Jeff Jones is a music industry executive best known as the CEO of

Apple Corps Apple Corps Limited (informally known as Apple) is a multi-armed multimedia corporation founded in London in January 1968 by the members of the Beatles to replace their earlier company (Beatles Ltd.) and to form a conglomerate. Its name (pron ...

, the company founded by

The Beatles The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960, that comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are regarded as the most influential band of all time and were integral to the developmen ...

. Jones was formerly an executive vice president at

Sony/BMG Sony BMG Music Entertainment was an American record company owned as a 50–50 joint venture between Sony Corporation of America and Bertelsmann. The venture's successor, the revived Sony Music, is wholly owned by Sony, following their buyout ...

, where he managed Sony's recorded catalogs, including repackaging classic albums. At Apple Corps he has overseen Beatles projects such as the launch o
TheBeatles.com
the release of the band's remastered catalog on CD, iTunes, and

vinyl Vinyl may refer to: Chemistry * Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer * Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation * Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry * Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl ...

, the DVD and

Blu-ray The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of st ...

releases of ''

Help! ''Help!'' is the fifth studio album by the English rock band the Beatles and the soundtrack to their film of the same name. It was released on 6 August 1965. Seven of the fourteen songs, including the singles " Help!" and " Ticket to Ride", ...

'', '' Yellow Submarine'' and ''

Magical Mystery Tour ''Magical Mystery Tour'' is a record by the English rock band the Beatles that was released as a double EP in the United Kingdom and an LP in the United States. It includes the soundtrack to the 1967 television film of the same name. The EP ...

'', '' The Beatles: Rock Band'', and the

Cirque du Soleil Cirque du Soleil (, ; "Circus of the Sun" or "Sun Circus") is a Canadian entertainment company and the largest contemporary circus producer in the world. Located in the inner-city area of Saint-Michel, it was founded in Baie-Saint-Paul on 16 Ju ...

collaboration, including the Grammy-winning ''

Love Love encompasses a range of strong and positive emotional and mental states, from the most sublime virtue or good habit, the deepest interpersonal affection, to the simplest pleasure. An example of this range of meanings is that the love o ...

'' album. He also produced the compilations ''

The Beatles in Mono ''The Beatles in Mono'' is a boxed set compilation comprising the remastered monaural recordings by the Beatles. The set was released on compact disc on 9 September 2009, the same day the remastered stereo recordings and companion '' The Beat ...

'' and ''

The Beatles Stereo Box Set ''The Beatles (The Original Studio Recordings)'', also known as ''The Beatles: Stereo Box Set'', is a box set compilation comprising all remastered recordings by English rock band the Beatles. The set was issued on 9 September 2009, along with ...

'', for which he won the 2011

Grammy Award for Best Historical Album The Grammy Award for Best Historical Album has been presented since 1979 and recognizes achievements in audio restoration. Since this category's creation, the award had several minor name changes: *In 1979 the award was known as Best Historical Re ...

Early life, education

Jeff Jones is a native of the

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

suburb of

Arlington, Massachusetts Arlington is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts. The town is six miles (10 km) northwest of Boston, and its population was 46,308 at the 2020 census. History European colonists settled the Town of Arlington in 1635 as a village w ...

. He started his career in music in the record department of the Harvard Coop and went on to hold various positions at CBS Records, Sony Music, MCA Universal Recordings and Polygram.

Career

Marketing positions (1970s–2000)

After working in marketing and music since the mid-1970s, Jones joined as marketing director of Columbia Records in 1984, where he stayed for four years. Jones then left Columbia to serve as VP of marketing at

MCA Records MCA Records was an American record label owned by MCA Inc., which later became part of Universal Music Group. Pre-history MCA Inc., a powerful talent agency and a television production company, entered the recorded music business in 1962 w ...

for two years. In 1991 he moved to the PolyGram Label Group to again serve as marketing VP. In 1993 Jones moved to Elektra Entertainment as VP of marketing. He gained the additional position of senior VP of jazz at Columbia Records in 2000. He also managed the Columbia Jazz A&R and Marketing departments.

Sony (1995–2007)

In 1995 Jones joined

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professiona ...

as vice president of marketing and product development at Legacy Recordings, Sony's catalog division. He was promoted to senior VP of Legacy in 1998, and rose to executive vice president of Legacy, overseeing all of the division's operations. While with Legacy, Jones spearheaded such projects as the

Miles Davis Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926September 28, 1991) was an American trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th-century music. Davis adopted a variety of musi ...

re-issues series, which earned multiple Grammy awards, and the historical Ken Burns ''JAZZ'' project.

Apple Corps (2007–present)

Jones became the chief executive of

, the company founded by

, in April 2007. He replaced long-time incumbent

Neil Aspinall Neil Stanley Aspinall (13 October 1941 24 March 2008) was a British music industry executive. A school friend of Paul McCartney and George Harrison, he went on to head the Beatles' company Apple Corps. The Beatles employed Aspinall first as t ...

. Jones, and his family moved from the US to

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, and he said his new job was "a dream come true". At Apple Corps he has overseen Beatles projects such as the launch o
TheBeatles.com
the release of the band's remastered catalog on CD, iTunes, and

, the DVD and

releases of ''

'', '' Yellow Submarine'' and ''

'', '' The Beatles: Rock Band'', and the

collaboration, including the Grammy-winning ''

'' album. In 2010, under his direction, The Beatles' catalogue was made available on iTunes through

EMI EMI Group Limited (originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records Ltd. or simply EMI) was a British Transnational corporation, transnational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in March 1 ...

, marking the first time Beatles music had ever been sold as digital downloads. Jones took part in talks for the use of "

Tomorrow Never Knows "Tomorrow Never Knows" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles, written primarily by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. It was released in August 1966 as the final track on their album ''Revolver'', although it was the firs ...

" in

AMC AMC may refer to: Film and television * AMC Theatres, an American movie theater chain * AMC Networks, an American entertainment company ** AMC (TV channel) ** AMC+, streaming service ** AMC Networks International, an entertainment company *** ...

series ''

Mad Men ''Mad Men'' is an American period drama television series created by Matthew Weiner and produced by Lionsgate Television. It ran on the cable network AMC from July 19, 2007, to May 17, 2015, lasting for seven seasons and 92 episodes. Its f ...

'', which was the first time a Beatles song had been used in an American television series. He also oversaw the release of Beatles box sets with remastered tracks, both stereo and ''

''. As the compilation producer for ''

'', Jones won a

in 2011. Jones is also the executive producer of the Beatles 2016 documentary "Eight Days A Week" directed by Ron Howard which won the Grammy for Best Music Documentary at the 59th Grammy Awards as well as the Critics Choice Awards in 2016. In 2019 Jones began production of the three part documentary " Get Back" about the final recording sessions and final live roof top performance of the Beatles. This film was directed by Peter Jackson with Jones and Ken Kamins as executive producers. The three part documentary is distributed by Disney and available on Disney+.

Awards

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jones, Jeff Apple Corps Apple Records American music industry executives American expatriates in the United Kingdom Living people Year of birth missing (living people)