New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Downtown
Music Publishing has acquired an interest in multi-award winning songwriter, producer, playwright, and musician, Wayne Kirkpatrick's catalog. Highlights in the catalog include "Every Heartbeat," "Good For Me," recorded by Amy Grant, "Place In This World" by
Michael W. Smith "
Wrapped Up In You" by Garth Brooks, and GRAMMY award winning Song of the Year "Change the World," (1997) by Eric Clapton, which charted at #1 on the Billboard chart for 13 weeks, and was featured on the soundtrack of the 1996 film, Phenomenon.
"Downtown is thrilled to add the works of such an acclaimed and entrepreneurial songwriter to our catalog and it's an honor to represent these iconic songs, spanning multiple genres,"said Downtown Nashville's Vice President, Steve Markland.
Kirkpatrick's works have earned GRAMMY and Dove awards and cover Contemporary Christian, Country, and Pop styles. His songs have been recorded by notable names such as Faith Hill, Garth Brooks, Babyface, Amy Grant, Joe Cocker, Eric Clapton, Tim McGraw, Kathy Mattea, Martina McBride,
Wynonna Judd, Trisha Yearwood, Bonnie Raitt, Susan Ashton, Michael W. Smith, Jill Phillips, Michael Crawford,
Peter Frampton,
Casting Crowns and T-Pain. He has also been a writer and producer for the GRAMMY nominated country group,
Little Big Town, yielding 4 top ten singles - "Boondocks," "Bring it on Home," "A
Little More You," and "Little White Church."
Of the announcement, Kirkpatrick remarked, "Downtown is the perfect home for these compositions. They are passionate and forward-thinking partners, something that is hard to find in a publisher."
Kirkpatrick has also seen success with several entrepreneurial endeavours in the arts and entertainment world. In 2014, Kirkpatrick teamed up with his brother Karey to co-write the Broadway musical Something Rotten!, for which they received a Tony nomination for Best Original Score (Music and/or Lyrics) Written for the Theatre. Most recently, Kirkpatrick founded "The Junk Bunk," a mixed media art collection, which gained popularity for signature clocks made from vintage board games.
Downtown was represented in this transaction by
Peter Rosenthal at Ritholz Levy Sanders Chidekel and Fields, LLP. Wayne Kirkpatrick was represented by Andrew Fromm at Fromm Consulting, LLC, and Gary Gilbert and Michael Rexford at Manatt Phelps and Phillips, LLC.
Since opening in Nashville in 2014, Downtown has signed agreements with songwriter/artists including Jason Isbell, Sturgill Simpson, Old Crowe Medicine Show, and John Moreland and acquired the catalogs of Charlie Black, Ray Whitley and VLS Music, which includes
Lady Antebellum songs written-by Hillary Scott. Active songwriters including Andy Albert, Marc Beeson and
Kelly Archer have written recent charted Country hits for
Blake Shelton, Josh Turner, and Cassadee Pope.
About Downtown
Music Publishing
Founded in 2007, Downtown
Music Publishing is one of the world's leading rights-management firms, with offices in New York, Nashville, Los Angeles, London, and Amsterdam. The company's catalog spans over seven decades of popular music, encompassing some of the world's most beloved songwriters and artists including The Beatles,
John Lennon & Yoko Ono, The Kinks, Hans Zimmer, Bruce Springsteen, Mötley Crüe, One Direction, Hardwell, Santigold, and Carla Bruni. The company also represents such renowned publishing catalogs as Cy Coleman's Notable Music, the legendary Latin music catalog, Fania, the UK's Kassner Music, and Germany's Budde Music. The company's technology platform, Songtrust, powers global royalty collection from over 100 countries and more than 20,000 unique income sources worldwide.
