Savoy Plucks Vollenweider
The Beat, by Melinda Newman

We’ve never been one to spout that major labels no longer practice artist development; it’s just that they now limit it to acts that they believe (and hope and pray) can turn into huge moneymakers down the line. And that line is getting shorter and shorter.

What the majors have done is abandon many music art forms that show no chance of yielding such rewards, leaving a bounty for smaller labels that do not have the overhead or expectations of a major.

That’s how a label like Savoy Label Group ends up with Andreas Vollenweider and uses him to launch a world music imprint.

As many of you will recall, in the ‘80s and ‘90s, as improbable as it may seem for a harpist, Swiss artist Vollenweider was quite the sales force, with one platinum album and three gold sets in the United States alone while signed to Sony worldwide. According to SLG, he has sold more than 20 million albums globally.

After a hiatus, during which he got back all his Sony masters, Vollenweider will resurface on SLG’s new Kin Kou world music label. Within the next few weeks Kin Kou will announce three more signings of established artists.

“The approach is, you kind of figure out which way the water is running and swim against it,” SLG president Steve Vining says. ‘These are areas where larger companies aren’t functioning anymore.”

The Vollenweider discussion went from releasing new album “Vox” to developing into a yearlong rollout that includes the reissue of his entire catalog with, in some cases, accompanying DVDs or CD-ROMs.

The slate starts with the June release of “The Magic Harp,” a greatest-hits set. The album will be the first SLG project to go through WEA Distribution; SLG formerly funneled through RED Distribution. Reissues will summarily follow, punctuated by “Vox,” which is due in September.

The Vollenweider releases will receive an extra push through a PBS special that will air during the August pledge drive and again throughout December.

The break-even point for “Vox”? An almost-guaranteed 20,000 copies. “I think we can do better than that, but if we sell that, we’re happy,” Vining says. “We’ve made a fair deal where we can all experience an upside, but the majors just aren’t interested in those numbers.”