R Research"), over his career, Steve has built and developed companies, departments, and teams, overseeing initiatives for major media corporations and startups alike, including A&R, the development and launch of social, digital and traditional media products and campaigns, media management and production, product management, marketing, strategic partnerships, industry and talent relations, business development, market and trend research, team building, branding, contract negotiations, media and public relations, promotional tours and campaigns, merchandising, mobile, gaming and more.

Steve also has extensive, first-hand involvement with social media, streaming music and music-facing tech since the mid 90's. This includes work with Billboard Talent Net, a groundbreaking music and social networking website considered to be among the first consumer and B2B platforms for talent, fans, executives and companies on the web (and a precursor to MySpace among others), where he wrote about/introduced music executives and fans around the world to new talents such as John Mayer, Nelly Furtado, Alien Ant Farm, Anthony Hamilton and Amerie, to name a few.

A voting member of The National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences (Grammy’s), along the way he’s been invited to speak as an industry thought leader at numerous conferences, workshops and panels around the country and the world, including Midem (Cannes, France), Popkomm (Germany), SXSW (Austin, TX), CMJ (NY) and many, many more.

Over the years Steve has contributed his time towards causes and the community, including extensive work with the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, the Make-A-Wish Foundation and much more.

Earlier in his career he worked with talent and programming at TV network American Movie Classics (AMC), founded a successful industry social network, special events and promotions organization, and landed his first record company position at EMI/SBK/Chrysalis Records out of college, working with artists such as D'Angelo, Blur, Selena, David Gray, Jon Secada, Fun Lovin' Criminals and more.

In college he interned in at Interview Magazine, the legendary pop-culture monthly publication founded by artist Andy Warhol, and formed his own organization creating, promoting and DJ’ing off campus events. He also served as a radio DJ/audio engineer at radio station WBAU, and received his first taste of the music business in high school as a volunteer at the trailblazing alternative radio station WLIR.

Steve grew up on Long Island, NY, just over the border of Queens and about 30 minutes from downtown New York City. Raised in a musical environment and trained as a child in piano, brass, percussion, and more, he later picked up bass guitar, guitar, and a number of other instruments, studied advanced music theory, and began honing his recording skills via a 4-track cassette tape multitrack recorder.

For information on past A&R, production, management, and other alumni see Discography & Discoveries.

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