Charlie Walk

Columbia Records

Walk began his career as a college rep for Sony Music, then CBS Records, while a student at BU. He was hired as a marketing and promotion manager for Columbia Records in1990. He worked out of the CBS Northeast distribution office in Winchester, Massachusetts. Among other early projects, he promoted the debut album by New Kids on the Block.^[8][7]

During his time at Columbia he became vice president for promotion at the label. He was profiled in The New York Times in 1988. ^[9] At Columbia he worked with Destiny's Child and Beyoncé Knowles,^[10] Will Smith, Maxwell, John Legend, Mariah Carey, The Fugees, Lauryn Hill, Wyclef Jean, John Mayer, Bruce Springsteen, and Aerosmith.^{[11][failed verification]}

He was named executive vice president, promotion, in 2000 from the position of senior vice president of pop promotion. In 2004, he was promoted to executive vice president of creative marketing and promotion at Columbia where he was in charge of developing non-traditional marketing strategies.^[12][13]

Epic Records

In December 2005, Walk became president of Epic Records.^[14] Jessica Simpson moved from Columbia to Epic to follow Walk.^[15] He also worked with the label’s established artists, including RedOne.^[16]

He also created a partnership with ABC to integrate Epic artists with their programming, which enabled viewers to purchase songs they heard on ABC television shows.^[17] He led the campaigns that broke new artists including The Script, Sean Kingston, The Fray, Sara Bareilles and Natasha Bedingfield.^[18] He was let go from the label in December 2008.^[19]

JWALK

In February 2009, Walk started his own entertainment company CWE Media to create content for Endemol, with a talent management and strategic branding divisions.^[7][20] Walk was executive producing the television content developed by the company.^[17][21] The company was functioning until 2011.

Later in 2009, Walk co-founded RJW Collective, later known as JWALK.^[22] The company's clients include the retailer Lacoste and the television broadcaster ABC.^[11][23]

Republic Records

In 2013 Walk joined Republic Records as its executive vice president.^[6] His position involves overseeing the marketing, PR and promotion teams for the label.^[22][24][25] On July 2, 2014, Walk produced a one-off revival episode of Total Request Live on MTV entitled "Total Ariana Live".^[26] He has also helped bring in John Varvatos Records.^[27]

In 2014, Walk led Enrique Iglesias' "Bailando" single campaign, which crossed the song over from Latin radio to Top 40 radio. The song has a blend of English and Spanish lyrics, and became the highest charting bilingual single since "The Macarena" in 1996.^[28] Walk spearheaded Taylor Swift’s "Shake It Off" campaign which led Swift to become the first artist to have a single debut at number one on the pop music radio charts.^[29] Additionally, Walk led the promotion for Lorde's quadruple platinum single "Royals". The Wall Street Journal wrote that Walk "is working on creating partnerships with radio stations, concert venues and music publications or blogs that will circulate her music without catapulting it into the mainstream. Instead of sending her music to KIIS, a famous top-40 Los Angeles radio station, they've turned to San Francisco's Live105 and Chicago's Q101, alternative stations."^[30] Walk also signed Hailee Steinfeld to Republic.^[31][5]

In February 2016, Walk was named president of the Republic Group, a newly formed grouping under the Universal Music Group, where he was charged with developing strategic partnerships with sister labels in addition to his role in charge of promotions and artist development.^[32] In 2016 Walk co-founded Guess Music, after approaching Paul Marciano to discuss his expanding their partnership into a full-fledged label.^[33] He also signed DNCE.^[34]