Youth on Record (YOR) is excited to announce that Erin Roberts has been named Director of Music Ecosystems. 

The hire marks YOR's commitment to advancing the next generation of Colorado's creative workforce by building an education and apprenticeship pipeline for local venues and music festivals, including the Underground Music Showcase, of which YOR is a co-owner.

"The music ecosystem is vast, and full of opportunities," says Jami Duffy, Executive Director. "Erin's extensive experience in this ecosystem and her commitment to local artists and industry professionals, coupled with her vision and decades of navigating what works–and what doesn't work, especially for historically marginalized artists–makes her a perfect fit for where our organization is heading "

Prior to joining the team full-time, Roberts was an Impact Talent Buyer for YOR, supporting YOR’s Music & Entertainment company with impact booking and artist cultivation. She was also an operations and community arts manager with over 20 years experience helping organizations manage programs and connect to the community. 

Her professional background includes Event Producing for Maven Productions, which provides highly tailored services to authors, performing artists, environmentalists, and cultural commentators whose voices and actions strive to help the world in positive ways. Maven Production’s clients include Jane Goodall, Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés, and Ani Difranco. Her previous experience also includes nearly two decades of experience in community radio, arts management, program coordination, and more. 

Roberts is also the standing Executive Producer of Audiovore, a multimedia project that aims to document Colorado's thriving music scene while providing training opportunities for marginalized and BIPOC community members in audio and video production. 

Like most of YOR’s staff, Roberts is also a longtime musician herself. She’s most famous for her band, Porlolo. Porlolo is an ever-evolving project that was formed in 2002. At once deeply pensive and thoroughly irreverent, Porlolo is a powerful songwriting force, cranking out grungy, sometimes twangy, reverb drenched, pure pop hits.

“I am thrilled to join the incredible team at Youth on Record,” Roberts said. “Not only does YOR have a proven track record of empowering young creatives to thrive both personally and professionally, the organization also has the rare ability to move quickly and be responsive to the ever changing music ecosystem. I am deeply inspired by the team at YOR, from teaching artists to administrators, who express activism through everyday action and profound dedication to equitable community building.”

As Director of Music Ecosystems, Roberts will continue to cultivate strategic relationships with artists, industry professionals, venue owners, mission-aligned organizations and businesses, policy makers, government agencies, and anyone else who seeks to further integrate the creative workforce into their work. She'll oversee YOR'S Young Creative Ecosystem, and will provide direction and leadership around the UMS and YOR’s Music & Entertainment company, a project that is currently in a market-validation phase.

About Youth on Record 

YOR recognizes that education alone can not solve for systemic injustice, nor can it, alone, liberate youth. Art is a powerful tool, but it also cannot bear the sole responsibility for creating more equitable communities. Still, education and art, when integrated under the right framework, are powerful tools toward liberation and equity. 

YOR’s education, music, and community programs are designed to help young people become more free, more rooted in their personal power, and better able to thrive in spite of systems and circumstances that dis-empower and marginalize them.

YOR designs and implements strengths-based, music-centered programs intended to equip young people from historically under-resourced communities with the skills needed to find success in life–by advancing their academic success, increasing their economic opportunities and career skills, and strengthening their community connections and networks.

For more visit youthonrecord.org and on social media @youthonrecord