Lifelong fan finds calling as music academy exec

Though he’ll never turn down the chance to meet celebrities, Ron Roecker’s true calling is helping those musicians who might never get a reserved seat at the Grammys.

Ron Roecker won’t pick up a statue on Grammy night Feb. 13, but he will bask in the adoration of his 8- and 11-year-old nieces, who have proclaimed him Uncle of the Year.

Roecker, senior vice president of communications for the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences, which produces the awards show, will escort the two girls to the glitzy event, where he plans to make good on his promises of celebrity introductions.

“They’ve already told me who they want to touch,” he says: “Usher and Gwen Stefani.”

As a self-confessed music fan (even as a college student, he shelled out the dough for a subscription to Billboard magazine), Roecker, j’92, readily acknowledges the allure of his job. The Wichita native still recalls his chat with Quincy Jones about the recording of “We are the World” and the moments he met Amy Grant, Madonna, Prince, Janet Jackson and the Indigo Girls.

But there’s more than meet-the-idol to his gig with the academy, which began three years ago. He earned recognition and his promotion to senior vice president for the “What’s the Download” campaign, the Grammy Foundation’s national consumer education project to help young music fans and parents understand the issues involved in illegal music downloading. After 18 months of research into the music-buying habits of 12- to 24-year-olds, the campaign unveiled its first public message during the 2003 Grammys.

WhatsTheDownload.com features news and a real-time message board. Roecker says the campaign, which is advised by a board of 18- to 24-year-olds, has appealed to young fans as well as teachers and parents. “Their response has been, ‘Thank God you’ve created something to help me talk to my kid in a language he understands.’”

“We’re not about suing people; we’re not Big Brother. We want to create dialogue. When you’re talking to young people about intellectual property, there is nothing to touch or feel or sense about the long-term impact.”

Roecker supervises all communications for the academy’s 12 regional chapters, the Grammy Foundation, the Latin Recording Academy and the MusiCares Foundation, which raises funds to support musicians in need.

Protecting the livelihood and cultural environment for the academy’s 18,000 members is his year-round mission. Those members include singers, songwriters and nearly 5,000 producers and engineers, most of whom will never make headlines in Billboard or millions in record sales. “What we do outside that night in February is critical, though it doesn’t get as much attention,” he says. “Folks think we’re about Britney selling more records, but our members are garage-band players, technicians and jazz musicians who are devoted to their art.”