Tim Westergren, Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Pandora
Tim Westergren founded Pandora in January 2000 and now serves as its Chief Strategy Officer. Tim is an award-winning composer, an accomplished musician and a record producer with 20 years of experience in the music industry. He has recorded with independent labels, managed artists, owned a commercial digital recording studio, scored feature films, produced albums, and performed extensively. His main instrument is the piano, but over the years he has played the bassoon, drums and clarinet and his musical background spans such genres as rock, blues, jazz and classical music.
Tim received his B.A. from Stanford University, where he studied computer acoustics and recording technology. A musician's musician, he is obsessed with helping talented emerging artists connect with the music fans most likely to appreciate their music. In addition to guiding Pandora's overall strategy and vision, Tim now spends most of his time as Pandora's chief evangelist - traveling the country to meet with listeners to collect feedback, research local music, and spread the word of the Music Genome Project.
About Pandora
When was the last time you fell in love with a new artist or song? At Pandora, we have a single mission: To play only music you'll love.
Since
we started back in 2000, we have been hard at work on the Music Genome
Project. It's the most comprehensive analysis of music ever undertaken.
Together our team of fifty musician-analysts has been listening to
music, one song at a time, studying and collecting literally hundreds
of musical details on every song. It takes 20-30 minutes per song to
capture all of the little details that give each recording its magical
sound - melody, harmony, instrumentation, rhythm, vocals, lyrics ...
and more - close to 400 attributes! We continue this work every day to
keep up with the incredible flow of great new music coming from
studios, stadiums and garages around the country.
With Pandora you can explore this vast trove of music to your
heart's content. Just drop the name of one of your favorite songs or
artists into Pandora and let the Genome Project go. It will quickly
scan its entire world of analyzed music, almost a century of popular
recordings - new and old, well known and completely obscure - to find
songs with interesting musical similarities to your choice. Then sit
back and enjoy as it creates a listening experience full of current and
soon-to-be favorite songs for you.
You can create as many "stations" as you want. And you can
even refine them. If it's not quite right you can tell it so and it
will get better for you.
The Music Genome Project was founded by musicians and
music-lovers. We believe in the value of music and have a profound
respect for those who create it. We like all kinds of music, from the
most obtuse bebop, to the most tripped-out drum n bass, to the simplest
catchy pop tune. Our mission is to help you connect with the music YOU
like.
Budd Carr
Budd Carr is acknowledged as one of the film industry's top talents in the field of Film Music Supervision. Best known for his work with Academy Award-winning director Oliver Stone he has applied his expertise to every Stone film since Salvador, including JFK, Platoon, The Doors, Born on the Fourth of July, Natural Born Killers, World Trade Center and W. He has supervised over 70 films and worked with renowned directors in addition to Stone such as James Cameron, Michael Mann, Frank Oz, Terry George, Norman Jewison and Mike Newell, among many others.
Budd began his professional career as a music agent with the CMA, IFA and ICM, handling acts such as The Cream, James Taylor, Bob Seger, Carole King, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, and Eric Clapton. Launching his own management company in 1980 he handled the careers of multi-platinum acts such as Kansas, Captain & Tennille, Heatwave, Asia and Slaughter.
He served as Executive Music Consultant for Peter Guber’s Mandalay Pictures at both Sony Pictures and Paramount Films, and as the Senior Film Music Supervisor for Windswept Pacific and EMI Music Publishing Companies.
Budd continues to work as executive music producer and music supervisor for motion pictures, Television and soundtracks. With his music supervision partner Nora Felder their Picture Tunes Music Company serves as music consultants to Overture Films. They produced the soundtrack album to the critically acclaimed and Academy Award nominated film Hotel Rwanda as well as the soundtrack for the highly successful and award winning Showtime TV series Californication starring David Duchovony.
He has served on the Board of Governors for The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, and is the founder and Co-Chairman of the Grammy Foundation's Film Music Scoring Program. He is a member of the Executive Committee of the Entertainment division of the City of Hope.
Hale Milgrim, Former President/CEO Capitol Records.
Hale Milgrim’s lifelong goal has
been turning people on to music. Hale has over 45 years of experience in the music industry, as President/CEO of Capitol
Records in Los Angeles, Sr. V.P. of Creative Services for
Elektra/Asylum/Nonesuch Records in New York, and prior positions with Warner
Brothers in Burbank and Warner/Elektra/Atlantic distribution in San
Francisco.
Presently, Hale is a Foundation
Board Member of the Santa Barbara Bowl, the Co-Producer of the“Sings Like Hell” series at The
Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara,
does consulting for Rhino Entertainment and can be found on Sunday
mornings on the “Go To Hale” radio show, 9:00am Sunday Mornings 99.9 KTYD or
KTYD.com.
John MacFarlane, Founder and CEO, Sonos, Inc.
Sonos is the leading developer of wireless multi-room music systems for the digital home. Sonos partners with more than a dozen audio services (like iTunes, Amazon, Pandora, Rhapsody, Napster, Sirius, Audible, eMusic and more), and over 25,000 Internet radio stations to give music lovers instant plug-and-play access to millions of songs and books that can be enjoyed throughout the home. Sonos systems are sold in more than 46 countries. The Company is privately-held and headquartered in Santa Barbara. John brings decades of experience in introducing category-defining products to the marketplace. Before founding Sonos, John was the Founder and CEO of Software.com, the largest provider of email software to Internet service providers worldwide.
David Cremin, Founder and Managing Partner, DFJ Frontier
David Cremin is a Founder and Managing Director of DFJ Frontier, a Draper Fisher Jurvetson affiliated venture capital fund focused on seed and early stage technology companies on the west coast. At Frontier, he leads fund management, fundraising and portfolio management efforts. Prior to Frontier, he was a founding partner of Zone Ventures in Los Angeles. As an entrepreneur, he served as founder and CEO of Vis-à-Vis Entertainment, a music publishing and digital media company. He also spent several years touring as a professional musician and recording for RCA Records, Atlantic Records, Elektra Records and EastWest Records. He holds a BS in Industrial Engineering from Stanford University.