Virgin Music Group Appoints New Leadership Team Following Downtown Merger

With Virgin Music Group’s acquisition of Downtown Music Holdings finally solidified, the Universal Music Group (UMG) subsidiary has made sweeping updates to its global and regional leadership team. Executives from Virgin and Downtown populate the updated list of roles.

Who’s doing what:

• Sarah Landy is Senior VP of Business Development, reporting to Jacqueline Saturn, President of North America and Executive VP of Global Artist Relations.

• Liz Northeast is Senior VP and General Manager, Europe, reporting to Nick Roden, President, Europe.

• Renato Vanzella is Managing Director, Brazil, reporting to Cris Falcao, President of Brazil and Portugal.

• Nathan McLay is Managing Director of Australia and New Zealand.

• Michael Roe is Managing Director of Asia, Middle East and Africa.

• Victor González is President of LATAM, U.S. Latin and Spain.

• Virgin co-CEOs Nat Pastor and JT Myers oversee all regional leaders.

• Jeremy Kramer and Zack Gershen remain Executive VP of Global Marketing and Executive VP of Global Commercial and Digital Strategy, respectively. Both will report to Myers and Pastor.

• Tom Allen has been appointed Virgin’s Chief Technology Officer.

• Christiaan Kröner will be Virgin’s Executive VP of Global Operations.

• Molly Neuman continues as President of CD Baby.

• Emily Stephenson remains President of Downtown Music Publishing.

• David Driessen is the new Chief Product Officer at Virgin.

• Matt Sawin is now Virgin’s Executive VP of Physical and Direct-to-Fan Growth.

• Gareth Mellor has been appointed Senior VP of Communications and Brand Strategy at Virgin.

• Allen, Kröner, Neuman, Stephenson, Driessen, Sawin, and Mellor are reporting to Downtown’s former CEO, Pieter van Rijin, who is now COO at Virgin.

What they said:

• Pastor: “Virgin Music Group and Downtown have each built their reputations by supervising the independent community and empowering local teams. This combined structure will help grow these strengths, continuing to innovate while deepening the entrepreneurial culture and trusted relationships that will define our future.”