This month, the Indigenous Music Office spoke with Maddy Oliver, the Founder of Young Music Professionals and Interim Executive Director of the Canadian Live Music Association. Young Music Professionals is a networking collective that connects emerging music industry professionals with leaders from across the country while creating space for relationship-building, mentorship, and industry access.  Maddy’s work centers around building anti-racist and community-minded spaces where equity, diversity, and inclusion are reflected in real industry practices.

As the Indigenous music ecosystem continues to grow, conversations like these are important in helping create stronger pathways for Indigenous music professionals working across all areas of the industry.

 

IMO: Can you give us a little taste of what you’re currently working on, what drew you to it and why it’s exciting?

Maddy Oliver: I had a winding path into the career. I grew up playing music as an average Royal Conservatory pianist. I got so far as teaching my own students, but I never thought about the music industry as a career. I think that’s a widely shared feeling.

It wasn’t until I went back to school, into the creative events industry, that I was introduced to the idea of arts advocacy. The apex of policy, creative industries and creative economy pulled me in right away — just by nature of my own interests and love of supporting creative projects without being in the spotlight myself. I found my career path and spent several years working at the City of Toronto and the Canadian Live Music Association (CLMA), before founding Young Music Professionals (YMP).

In my tenure at CLMA, I noticed there were conversations between leaders and young people about career advancement. I looked at my peers and asked ‘what about this next generation, this part of the career pipeline that’s not being addressed or helped along?’ There’s no real structure to lean on and move forward in their careers. These are young, diverse, thoughtful people who want to step into leadership positions over the next decade. So, how do we equip them with the skills, connections and resources needed to give them those steps forward?

The answer for me was community. A well-resourced and fairly compensated space. One that isn’t tokenistic or boxchecking, but is anti-racist, active, progressive, strategic and builds those principles into its business practices and workplace culture. These spaces also recognize that young people are extremely diverse in all sorts of lived-experience identities.

 

IMO: Why do you think this is a good time for collaboration and promotion with organizations like the Indigenous Music Office?

Maddy Oliver: We’re in a time of flux in so many ways. It’s time to come together. When it comes to the music industry specifically, breaking down silos and building community is important. That’s what it takes to build internationally competitive organizations and bring Canada to the forefront. We’ve been punching above our weight as a music industry for decades.

 

IMO: Building communities, sharing knowledge — it reflects what the Indigenous Music Office does. Young Music Professionals speaks to Indigenous artists because you’re building the kind of thing Indigenous Peoples know and understand. We feel a lot of optimism about what you’re doing — and in parallel, what we’re doing.

What does meaningful support for young Indigenous professionals, in terms of the music industry, look like in practice?

Maddy Oliver: It’s listening, planning, advocating and financial support. A good example is being able to smudge in a concert venue. In some cases, but not all, the live music industry recognized this was a need. They were listening. They planned accordingly and asked what we needed to remove those barriers. It’s new policies around whatever infrastructure is necessary to welcome Indigenous Peoples into those spaces.

 

IMO: We’re so glad you talked about that, because it’s happening in real time right now — IMO Chairperson Alan Greyeyes spoke of this while leading the Indigenous Music Framework consultations in March.

Maddy Oliver: Full credit to Alan, who is the person who brought this to my attention. I didn’t realize funding for powwows was an issue until voices like Alan’s let me know. That’s why we listen to, advocate for and support Indigenous voices.

Photo Credits to Young Music Professionals

 

IMO: if we can flip gears to talk about programming and why you took the direction you did — can you tell us about the evolution of that?

Maddy Oliver: It started from research and development. Young Music Professionals is trying to understand the perspectives of young people and industry leaders. What are their needs and how do we pull opportunities out of that? The way that breaks down in practice is we have digital and in-person networking opportunities like events, our Slack workroom and our recent mentorship cafe. Our mentorship program runs digitally, connecting young people to opportunities and resources. Young People Doing Cool Shit at Organizations is a good example of that. It’s a publication that cropped up organically, dedicated to highlighting the young people contributing to organizational milestones. It wasn’t part of the plan, but there were so many people doing needlemoving projects that weren’t mainstream and it’s very strong today.

That was inspired by the 2025 JUNO Awards. There were so many incredible young people on the ground making that event happen. We felt it was necessary to look at the people who made it happen — here are the faces behind it!

We also work with existing industry awards to advocate for our partners on awards that recognize the next generation. Women in Music Canada has an excellent Rising Leader Award we just presented from the stage a few days ago. And finally, it’s access to resources. One of the tough things is the cost of going to events; it’s a barrier for people. Young Music Professionals are creating economic incentive to send young people to networking events.

 

IMO: It mirrors a lot of what we’re trying to do. While the Indigenous Music Office supports people across all generations, many of us are still growing our experience within the music industry and building pathways into spaces that haven’t always been accessible to Indigenous Peoples. Organizations like Young Music Professionals play an important role in creating wraparound professional development, mentorship, and relationship-building opportunities that help people navigate the industry with more confidence and support. 

Maddy Oliver: We want to be a responsive organization. Our values are grounded in equity rather than equality  — recognizing that different groups have different needs. We want to be able to work with organizations like the Indigenous Music Office to welcome Indigenous artists of all ages into spaces and help meet their needs.

 

IMO: One of the things Alan often speaks about is that Indigenous Peoples are not simply an equity-deserving group within music — Indigenous music, artistry, and storytelling have always been foundational to this land. It reflects the spirit behind the Two Row Wampum belt: your ship and our canoe travelling alongside one another down the same river, each carrying our own ways of being while learning from one another along the journey. There is so much opportunity to share knowledge, relationships, and resources in ways that strengthen the industry as a whole. 

Maddy Oliver: Indigenous music and art has always been here. It’s been here long before settlers were here.

 

IMO: To end on a final question: can you talk about the optimism of the future of Indigenous music in Canada?

Maddy Oliver: I’m excited the music industry is dedicating more of its resources to uplifting and spreading Indigenous music farther and wider, so that more audiences will be able to hear, learn from and fall in love with it. The incredible impact, artistry and culture behind Indigenous music can be shared, understood and reveled in — to find joy in and understood more widely.

I’m just incredibly excited. Young Music Professionals will be there to support, recognize and respond to creatives and business folk in the Indigenous music industry to the best capacity we can. We’re really honoured to be in a position where we’re able to do that and help drive change.