Applications for The Seed 2027 are now open; apply via theseedfund.org/applytheseedfund.org
Back in 2005, John Butler and Danielle Caruana (Mama Kin) were inspired to create an artist-led support network for emerging managers and self-managed artists. As they toured the country, they saw time and again how many incredible Australian artists had ineffective management or weren’t seen as bona fide in their attempts to self-manage.
They sought to create a community that fostered support and the sharing of knowledge and resources in an industry that was heavily blocked by gatekeepers. On the brink of independent models becoming viable release options, the timing felt crucial to share the importance of creating networks and fostering relationships with valued partners.
The Seed Fund’s inaugural workshop in 2006 was a humble yet ambitious pilot, starting with a gathering of 20 emerging managers and self-managed artists at the Clarendon Hotel in Katoomba. The workshop was, as it is now, a five-day live-in intensive, peppered with workshops and panels delivered by a generous network of industry experts and peers. The chance to talk freely and problem-solve between emerging and established practitioners marked the beginning of a community that would grow over the next twenty-one years and include hundreds of people.
Fast forward to 2026: The Seed Fund Management Workshop Program annually hosts 35 managers and self-managed artists for a five-day intensive and then a twelve-month mentorship program facilitated by alumni of the program. The workshop alumni has grown to over 360, many of whom return to speak across the intensive, continuing the circle of reinvesting into the music community.
The 2027 cohort will mark twenty-one years of The Seed Fund bolstering artists and managers through The Management Workshop Program.
As they acknowledge this milestone, Danielle Caruana reflects on those early days in Katoomba: “It felt like such a simple idea; let’s get a room full of emerging managers and self-managed artists and share all of our resources and connect them to the people they wish they could have a coffee with and fire questions at. What was striking in hindsight was how much generosity was in the community to turn up and freely share their information, strategies and assets, and how quickly the cohort turned to supporting each other. We reached the end of that first workshop and were immediately struck by how much bigger it was than the sum of its parts. Everyone who came to speak enthusiastically offered themselves up for the next year. The value was evident for speakers and participants alike. It was the independent mindset of looking at something and seeing a gap and just going after filling it ourselves.”
John Butler shares: “I’m struck that after this many years the program is still embedded with the same exact spirit as we started. It’s always been an act of building connection. To focus on community rather than competition, relationships over industry. To learn from each other and cross-pollinate. To provide a space for those who’ve done so much good work over the years to give back to a newer, and just as hungry, generation of creatives.”
The Seed Fund’s Management Workshop Program continues to be one of the most powerful investments in the Australian music industry, ensuring that artists, self-managed artists and artist managers are centred in the industry that they fuel. Community and connection are The Seed’s enduring legacy and will always be its future.
At the heart of its work, The Seed is built on a belief in advocacy, generosity and collective responsibility; that the rising tide lifts all boats. The Seed encourages innovation through creating pathways and actively invests in the next generation of artists and managers.
The Seed is a not-for-profit organisation, artist-founded and led, that is committed to placing artists and managers at the centre of the contemporary music landscape. The 2026 Management Workshop Program was made possible by the generosity of philanthropic contributions by John Butler, Wonderlick Entertainment, Eleven Management, Look Out Kid, Love Police ATM, Unified Music Group, Sorrento Strategic Accounting, One Louder, Conchord Music Publishing ANZ and proudly funded by the NSW Government through Sound NSW.
Applications for The Seed 2027 are now open and close COB Friday November 20th, 2026 apply via theseedfund.org/apply