“To Unite, Promote and Develop UK Country Music”
As country music has its moment a new organisation has been founded to promote the UK’s interests. The UK-CMA launches on 10th March 2025 as a membership umbrella for UK artists, musicians, and industry professionals. “We are fighting the cause for the UK country music industry,” says John Finch, Chair of the newly founded collective. The UK-CMA (definitely not the Competition and Markets Authority!) was founded to support the 2,000+ artists, musicians, and industry professionals who strive to make a living from writing and performing country music. The timing appears to be right. According to IQ Live Music Intelligence, in the last five years there has been an increase in the consumption of country music by 380%, while, in 2024, The Economist reported that country overtook easy listening to become one of the five most popular genres of music in the UK.
“When it comes to the UK country scene, it is artists from the US that dominate the limelight.” John Finch says, “American artists get all the plaudits! The UK Country Radio Airplay Chart is packed with Nashville artists but rarely includes any UK-based acts. This is perhaps unsurprising, given the comparative size of UK and US markets. However, UK acts are as good as, and in some cases better than, many of their US counterparts. We believe that greater awareness of the UK scene, especially in other markets like the US, Canada, and Australia, will propel more tracks by UK artists into key playlists, which will increase streaming consumption and ticket sales.”
Four key elements seemingly underpin the plans of UK-CMA:
- Promote UK artists and their music with information on the scale and quality of the scene to the media, both in the UK and around the world.
- Help these artists form alliances with the wider country music community, including those in Scandinavia, mainland Europe, Canada, and Australasia, to improve awareness of the undeniable quality of UK country music.
- Develop existing talent, from the grassroots up, and foster collaboration among artists to equip them with industry knowledge, write even better songs and improve concert performances.
- Unite the UK Country Music community, throughout the UK.
With the AMA-UK, the BCMA, and now the UK-CMA all vying for attention it does seem that a moment is happening but with lots of artist crossover between the organizations the question may arise of the need for all of them. Only time will tell.
