NEW YORK, NY. (Top40 Charts/ Atlantic Records) - Pete Ganbarg has joined Atlantic Records as Executive Vice President of A&R, based at the company's New York headquarters. The announcement was made by Atlantic Chairman/CEO
Craig Kallman and President
Julie Greenwald. Ganbarg, who began his A&R career 20 years ago, has served as a major label A&R executive for SBK/EMI, Arista, and Epic Records, and was most recently head of his own music consulting company, Pure Tone Music.
Craig Kallman commented: "Pete is the ideal person to lead our A&R mission at a time when the label is in the midst of a musical renaissance. First and foremost, what he brings to the table is a rare diversity of musical taste and deep A&R background, having worked with a string of successful artists who cut across the spectrum - from pop and rock to R&B and hip-hop to country and blues. He has a combination of great ears, executive experience, and most importantly, a pure passion for the music. It gives me great pleasure to welcome Pete into the Atlantic family."
Julie Greenwald added: "Atlantic is first and foremost an A&R-driven company, and Pete's amazing track record of delivering great records makes him the perfect choice to head up our A&R team in this exciting new era in the company's history. Everyone is looking forward to the fantastic music that we know Pete will be bringing us, and I join Craig in welcoming him on board."
Since beginning his music industry career in 1989, Pete Ganbarg has worked on projects whose worldwide sales total more than 60 million units. He started out at SBK Records, where he A&R'd projects ranging from the RIAA platinum soundtrack to "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" to pop/rap star Vanilla Ice's RIAA 7-times platinum "To The Extreme," as well as such diverse artists as Blessid Union of Souls, Black 47, and country singer-songwriter Darrell Scott.
With the closing of SBK/EMI in 1997, Ganbarg joined Arista Records as Senior Director of A&R. The first artist he worked with was Santana, for whom he conceived the 9-time Grammy-winning "Supernatural," which sold 27 million copies worldwide. While at Arista, he also worked with his childhood heroes Run-DMC, A&R'ing their final album, "Crown Royal." In 2001, Ganbarg moved to Epic Records as Senior Vice President of A&R. There he worked with a wide range of the Sony roster, from Michael Jackson to Celine Dion to Keb Mo, whose "Keep It Simple" won the 2005 Grammy for Best Contemporary Blues Album.
Since 2003, Pete has run Pure Tone Music, one of the industry's leading A&R consulting firms. Pure Tone's label clients include Atlantic, Arista, RCA, Capitol, Columbia, SonyBMG, and Burgundy Records. Pure Tone's success stories include A&R'ing Daughtry (their RIAA quadruple-platinum debut) as well as recent and forthcoming albums by Kelly Clarkson, David Cook, Chaka Khan, Santana, Train, Donna Summer, Aaron Neville, Taylor Hicks, America, Blake Lewis, Kenny G, and others.
