YESSIAN MUSIC: Now 50 years old, Yessian Music Inc. has seen first-hand how technology has impacted the music and advertising businesses. The Farmington Hills-based Yessian was started in 1971 by school teacher and musician Dan Yessian as a commercial music production company working with automakers and other companies in the area. Now a second-generation company run day-to-day by Dan Yessian's sons Michael and Brian, the company has expanded to have clients around the globe and production studios in Los Angeles, New York and Hamburg, Germany. Brian Yessian, 44, partner and chief creative officer with Yessian Music, spoke with Crain's about how the company over the last two decades has expanded beyond its Detroit roots (which, yes, includes ties to Bob Seger), and how consumer demand for new experiences is pushing the company into new areas.
- How did you wind up following your father into the family business?
I guess in like the late '90s is when I got involved in the company. I come from a music background. I'm a classical clarinetist. I went to music conservatory (Mozarteum University of Music in Salzburg, Austria) and finished my degree at Wayne State in Detroit. And my brother got involved in the early 2000s.
I kind of come from a very global mindset, because I did part of my schooling overseas in Austria, going to Music Conservatory. And I've always been fascinated with traveling the world since I was very young and involved in music. It was never my intention to get involved in the industry and in this business. I was always kind of playing in orchestras and ... touring around the world for that matter and really enjoyed it. But, kind of came home a summer and just got sucked in, because I just fell in love with the business.
- What was happening at Yessian Music at the time you got involved?
So when we got when we started in the early 2000s, we just really had this idea of being able to expand our offerings and work not only in Detroit, Michigan, but around the country and around the world, for that matter. So I had a lot of high hopes (for) really, how can we take what we do, knowing that there's fierce competition on the coasts in New York and L.A., especially. But how can we be something a little bit different and special in these industries.
- What did you find?
It was a very organic process. We started out very small, with just a person working out of their home in these cities, and then slowly started to expand what we did and what our offerings were.
And then globally, which has always been the fascination for me, just to travel the world and interact with other cultures. We really made a big push to be working around the world with different types of companies. And then not only advertising, but now we're doing everything from immersive experiences, and theme parks around the world. And different types of innovative technologies, like virtual reality and sonic immersion in theater-type work. So it's given us the opportunity to really expand what we do and create sound with kind of a future-forward mentality.
- Can you define what you mean by "future-forward mentality?"
Right now what we're really dabbling in is this idea of sonic immersion, and you know, immersive experiences within the last four or five years now have become very popular. You're seeing like the Van Gogh exhibit coming to Detroit here, which is a full-on projection mapping of visual mixed with sound. As you're walking through these environments, (you're not) walking through a silent environment. You're walking through something that's immersed in sound, and sound that's carrying you through the space. So we're really testing and working with technology in audio, to pull people through spaces and get them to get sound to direct people in different ways, so that if something is supposed to happen on the other side of the room, how can the sound pull you over rather than just the visuals, or the combination thereof?
- So on a broader scale, how would you say shifting technology and consumer practices are impacting how Yessian Music does music?
I think the technology is always moving very quickly. And there's new tools and new resources coming out on a daily, weekly basis here. I think, from our perspective, we're trying to team up with some of those technology companies and collaborate with them more so that we become beta testers, and we're involved in the process at a much earlier stage than when it's just released. So that we are kind of ahead of the technology as it comes out.
- Music in Detroit is typically affiliated with Motown artists, Bob Seger, etc. Yessian Music, however, has worked on the commercial side of the business. How would you say the company fits in with Detroit-area music history?
My dad has worked with so many artists over the years and integrated artists into the work that we do. Our head executive producer and mixer at our place, Gerard Smerek, he has recorded most of Bob Seger's albums over the last several years. And he was actually Anita Baker's main mixer and producer for many years as well. So a lot of the people that we have on our staff come from some of those Detroit roots and music roots. And I think that's kind of found its way into the bloodstream of our company.
- Given the fierce competition you mentioned, how has your base in metro Detroit been viewed around the world?
Over these (few) last years, you know, Detroit has quite a name around the world, not just in the U.S. It used to be when we started back in the late '90s, early 2000s, expanding out of the Detroit area, people thought, well, 'they're just in Detroit, so they're just a small town kind of music company, and they're not going to be as good as the ones in New York or L.A.' But now, not only were we able to prove them wrong, but now we have the kind of Detroit backing of the name behind us. And we take that around the world with us.
Read all the conversations at crainsdetroit.com/theConversation
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