Universal Music Group Nashville Launches Production Arm

Universal Music Group (UMG) Nashville has launched Sing Me Back Home Productions, a new production arm with a focus on developing documentaries, original scripted and unscripted television, feature films and short-form content.

The new production arm is led by Cindy Mabe, UMG Nashville chair and CEO, and Dawn Gates, senior VP of digital business and creative development. Through the new arm, they will tap into the deep catalog of artists from throughout UMG Nashville’s history and celebrate newly discovered talent and stories. The new arm will also be heavily involved in securing production partners, music supervision and distribution.

“Country music has always been the home of the richest storytellers in music—storytellers like Merle Haggard, whose ‘Sing Me Back Home’ helped frame the intent and name behind our production company,” Mabe said. “Songs and stories can transport people and literally sing them back home no matter where they are in the world. Creating a new canvas for our storytellers to paint was a natural next step for our artists to talk to their fans in a new way. With several productions underway, this new endeavor fits prominently into what we are sustaining and building as a music company: roots, legacy, music discovery and storytelling. We are finding faith, family and heartland are at the core of our business. and we are making sure we are building generational content for different mediums across a variety of platforms and shepherding it into the homes of our audience.”

Sing Me Back Home Productions has already partnered with ITV America’s Thinkfactory Media to develop and produce a new docuseries that will follow the personal and professional lives of Michael Trotter Jr. and Tanya Trotter, the Grammy-nominated husband-and-wife duo known as The War and Treaty. The series will chart their breakout success and follow as they work together to navigate their ascending careers as musicians and their home life, which includes 13 family members living under the same roof. It is the first among many projects in development via Sing Me Back Home Productions’ broader collaboration with Thinkfactory Media.

“Country music and its community of artists, past and present, offer such a vast and rich world to explore for content,” said Adam Reed, Thinkfactory’s CEO. “As Thinkfactory doubles down on work rooted in the Heartland, we’re incredibly bullish on the projects we’re developing with Sing Me Back Home, and we admire what Cindy and her group are building at a time when the genre and its hitmakers are flying higher than ever.”

Also coming up is Gloria Gaynor: I Will Survive, in partnership with Storyville Entertainment. It follows the unexpectedly difficult eight-year journey of disco icon Gloria Gaynor as she writes and records a gospel album. The documentary premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and was the official opening night film at the Nashville Film Festival, where it won the audience award.

“We are thrilled to have the expertise of Cindy, Dawn and the Sing Me Back Home team to partner on producing Gloria Gaynor: I Will Survive,” commented Betsy Schechter, director of the documentary. “Just like her iconic song ‘I Will Survive,’ Gloria’s life is equally inspirational, and this film has the power to impact audiences around the world for years to come.”