Hi there!

I’m sending this en route to Berklee’s AI Music Summit (AIMS) in Boston. On Friday, my colleague Lenny and I will be giving a keynote presentation on “AI and rights management 101” — breaking down the latest developments in AI music detection, watermarking, and attribution, with a focus on real-world case studies from YouTube, Google Deepmind, Udio, Deezer, and more.

Please come say hi if you’ll also be in town. And if not, no worries; we’ll publish a recap of our AIMS experience in this newsletter next week. :)

Today's edition is short and sweet: the latest on our flagship New York Music Month events, featuring the startups and investors building the next layer of music tech.

If you’re new to this newsletter, please feel free to reply directly to this email to introduce yourself — I read everything that comes through.

Thank you so much for your support!

Best,

Cherie Hu
Founder, Water & Music

Survey: Artist services & AI

I’d love your help in filling out Water & Music’s latest survey on AI music trends, especially if you are a professional artist or music creator.

The AI music landscape has hit an inflection point, with a new wave of licensing deals moving real money — and shaping the terms of training, attribution, and royalty flows — faster than most artists can track. What does this moment look like for individual recording artists, songwriters, and producers, especially those whose labels, publishers, or distributors might be involved in these deals?

We’re running a 100% anonymous survey to find out. This survey is open to recording artists, songwriters, producers, engineers, and the wider creative community — whether signed, self-releasing, freelance, or somewhere in between.

As a thank-you, every respondent will receive a special copy of a keynote presentation we gave in December 2025 on how AI music attribution and compensation works ($2,000 value).

We’ve extended the survey deadline to Wednesday, June 10 at 11:59PM ET. Please contribute your perspective and/or spread the word to your artist, songwriter, and producer peers. Thanks so much to everyone who’s responded so far!

NY MusicTech Meetup: Meet our presenters

The lineup is here! We're excited to announce the three startups selected to demo at our NY MusicTech Meetup next Tuesday, June 9 at Public Records in Brooklyn:

Kalshi

Ian Cook (Culture Markets) and Clarissa Bronfman (Culture GTM)

Kalshi is the largest prediction market in America and the only federally regulated exchange where people can trade on the outcome of future events. From elections and economic indicators to sports, entertainment, and music moments, Kalshi turns opinions into markets.

Within music, Kalshi allows users to trade on outcomes across chart performance, streaming milestones, album releases, festival headliners, and major industry moments, creating a new way for fans and artists to engage with culture.

Kalshi’s Co-Founder/COO Luana Lopes Lara recently appeared on Billboard’s On The Record podcast to chat about the vision behind the company’s expansion into music.

Plates

Kristian Fryer-Kelsey (Founder/CEO)

Plates is an AI-powered marketing intelligence platform for the music industry. Marketers and artist managers are drowning in data; every TikTok surge needs investigating, and every significant playlist add needs an email. Plates uses AI and data to make your music marketing easier, and even suggests creative ideas to help connect artists with new audiences.

Built by three former Universal Music Group executives who spent 15 years building the company's data and analytics backbone, Plates now serves 30 paying customers including Disney Music Group, Big Loud, and Red Light Management, with over 50 companies in active trials.

Motif

Jad Al Masri (Founder/CEO)

The future of music is being built without most of the world's music. Less than 6% of AI music training data — and the evaluation metrics built on it — represents non-Western traditions. Yet, 5.5B+ people's musical heritage uses tuning systems, scales, and rhythmic structures that current AI cannot understand, generate, evaluate, or recommend.

Motif (Techstars ’25) builds the infrastructure to solve these issues at each layer: culturally-aware datasets, novel music models, enrichment tools to improve MIR, and evaluation metrics based on research submitted to top-tier conferences, alongside a team of ex-Microsoft/ex-Apple engineers. The company empowers the capabilities of AI music platforms, streaming services, sync libraries, music labels, and research institutions.

Event details

Date: Tuesday, June 9
Time: 6:00–9:00 PM EDT (demos will start ~6:30PM)
Location: Public Records | 223 Butler Street, Brooklyn

Each startup will have 5-10 minutes to show their tech in action, followed by audience Q&A. Our longstanding mandate is no pitch decks — this meetup will be about seeing real products that are reshaping how music is created, shared, and monetized.

​Click here to RSVP if you haven't already. We will close RSVPs at 12:00PM EDT on Tuesday, June 9 or once we hit capacity — whichever comes first!

Music tech investment panel: New speaker added

We’re thrilled to share that Valeska Pederson Hintz, Partner at Perkins Coie LLP, will be joining our music tech investment panel on Wednesday, June 17 at 6:00PM EDT.

Valeska guides growth-stage companies and investors from Series A through IPO — advising on governance, acquisitions, public offerings, and other liquidity events, and working across many industries including AI, music, film, and television.

She will be joining our roster of existing speakers including Robert Frech (Managing Director, The Raine Group), David Hua (VP, Creator Partners), and Raj Gopal (Partner, Vesper).

Collectively, our panelists have been behind several key music tech investment and M&A deals in the last decade, working with the likes of Stem, SoundCloud, Duetti, Reverb, Mogul, Hook, AWAL, and Position Music.

​We'll open with a snapshot of the music tech investment landscape so far in 2026, drawing from exclusive Water & Music data. Then, we'll dive into a panel discussion contextualizing this data against the lived experience of active investors navigating today's market realities, and identifying tomorrow's breakthrough opportunities.

Click here to reserve your spot.