past Talks

Tracy Lanza participated in the annual music summit, held by Sound Diplomacy, a leader of the Music Cities movement which sees culture built into the urban environment through policy. Their mission is to help governments develop healthy music ecosystems to create vibrant, exciting communities. The 2018 program focused, for the first time, on how music and music culture can help drive travel inspiration and tourism. Tracy shared Brand USA's strategy of using music as a lens for cultural exploration, including the "America's Musical Journey" giant-screen film and "Hear The Music" video series, and participated on a panel of music experts that focused on genre as a cultural identifier.

Other U.S. attendees included the state of Mississippi and the city of Indianapolis. International attendees included the cities of Berlin (DE), Dusseldorf (DE), Barcelona (SP), Manchester (UK), and Liverpool (UK). In addition to DMOs, Sound Diplomacy's clients also include the United Nations and the Walton Family Foundation. In 2019, the annual summit will be held in Liverpool, and in 2020 it will be held in the USA. Our hope is to help our partners understand the basic tenets of being a music city, including and helping Sound Diplomacy develop a tourism strategy we can share with our partners.