For the sixth consecutive year, Billboard magazine has included Occidental College in its annual list of Top Music Business Schools.
Billboard selects schools through executive recommendations, alumni information provided by honorees from multiple power lists, information requested from each school, and a decade of reporting on these programs. The magazine highlighted the College’s John Branca Institute for Music, announced in June 2024, which bridges academics with real-world industry engagement through programs such as the Mike Curb Endowed Program in Popular Music History.
Oxy alumni include such prominent music industry figures as former Warner Music Group CEO Steve Cooper ’68; Charlie Cohen ’78, president of TV, film, and live theater at Warner Music Group; manager Ian Montone ’89 (Jack White, LCD Soundsystem); music attorney John Branca ’72, Billboard’s 2016 Lawyer of the Year; music attorney Richard Leher ’66 (Rolling Stones, Pearl Jam); Welz Kauffman ’83, former president and CEO of Chicago’s Ravinia Festival; and Assistant Professor of Music Ramona Gonzalez ’09, the L.A.-based musician and scholar who records and performs as Nite Jewel.
