Meet Jason Owen, the Mega-Manager Whose Customers Swept the Grammys’ Country Honors

Nashville’s Sandbox Entertainment houses Kacey Musgraves, Dan + Shay and minimal Big Town, amongst others.

There clearly was a second in the of Feb. 10 when supervisor Jason Owen permitted their head to “go here. evening” Could their customer, Kacey Musgraves, whom by 4 p.m. had currently acquired two Grammy honors — for “Space Cowboy” and “Butterflies,” for best nation track and greatest nation solamente performance, respectively — in Owen’s words, “sweep this thing”?

Musgraves did exactly that, winning every category for which she was nominated — including what many give consideration to the absolute most coveted honor associated with the evening, the all-genre record of the season honor, for “Golden Hour.” Nonetheless it ended up being also a sweep for Owen’s very very own Sandbox that is nashville-based Entertainment whose clients — which include Dan & Shay (co-managed with Scooter Braun) — took home all of the Grammys in the united states groups.

For Musgraves, who Owen has represented since 2011, it ended up being “a reckoning,” he says. “It stated a great deal for Nashville and also for the future of nation music, to place a limelight on items that are thought never as conventional that deserve most of the attention in the field. It absolutely was unique.”

And really talking? Claims Owen, who presently boasts tasks in development at Netflix and Amazon: “It ended up being single-handedly the most readily useful evening of my expert life. Definitely.”

If ever a couple had been destined to traipse through life together, it is Musgraves and Owen — he, an unabashed worshiper of most things Dolly and Madonna while growing up in Arkansas, and she, a Texas girl that embodies the united states glamour of a Barbara Mandrell utilizing the vocal majesty of a Linda Ronstadt (Harry Styles’ contrast). Plus it’s perhaps their mutual growth that is real-time fairly brand new landscapes that both received and bonded them to one another. “The work of an excellent supervisor is actually to permit the musician to help make the music therefore the art which they would you like to make, then I want to venture out and offer them the possibilities,” Owen describes.

But Owen is more of the builder than the usual finger-snapper. From their very first administration customer Shania Twain, who he took in after serving in senior promotion, advertising and imaginative jobs at her label, Universal musical Nashville, to Midland, a neo-traditionalist band that unexpectedly topped the country charts, there’s strategy behind the step by step placement of the Sandbox work, especially because it pertains to the real time arena.

“I never pigeonhole because I don’t pay attention to music like that, and I also do not have,” says Owen. “There’s a spot for many, specially because of the right documents as well as the exact same is true of touring. Like Kelsea Ballerini is going with Kelly Clarkson at this time; Harry Styles and Kacey had been a combination that is magic and in early stages with Katy Perry and Kacey, too. Neither she nor i needed in which to stay a particular lane of nation touring.” (At Sandbox, Leslie Cohea heads touring.)

Owen has constantly gravitated towards feminine artists, returning to their youth playing Madonna, Cher, Bette Midler and Dolly Parton. “ i believe female acts simply possess this energy of superstardom,as he eagerly awaited the premiere of Madonna’s “Vogue” video” he says, recalling a family ski trip in 1990 during which he traded the slopes for MTV. “I would personally maybe not go out because I happened to be dying because of it,” he says with a laugh. “The artistic of this spectacle just always stuck beside me.”

Unlike many Nashville industry heavies, but, Owen didn’t start out in the songs company. Away from university, he went along to just work at brand New Line Cinema and line that is fine moving up to Spelling Entertainment. It absolutely was then that veteran label PR strategist Lauren Murphy (now Lauren Lewis) tapped him to just take cost of promotion for Mercury Nashville. During the exact same time, UMG established a fresh label called Lost Highway. Positioning it self as kept of mainstream country, it had been house to records by Johnny money, Ryan Adams (Owen notes that Adams’ promotion ended up being come to an end of brand new York) and the newly signed Musgraves. “I utilized to stay for the reason that seat at Universal and would need to handle the worst f—king supervisors. And I also had been, like, ‘I’m able to fare better than that with my eyes shut.’ And that is just just what began me personally thinking about management. Nonetheless it ended up being frightening.”

Timing-wise, a change ended up being arriving at the Nashville music company whilst the 2010s approached.

Luke Lewis, a figure that is beloved musical City, ended up being set to retire (he was succeeded by present UMG Nashville president and CEO Mike Dungan) and with their exit in 2012 arrived some doubt. Claims Owen: “I knew that i possibly could be kept here in a truly good or bad situation.”

Owen wound up making his peers within the dust as Sandbox finalized Faith Hill, Dan + Shay, Little Big Town, Midland and Devin Dawson (Twain left for Maverick in 2016). Their group expanded too, to 15 — “basically 90 % feminine,” Owen adds. “And the acts don’t really contend with one another. They’re all supportive and rooting for every other.”

And there’s a complete great deal to cheer on. Dan + Shay, whom saw a huge crossover hit in current months with “Tequila,” and also acquired a Grammy final Sunday, simply racked up 10 Academy of Country Music Awards nominations, as being a duo or separately. Five a lot more of those ACM nominations went along to Musgraves, whom, almost a 12 months after “golden hour” was launched, is finally getting played on country radio, which had all but sat out of the period.

Owen’s spot when you look at the greater socio-political-economic stability of Nashville — an oasis of blue in a typically red state — is significant. Early a year ago, whenever conservative talk-show host Mike Huckabee was appointed into the Country Music Association’s charitable board, Owen ended up being those types of vehemently opposing the move, in specific as a result of Huckabee’s history of slamming not only same-sex wedding but homosexual parenting. In a letter to top CMA metal, Owen published, “As you might understand We have a young child as well as 2 on route. This guy has managed to make it clear that my children just isn’t welcome inside the America.” Huckabee quickly have a peek at this web-site resigned amid the firestorm, with numerous crediting Owen’s clout for the quick action, although he had been fast to indicate that numerous other top execs had been exerting their very own stress behind the scenes. He’s confident Huckabee’s views are particularly much the exclusion and never the norm among his Nashville peers.

“Look, since 2002 once I relocated here, we never ever felt such a thing but accepted and enjoyed and normal,” says Owen. “There had been for the time that is long and probably ‘s still to some degree — exactly the same way to do things. And there are some of us whom stray far from that way of thinking. That may ideally begin the change.”

As for nation radio, Owen and Musgraves d have every one of these people saying, ‘Where does this fit?’ Like, whom cares where? It’s brilliant.”

In an instance that is rare of business getting up aided by the art,” Owen is delighted that the structure is coming around to Musgraves, and credits John Sykes at iHeartRadio for leading the fee. “I’m happy for her and I’m delighted for all of us,” he says. “I think it provides her yet another layer of possibilities and things for all of us to complete. … We’re off to a truly good begin.”