Latin Notas: Pérez Funds Latino Songwriting Scholarship

Songwriter/producer Rudy Pérez, who was Billboard's 2002 Latin producer of the year, has donated $25,000 to launch a scholarship program for new Latino songwriters and composers through the ASCAP Foundation. He is the first Latin ASCAP member to do so. The first ASCAP Foundation Rudy Pérez Songwriting Scholarship will be formally announced Sept. 4 at a luncheon in Miami.

Scholarships will be rotated yearly to students at five universities in key Latino markets: the Juilliard School of Music in New York, the Conservatorio Nacional de Musica in Puerto Rico, the University of Miami School of Music, the Los Angeles County High School for the Performing Arts and the music department of the University of Texas at San Antonio. The first recipients will be Miami students.

"The songwriting scholarship was something that I wanted to do to give back to the world of music, which has given so much to me," says Pérez, who was born in Cuba but grew up in Miami. "When I was growing up, I didn't have the money to go to college, and I feel that if I can help at least one aspiring songwriter succeed, then I've accomplished my goal."

According to Karen Sherry, senior VP of industry affairs for ASCAP, Pérez himself approached ASCAP with the notion of contributing to its scholarship fund.

"And we came up with some ideas," she says. "Now we will look to expand the funding and maybe eventually have a Latino fund, hopefully with others contributing to it. I absolutely hope this will encourage others."

Although the ASCAP Foundation oversees multiple scholarship and fund programs, this is the first targeted specifically toward Latin songwriters.



TRIPLE GRAMMY: The Latin Grammy Awards really are new and expanded—from the CD perspective, at least, thanks to a deal cut with Universal Music International Latin America.

The company is releasing three Latin Grammy nominee CDs. Each will feature a different genre of music and will be marketed to separate audiences.

The first set will feature pop, rock and tropical acts and will initially be marketed to the East Coast and Puerto Rico. A second CD will focus on regional Mexican and Tejano music, with marketing efforts concentrating on the West Coast and Mexico. A third will feature only Brazilian nominees and will be released in Brazil by Universal Music Brazil.

All CDs will be released Aug. 26.

In other Latin Grammy news, Ricky Martin, Bacilos, Molotov and Thalía (yet again) are the first confirmed performers for the Sept. 3 Latin Grammy Awards.

Brazilian singer and multiple nominee Alexandre Pires will also perform, alongside Kelly Clarkson. More pairings are expected to be announced in the next two weeks.



IN BRIEF: As part of its ongoing Operación Frontera (Operation Border), Mexican customs authorities seized four containers containing 5.3 million blank CD-Rs at the end of last month. The containers, seized on their way from Tijuana and Nuevo Laredo, were headed toward Mexico City. The contents came from Asia.

Operación Frontera is an anti-piracy border operation developed by Mexico's local anti-piracy group, APDIF Mexico, in conjunction with the Latin American branch of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. Information provided by APDIF led to the seizure. To date, Operación Frontera has yielded seizures of more than 31.8 million blank CD-Rs.

Former BMG U.S. Latin publicist Mayna Nevárez has launched her own PR firm, based in Miami. Nevárez, who also worked as editor of Teen Magazine en Español, currently counts José Luis Rodríguez and Raúl Di Blasio as clients. She can be reached at maynanevarez@hotmail.com.



errata: Kate Ramos' position was misstated in the Aug. 9 issue of Billboard. She is regional VP of Vívelo, which at the time was called Clear Channel Entertainment/Televisa.

Brenda Vallecilla is the company's VP of national sales and marketing.