Sacem renews its board of directors against the backdrop of governance reform

— France, Press releases, Nomination

SACEM’s members given an opportunity to elect a Supervisory Board for the first time

21 June 2017: The General Meeting of SACEM (The Society of Authors, Composers and Publishers of Music), held on Tuesday 20 June, has elected its new Board of Directors for one year, as well as six members of the new Supervisory Board.

SACEM’s Board of Directors are elected by their peers – authors, composers and publishers – to serve a three-year term (two years for the writers-directors) Each year the members of SACEM are asked to renew the mandate of administrators. The President is appointed by the new Board of Directors to serve a one year term that can be renewed.

For the first time, the creators and publishers, who are members of SACEM were invited to elect their representatives within the Supervisory Board, following an initiative introduced in March to further improve the influence of SACEM’s members in its governance. This was introduced during an extraordinary General Meeting.
The Board of Directors is composed by two authors, two composers and two publishers; it is also elected by the General Meeting for three years, renewable equally and by category. The conditions of eligibility and revocation are the same as those of the Board of Directors.
 

BOARD OF DIRECTORS (NEW MEMBERS ELECTED IN BOLD):

  • President: Jean-Claude Petit, composer
  • Vice-President: Jean-Marie Moreau, author
  • Vice-President: Nicolas Galibert, publisher
  • Vice-President: Wally Badarou, composer
  • Treasurer: Patrick Lemaitre, composer
  • Assistant Treasurer: Thierry Perrier, publisher
  • General Secretary: Dominique Pankratoff, composer
  • Assistant General Secretary: Serge Perathoner, composer
     

ADMINISTRATORS (NEW MEMBERS ELECTED IN BOLD):

Jean-Philippe Allard, publisher/ Gilles Amado, author-director/ Elisabeth Anaïs, author/ Alain Chamfort, composer/ Yves Duteil, author/ Jean Fauque, author / Rémy Grumbach, author-director/ Christine Lidon, author/ Bruno Lion, publisher/ Caroline Molko, publisher / Thierry Perrier, publisher/ Jean-Claude Petit, composer/ Jean-Marie Salhani, publisher/ Frédéric Zeitoun, author.

SUPERVISORY BOARD:

Members elected to the Supervisory Board include: Marc Chantereau, composer/ Arlette Kotchounian, author/ Sylvain Lebel, author/ Pierre Lemoine, publisher/ Valérie Seiller-Billaud, publisher/ Béatrice Thiret, composer.

SACEM’s Supervisory Board is responsible for supervising the activities of the Board of Directors and the Director General, and is also responsible for monitoring the Accounts Committee.

The new system to enable SACEM’s members to elect the constituents of the supervisory board was introduced as part of the changes to bring SACEM into line with the Collective Management Directive – just three months after the directive was transposed in French law. It also covered on a reform of SACEM’s regime of allowances of mutual assistance (RAES).

SACEM was the first collective management organisation in France to comply with the European regulation. Its numerous members who came at the extraordinary General Assembly on 1 June 2017, have adopted a statutory reform of exceptional scope (88 articles were agreed in a virtually unanimous vote). The statutory reform is based on the governance and the management of SACEM, to make them more transparent, democratic and able to respond to the challenges of international competition.
For further information on the statutory reform, click here.
 

Jean-Claude Petit, President of the Board of Directors

BIOGRAPHY

Jean-Claude Petit's generation of musicians embraced the entire musical spectrum of their day - from jazz to rock'n'roll, via classical and contemporary. His music studies at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Paris, where he was awarded his first music theory medal at the age of ten, then three First Prizes (harmony, counterpoint and fugue), did not get in the way of the wonderful jazz adventure he embarked upon whilst still in his teens. He performed at major Parisian venues, playing piano for the best American musicians of the '60s: Dexter Gordon, Johnny Griffin, Kenny Clarke, etc.

The idea of writing appealed to him, and he responded favourably to requests from show business from 1966, quickly becoming a highly sought-after arranger. He thus wrote and arranged the records of Julien Clerc, Serge Lama, Claude François, Mink Deville, Joan Baez, Michel Sardou, Mort Shuman, Gilbert Bécaud and others. He composed songs for a host of these artists and also for Marie Laforêt, Juliette Gréco and Alain Souchon. He also tried his hand at stage musicals with La Révolution Française, Mayflower and 36 Front Populaire, also composing music for a host of ads. All this time, Jean-Claude Petit was also conducting prestigious classical orchestras, such as the London Symphony Orchestra, the Munich Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre de l'Opéra de Paris, and the Orchestre de Paris. But jazz was always there. Jean-Claude Petit produced, played and composed jazz-rock albums such as Babel (with guitarist Philip Catherine) and The Best of all Possible Worlds (synthesiser album).

In 1982, he decided to break away from variety and channel his experience across the entire spectrum of modern music into films. He quickly gained recognition as a film score composer, receiving in under ten years one César, two Victoires de la Musique, a Brit Award, the SACEM Grand Prix in 2010, and multiple nominations for the Oscars and the European Awards, etc. He also wrote his first symphonic works at that time (published by Éditions Durand et Leduc), composed his first two operas which were premiered in 2007 and 2014 at the Opéra de Nice and the Opéra de Marseille respectively, and continued his long-standing relationship with the theatre, from Max Frisch to Victor Haïm, via Robert Hossein and Alfred Jarry, thus travelling through genres and time.