About Karen Brown

I presently work as a Senior Manager of Contract Administration at Universal Music Group. I've been in the Music Industry since 1995. I began with an internship at Perspective Records/A&M Records back in Summer of 1994, and then went to work at Spike Lee's retail store, Spike's Joint, for a couple of years. When that ended, I temped around at major labels until landing in the Business & Legal Affairs department, as an executive assistant, at Motown Records when it was under PolyGram. I transitioned with the label to Universal Records in the late 90's and became manager, handling sample and side artist clearances, reports to executives, tracking artist options, etc., all the while nurturing my lyric writing passion. I took some time off to raise a family and returned back to corporate America at UMG in 2010. I still have a passion to write lyrics, and work on more creative projects with other songwriters and collaborators. Its been a ride and I look forward to a future ruled by women in this industry.

Work experience

Karen's Skills

Business
  • Analyst
  • Project Manager
Live
  • Production Manager
  • Tour Manager
Venue Type Experience
  • Club
Producing
  • Vocal Producer
Songwriting
  • Co-Writer
  • Lyricist

Karen's Genres

  • Alternative Rock
  • Funk
  • House
  • Pop
  • R&B
  • Soul
  • World

Karen's Experience

My husband and I are into music. He’s into Funk, Soul, R&B, Rock, Pop – a producer, songwriter, arranger, performer and I, collaborate with him in songwriting. He goes under the name The Christopher COmplex. Our latest collaboration, that is published, is called “Fake Lover” (link above to listen on Spotify). When he was working on debuting his EP, I created his presskit, set him up on social media and maintained them, tracking his progress. I assisted in his press, publicity, marketing and promotions for local shows around the NYC area. For a short time, I created a business assisting artists to understand their business side of the industry by creating “start-up” dashboards to better organize their career, as well as, consulting. My husband and I created Music For Life Brooklyn, where we produced a show for charity with performances by local talent for door proceeds to go the American Cancer Society through one of their fundraisers called Relay For Life. I am familiar with a television studio in micing and lighting for television performances, as I took a production studio class at the local cable network, BRIC.