Janet Billig Rich

Janet Billig Rich
Born Janet Sue Billig[1]
1967[1]
Long Island, New York
Residence Los Angeles, California
Employer Manage This!
Known for artist manager, music supervisor, producer, record label executive
Spouse(s) David A. Rich[1]

Janet Billig Rich (born 1967 as Janet Sue Billig) is an artist manager, music supervisor, producer, and Tony Award nominated Broadway theater producer. Born in New York City, in the 1990s she worked at Caroline Records and Gold Mountain Entertainment, where she managed or publicized bands such as Smashing Pumpkins,[2] Hole,[2] White Zombie,[3] Nirvana,[2] The Breeders,[2] The Lemonheads,[1] Lisa Loeb,[4] Walt Mink,[5] and Dinosaur Jr.[3] She became the youngest senior executive at Atlantic Records in the mid-1990s,[6] where she developed artists such as Sugar Ray, Matchbox 20, and Jewel.[3] She currently operates the Los Angeles entertainment company Manage This!

She has either produced or served as music supervisor for shows such as Rocked with Gina Gershon, #1 Single with Lisa Loeb, What Remains, Pretty Persuasion, Pretty Things and The Biz, The Fashionista Diaries, Surfwise, Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane, See You in September, and Barry Munday.[7] She co-produced and handled music licensing for the Tony-nominated Broadway play Rock of Ages. In 2011 Billboard Magazine nominated her as one of the top 40 "Women in Music."[8]

Early life

Janet Billig Rich was born as Janet Sue Billig in 1967[1] in Long Island, New York[6] to Priscilla and Norbert Billig.[1] She has stated she loved music from a young age, and as a girl was obsessed with "Nadia's Theme."[4] While attending Calhoun High School on Long Island she became an avid fan of The Replacements, and drove around the country following their tours.[4] She later graduated from New York University.[1]

Career

Billig Rich began working in music by selling merchandise for bands such as Sonic Youth and R.E.M. at New York rock clubs.[4] She then went on to work at Caroline Records in publicity and A&R. At Caroline she worked with bands such as Primus, Pussy Galore, Smashing Pumpkins, Hole, and Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.[2] After joining the Manhattan-based Gold Mountain Entertainment in the early 1990s, she served as a manager for bands such as Hole,[2] White Zombie,[3] Nirvana,[2] The Breeders,[2] The Lemonheads,[1] Lisa Loeb,[4] Walt Mink,[5] and Dinosaur Jr.[3]

In 1995, New York Magazine named her one of "100 Smartest New Yorkers."[9]

By the mid-1990s she became the youngest senior executive at Atlantic Records.[6] While at Atlantic as VP for a year, she ran the A&R department and helped develop artists such as Sugar Ray, Matchbox 20, Jewel,[3] and By 2000 she was running her own music management company in New York, with clients including Bijou Phillips, T-Bone Burnett, and Lisa Loeb.[1] She was also a partner at Immortal Management, an entertainment company based in Santa Monica, California.[10][11]

Manage This!

Janet formed the management and production company Manage This![8] with partner, Jackie Nalpant in NYC in the early 90's. Through Manage This! she has worked with Lisa Loeb, Courtney Love, Hole, Guided By Voices, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, and a number of other artists. Also through Manage This! she has produced and served as music supervisor for a number of concert tours, television shows, and films,[4] including production on the Pixies reunion tour and documentary loudQUIETloud. She produced the Down From the Mountain tour – which featured music from the award winning Oh Brother Where Art Thou,[12] and worked with Linkin Park on their Projekt Revolution tours.

On March 19, 2004, Billig Rich was featured on the cover of the New York Post while bailing Courtney Love out of jail.[13]

She was co-producer for the TV special Crossover (2001), associate producer for the TV series documentary Rocked with Gina Gershon (2004), and produced five episodes of the 2006 unscripted television series #1 Single, which starred Lisa Loeb.[7]

Since 2004 she has served as a music supervisor for a number of projects, including the TV series Family Bonds, the documentary What Remains, Pretty Persuasion, the TV documentaries Pretty Things and The Biz, The Fashionista Diaries, Surfwise, 12 episodes of Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane, Nic & Tristan Go Mega Dega, See You in September, Barry Munday, No One Dies in Lily Dale,[3][7] and Skin to the Max.

In December 2011, she was nominated as one of 40 "Women in Music" by Billboard Magazine.[8]

Rock of Ages

Around 2003, Matt Weaver asked Billig Rich[14][15] and a number of collaborators to help him develop and pitch the concept of a musical based on 1980s rock hits. Band were to include Journey, Styx, REO Speedwagon, Foreigner, Pat Benatar, and Whitesnake.[4] She became one of multiple producers for the show and took the role of talking to bands and securing song rights, a process which she has said took over three years.[6] Rock of Ages premiered in 2005. After playing off-Broadway in New York in fall 2008, it opened on Broadway on April 7, 2009.[4] In 2009, the play received five Tony Award nominations, including Best Musical.[4][6] Billig Rich is Executive Producer of the film version of Rock of Ages, which was released in June 2012 and stars Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, and Catherine Zeta-Jones.[16]

Personal life

As of 2011, Billig Rich lives in Encino, California[6] with her husband David and their two twins, born in 2003.[4]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 "Weddings; Janet Billig, David Rich". New York Times. November 19, 2000. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Paoletta, Michael (21 January 2006). Sunset Strip goes Broadway. Billboard. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Daisy Rock Guitars the Girl Guitar Company: the Grammy Museum". Daisy Rock. October 6, 2010. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Melville, Lee (February 15, 2011). "Rock of Ages: '80s Letter to Music and Sunset Strip". LA Stage Times. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  5. 1 2 Groebner, Simon Peter (January 17, 1996). "What Becomes a Legend Most? The Return of Walt Mink". Citypages. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Jones, Chad. "Damnit, Janet. Let's Rock!". Chad Jones' Theater Dogs. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  7. 1 2 3 "Janet Billig Rich". IMDB. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  8. 1 2 3 "Billboard Women In Music 2011: List of Nominees". Billboard. December 2, 2011. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  9. ↑ "100 Smartest New Yorkers". New York Magazine. January 1995.
  10. ↑ Herman, Maureen. "Great Managers and How to find Them". SongStuff. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  11. ↑ "Behind the Music". Nylon Magazine. January–February 2000.
  12. ↑ "Down From the Mountain". Los Angeles Business Journal. April 1–7, 2002.
  13. ↑ "Janet Billig and Courtney Love". New York Post. March 19, 2004.
  14. ↑ "Girls Rock Your Boys". SHNews. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  15. ↑ "Janet Billig Rich". Torontette. June 8, 2010. Retrieved 2011-12-03.
  16. ↑ Templeton, David (March 11, 2011). "Talking Picture: Every Show Has Its Thorn". Pacific Sun.
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