SOUTH, a music production company with bases of operation in Santa Monica and Nashville, has brought Ann Haugen on board as executive VP/director of production. She comes over from Elias Arts where she spent over a decade as EP and general manager.
Haugen led the musical production behind global campaigns for Apple, Adidas, Nike, Audi, Google, Reebok, BMW, Toyota, Visa, Sony, Sprint, Honda, Intel, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, and Microsoft, among others. Her body of work has garnered over 700 major industry accolades worldwide, including numerous Clios and Cannes Lions, and an Emmy Award for the benchmark-setting score in Nike’s “Move” campaign. Haugen first tapped into her innate understanding of what brands are seeking during her time at TBWA/Chiat/Day, where she began her career as an account executive on the iconic Energizer Bunny campaign.
Since joining SOUTH, Haugen has overseen the production of projects for Levi’s, Nikon, AT&T, BMW, and Google alongside partner/ECD Jon Darling. Both classically trained and an experienced touring musician as the lead singer and principal songwriter of Crash Kills Four and The Trauma Club, Darling had his first foray into commercial composition shortlisted for a Cannes Lion. Darling continued to offer his services as a freelance composer for other top-tier music companies, scoring hundreds of spots, until he founded SOUTH in 2009 with fellow partners Dan Pritikin and Britt Fredensburg.
Haugen remarked, “The thing that attracted me to these guys is that they are doing the most inspired music out there, from orchestral to punk rock and everything in between, and their production is really smart and innovative. It’s rare when those two things come together at such a high level.”
SOUTH has created the bespoke musical story for brands such as Samsung, Target, Sprint, E*Trade, and Chevy, to name a few. In 2010, the partners opened the Nashville office to give advertising clients access to the emerging hotbed of fresh musical talent there. Darling continues to pursue his passions as an independent artist and has a new record entitled High Forest due out this summer.
A series of new business ventures have already been set into motion with the arrival of Haugen, including partnerships with Quiver, headed up by top music supervisor Kenny Ochoa, and with mixing company Noise Floor, which shares its L.A. market offices with SOUTH.
