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Sounni de Fontenay
Not many people who access and read the urban music webzine, Black Hole
(www.eyeofthehole.com), know that there is a mastermind behind the scenes ensuring that the public get an up-to-date publication with current features, on-the-ball advertising and a user-friendly front-end. This mastermind is Sounni de Fontenay.Born Emmanuel Sounni Ali Bourdeau de Fontenay in 1975, Sounni let go of a few of his names to encapsulate the short, but snazzy sounding Sounni de Fontenay. After starting life out in Ottowa, Canada, Sounni lived in Gatineau, Quebec until he was 8 years old. New Jersey was his next home until he reached the age of 18. Now he's based in New York. Exposed to various types of music from a young age, Sounni listened to Classical, Reggae, Jazz, Heavy Metal and then Techno. He was also a musician playing the saxophone for 6 months at the age of 10 and then moving onto the bass. The question on the Dainty Crew's mind when we decided to venture into interviewing this Internet guru was what he was involved in exactly and to what extent. The answers astounded us as he's not only involved with Black Hole, but Sounni is also involved with Tag It, 'LA 'Ritmo.com, MusicDish and Mi2N (Music Industry Newswire)! Tag It (www.taggin.com) is a new media company that was founded in the middle of 1997 by Sounni's brother, Eric de Fontenay, and his sister-in-law, Stephanie. He recalls "we started as a web design company, but soon decided to enter the online music industry with our first publication, Beats E-Zine". This music industry publication included some Latin content, industry articles and news and it quickly took shape with the expansion and separation of the Latin section into The Latin Beat and eventually into 'LA 'Ritmo.com in the Summer of 1998. 'LA 'Ritmo.com (www.laritmo.com) became their 2nd online publication. In early 1999, Beats E-Zine was renamed MusicDish (www.musicdish.com) and so the trio now had MusicDish, Mi2N (www.mi2n.com), Black Hole and 'LA 'Ritmo.com. Sounni says "we targeted niche markets within the music business... MusicDish and Mi2N targeting music industry professionals... Black Hole and 'LA 'Ritmo.com targeting the consumer." More recently, the trio launched the MusicDish Genome Project, "a qualified music websites database with the purpose of mapping the online music industry." What fuelled Sounni, Eric and Stephanie to start these online publications? Well, Black Hole as all those reading this interview know, caters for the Hip-Hop, R&B, Dancehall Reggae massive and is "unique in that it brings all aspects of urban music culture together." 'LA 'Ritmo.com was started because "at the time there was not much in the way of Latin music online." MusicDish is more of a "trade journal. It has everything... music technology/new media news and analysis, music career tips." The other important aspect of MusicDish is that it deals with "business/artist consulting and licensing." Finally, Mi2N is "the largest open publishing music newswire online." In addition to having their own sites, the talented trio designed and managed a site for a label called Celestial Navigations and their artist Wolfgang (www.celnav.com). They have also worked on various projects in the past which can be seen from the Tag It website. Sounni's roles for each site are similar apart from Tag It. He is the COO and Publisher of Tag It whilst playing editor-in-chief for Black Hole, 'LA 'Ritmo.com and MusicDish. He does all the web design for 'LA 'Ritmo.com and Black Hole with the latter being "a personal favourite" of his because of his love for urban music. For Tag It, his position means he deals with all the business aspects of Tag It whilst "heading the publishing and syndication divisions, consulting, industry analysis, artist relations" and he also attends most music conferences such as the MP3 Summit and New York Music & Internet Expo as a speaker on panels. As a part of the organising committee for the NY Music & Internet Expo, Sounni helps coordinate the speakers and panels, speaks on the panels and represents all the publications and services at the booth! Sounni's talents are not solely restricted to the Internet as he used to manage a set of leading Latin restaurant and clubs in New York called Gonzalez y Gonzalez. Food is something he loves and "cooking is my passion". The restaurants had live Latin music which sparked Sounni's love for Salsa, Merengue and Latin Jazz. He left in 1998 to work on Tag It full-time. Aside from his full-time occupation of dealing with the online publications, Sounni enjoys listening to all sorts of music including Hip-Hop, Reggae & Dancehall, R&B and Latin. His favourite artists comprise of Redman, Rakim, Peter Tosh, Lady Saw, Mary J. Blige, Tito Nieves and George Lamond to name a few. He likes many more artists and groups as he says "music just clicks with me." Due to his commitments, Sounni doesn't have much spare time, but if he did he would travel to places like Africa, Asia and Latin America with an emphasis on "reading, writing, camping." He has 3 cats called Sebastian, Tecumseh and Zhanna who he would take with him if stranded on a desert island and could only take 3 things or people along. For those of you reading this who would like to get into the business, Sounni advises that it's "important to dedicate yourself to whatever you do. Never do things halfway." Education is a key thing to the New Media/Internet field and so you need to learn about what it is you want to be involved in. As for musicians, "learn all the different aspects of a music career, know your abilities and most of all, enjoy what you do." It's obvious Sounni enjoys what he does as the finished product speaks volumes with it's high calibre content, on-point graphics and constant innovation. He would like "to thank all the people who have made our publications a success: the writers and readers" and we want to thank him for providing the public with top class online music sites and the writers with a forum to express themselves. |
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