Phylicia Fant has just been named the new senior executive of urban music at the second largest record label in the country, Columbia Records.
What We Know:
- Fant’s journey into the music industry was driven by her disinclination for the traditional. While completeing her studies at her alma mater Spelman College, Fant saw a job posting for CNN that was looking for journalism and english major interns.
- After attaining and completing the internship at CNN, Fant realized where she didn’t want to be but what she did know is that she still wanted to use her training in the art of language, story telling, and narration as the perfect start to crafting campaigns to tell the stories of musicians.
- Jojo was the first artist Fant ever worked with. Jojo became the youngest artist to ever have a No.1 single on the Hot 100 chart. Fant’s first boss wanted to avoid pigeon holding her to one genre. From there, she was able to work across many genres like rock, pop, and blues.
- As a music executive, Phylicia Fant has conceived and completed campaigns for many award winning artist such as Drake’s OVO sound, Prince, Andra Day, Amy Winehouse, Raphael Saadiq, Kid Cudi, and more.
- When Fant is working with a new artist for the first time, she not only wants to connect the personal and passion but also wants to know what legacy goals they have. Legacy for Fant is more than finacial security but how the artist plan to change their communities.
- Fant stated, “I try to help these artists leave legacies for their children and their communities, and the world around. I try to position, empower, and educate my roster on how they can give back and help them do so”.
- Last year, the Spelman graduate was an honoree to recieve a Trumpet award for Corporate Excecutive of the year. The award recognizes her for her exemplary career as a publicist ans creating opportunities for others to succeed.
The CEO of Columbia Records, Ron Perry, hired Fant to help spearhead a new urban strategy. Although Fant is leaning into her role as an urban music strategist, she brings a wealth of experience from other genres to the table.
