Addressing the packed Berk Recital Hall on campus last month, music industry giant Robert Kraft seemed astonished to find himself looking back on his career with the rest of us. In conversation with Don Gorder, chair of the Music Business/Management Department, Kraft discussed his beginnings as a songwriter and bookseller living in New York City, and how a series of unexpected early career opportunities (record deals) and misfortunes (label failures) led him, eventually, to first writing music for television, then scoring films, then producing and supervising music, and eventually to his long career as president of Fox Music, where he worked until 2012. He went on to found the production, management, and media consulting company Kraftbox Entertainment in 2013.
Whats It Take to Succeed in the Music Business?
Berklees Music Business/Management Department prepares graduates for long-term careers in the industry.
Kraft explained how he would try to to get in the way of opportunity through personal tenacity and an openness to saying yes first and then figuring out how to get the job done once the pressure was on. He discussed what makes a great soundtrack (it's simple: a hit, like Celine Dion's My Heart Will Go On from Titanic, which Kraft oversaw during his time at Fox Music). And he stressed the important but often overlooked role self-care plays in a creative profession. I eat right, I try to sleep, I exercise-I do all of those things for one simple reason: this is an athletic endeavor, being an artist and a musician; you've got to be together, because if you want a long career you've really got to lay in for it.
Kraft also answered student questions about how he dealt with competition in the music industry- comparison is the thief of joy, he said, quoting Theodore Roosevelt-and how to be an effective, assertive leader even if it means nobody's going to like you all the time.
Below is an edited selection of takeaways from Kraft's remarks.
On Deciding at a Young Age to Become a Songwriter: Just making a very specific choice of a destination, in retrospect, was very helpful, because not unlike I'm sure a lot of people here, I like a lot of things-I like movies, and I like writing songs, and I like canoeing but I decided to focus on one thing, and it really helped me to just say, That's who I am and what I do,' because it actually turned out to be the wedge into every other field.
On Career Endings and Beginnings: My career continues to keep ending...Careers, when you're an artist...are always just about to end Because we've all decided in this room to take a risk with our careers. I had roommates that went to business school and law school, and they have a kind of lane ahead of them. I don't have a lane ahead of me; I make the lane.
On Learning to Manage a Film Budget: It didn't occur to me that movies had budgets before I started at Fox. I thought you just do what you do, you express yourself-and they pay for it.
On the Commonality between All the Roles He's Held: In the center of this wheel with all these spokes-all of which are surprising to me as well-is music There's nothing I love more than a funky beat.
Related categories:
News
Related Reading
From Berklee to Nashville with Chad Michael Jervis Chad Michael Jervis 18 followed a Career Jam opportunity that led him to King Calaway, a new country band already making noise in Nashville.
Breaking a Sound Barrier with Captain Marvel Berklee Today
Spring
2019
Volume
30
Number
3
Composing Berklee's Story Berklee Today
Spring
2019
Volume
30
Number
3
More from Berklee Now
Most Popular
Berklee Alumni and Faculty Nominated for Grammy Awards 28 Berklee alumni and two faculty members were nominated for Grammys across 17 categories.
Latest
Ricky Duran Lights Up the Semifinals on The Voice The Massachusetts native and Berklee alumnus will sing in the show's finale next week.
Berklee Contemporary Symphony Orchestra Performance Spans Countries, Cultures, and History Inspired by an iconic John F. Kennedy quote, the BCSO selected each piece to be written by a composer from a different country, embarking on a global musical journey.
Former Fox Music President Robert Kraft Makes His Own Lane The longtime film music executive offered advice to Berklee students on withstanding the constant changes of a life in the industry.
Read All
Subscribe The latest sounds, stories, and ideas, sent to your inbox weekly.
Berklee Blogs
Facebook
Twitter
YouTube
Instagram
Snapchat
Soundcloud
Spotify
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
06/09/2026
June 9 2026, 23:00 (PDT) Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA Worl...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
06/07/2026
Long-developed relationships and informal access, three production models, and c...
06/07/2026
The deal follows Lumine's recent acquisition of Synamedia's video-networ...
06/07/2026
This former SportsCenter producer is shaping local-team studio coverage to surro...
06/07/2026
IMS Productions and FOX Sports deployed more than 100 cameras, 32 onboard feeds,...
06/07/2026
Lumine Group Inc. has announced the completion of its acquisition of the Video Network Business from Synamedia. The business will operate as a standalone compan...
06/07/2026
NASCAR has announced a content and commercial partnership with Motorsport Network, a motorsports and automotive media platform, to distribute NASCAR original co...
06/07/2026
Versant Media Group has announced a definitive agreement to acquire Full Swing, a sports technology company, from Bruin Capital and a group of minority investor...
06/07/2026
DAZN has announced global broadcast rights to 3ICE, a professional hockey format featuring three skaters and a goalkeeper per side, with no power plays or offsi...
06/07/2026
Bundle gains 100 new synths & more
Synth Anthology 5 the largest and most feature-packed edition of UVI's hardware synth emulation bundle, bringing toge...
06/07/2026
Available now via free firmware update
MOTU have just announced that three of their popular audio interfaces now boast official Milan Certification. The 16A...
06/07/2026
Rohde & Schwarz completes Hunter Preliminary Design Review for the Integrated Co...
06/07/2026
The R&S IMAGER from Rohde & Schwarz uses millimeter wave imaging to inspect the ...
06/07/2026
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
06/07/2026
Digital Domain Appoints Industry Veteran Patrick Davenport as Executive Vice Pre...
06/07/2026
Gravity Media USA appoints Brittney Boston as Head of Business Development
Brie Clayton July 6, 2026
0 Comments
The strategic new appointment supports...
06/07/2026
Remote Editing Without Cloud Storage in Resolve
Michael Cioni July 6, 2026
0 Comments
This is a step-by-step guide that demonstrates how to setup your...
06/07/2026
Automatic Caption Translation in Adobe Premiere Pro
Colin Smith July 6, 2026
0 Comments
Here I showcase the innovative automatic caption translation f...
06/07/2026
Flavor's First Ever Managing Director Neal Cohen Retires; Longstanding Execu...
06/07/2026
How Adam Rosenwach Pivoted from Music to Medtech Without Missing a Beat What do the rehearsal room and the boardroom have in common? More than you might think...
06/07/2026
Zhongyi Optics unveils the Dreamy Zone T1 FF Cine Lens Series on Indiegogo with ...
06/07/2026
Techtel debuts insyght: making ST 2110 media discovery easy
intellisphereinsyght2026
6 July Written By Suzanne Costello
Sydney, Australia - 06 July 2026 T...
06/07/2026
Monday 6 July 2026
Sky agrees to acquire ITV Media & Entertainment, creating a ...
06/07/2026
Fresh from his World Cup heroics with Cabo Verde, Roberto Pico' Lopes will join the RT panel for Argentina v Egypt tomorrow and for the England v Norway q...
06/07/2026
Nations have long invested in domestic infrastructure to advance their economies, protect and use their data, and take advantage of technology opportunities in ...
06/07/2026
Every year, the International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML) reveals where thousands of AI researchers have decided to put their work.
This year's ...
06/07/2026
A death can be unsuspicious, but it has to be explained
What happened to Ke...
05/07/2026
We've gone to another level of integrating the graphics into the set architecture' - Zac Fields, SVP, Graphic Technology and Integration, FOX Sports...
05/07/2026
Browser-based and desktop apps available
Digital Sunset Studios have been busy working on an interesting project: a free software tool that provides compute...
04/07/2026
When Canada qualified for the FIFA World Cup 2026, OneSoccer knew this wasn'...
04/07/2026
Celebrates company's 80th anniversary
Rhodes have recently revealed that they will be producing a limited run of electric pianos in celebration of their...
04/07/2026
Blackmagic Design Cameras Empower Youth Broadcasting Program
Brie Clayton July 3, 2026
0 Comments
Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 6K Pro and Blackmagi...
04/07/2026
iZotope Joins Boris FX
Boris Yamnitsky July 3, 2026
0 Comments
iZotope, the team behind RX and Ozone, is joining Boris FX. A letter from founder Boris...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
03/07/2026
New bundle & three Single Packs
Continuing to expand their already sizeable orchestral collection, VSL's latest release introduces three new Single Pack...
03/07/2026
Venue installs new ATC-equipped control room
LSO St Luke's, a unique music venue that also serves as the home of the London Symphony Orchestra, have rec...
03/07/2026
Caden Pearson appointed new Commissioning Editor for NITV
3 July, 2026
Media releases
National Indigenous Television (NITV) has strengthened its commitment...
03/07/2026
1 February 2023
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany, 1st February 2023: Cinegy GmbH, the premier provider of software technology for digit...
03/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
03/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
03/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
03/07/2026
Death Star
Andy Marken July 2, 2026
0 Comments
Look, I can't get involved. I've got work to do. It's not that I like the Empire; I hate i...
03/07/2026
Berklee's New Visual Identity: Honoring Our History, Building for What's...
03/07/2026
Scripps Research scientists awarded $2M to advance global disease surveillance Two Gates Foundation grants will expand wastewater surveillance and AI-driven dis...
03/07/2026
Joan Pulupa joins Scripps Research faculty to study the organization of DNA in brain cells and its links to neurodegeneration Using smell-sensing neurons and ad...
02/07/2026
Entering her senior year, this hometown girl is paving a career in live sports production gaining experience in replay and audio and as a TD
In the live-sports...
02/07/2026
In-venue and creative video staffers at the professional and collegiate level ha...
Addressing the packed Berk Recital Hall on campus last month, music industry giant Robert Kraft seemed astonished to find himself looking back on his career with the rest of us. In conversation with Don Gorder, chair of the Music Business/Management Department, Kraft discussed his beginnings as a songwriter and bookseller living in New York City, and how a series of unexpected early career opportunities (record deals) and misfortunes (label failures) led him, eventually, to first writing music for television, then scoring films, then producing and supervising music, and eventually to his long career as president of Fox Music, where he worked until 2012. He went on to found the production, management, and media consulting company Kraftbox Entertainment in 2013.
