CEO Weekly

The Trailblazing Dani Stephenson Executive Produces a Song on Marvel’s Hit Film Eternals

[as originally published on ceoweekly.com]

Every great success story has the same denominator—individuals who strived for excellence even in the face of adversities, combining their talent with a clear vision, consistency, innovativeness and hard work, creates the foundations of great achievements. Successful entrepreneur, entertainment executive, and philanthropist Dani Stephenson ticks all of these boxes and has solidified his name as a leader in the music and entertainment industry for the past sixteen years, amassing countless awards and accolades.

Founded in 2009 by Dani Stephenson, Straight Forward Music Group, is a multi-award-winning group of companies, which consist of numerous divisions such as Straight Forward Music, a talent management and artist development company; Straight Forward Recordings, a record label, film

production and a recording studio chain; Straight Forward Publishing Group, a music and literature publishing company; Mugal Group, a 360 entertainment company that specializes in developing talent from Southeast Asia; Full Circle Art agency, which specializes in fine art, NFT creation, management and procurement and Straight Forward Giving, an educational organization that helps fund charity initiatives for underprivileged families, which is also in collaboration with the Prince’s Trust Foundation.

Over the years, Dani has worked on many successful campaigns through his companies. Some of his award-winning and nominated work includes Big Sean’s platinum single “Marvin & Chardonnay” featuring Kanye West and Roscoe Dash and chart-topping single MANN feat 50 cents “Buzzing” and MANN feat. T-Pain “Get it Girl” via Def Jam. He also worked as Global A&R for DJ Antoine’s hit album “We Are the Party.” The album topped the charts in Switzerland, #4 in Austria and #6 in Germany.

In 2016 under Dani’s management Nana Rogues went on to produce the x2 Platinum selling, Brit Award winning single for Tinie Tempah called “Girls Like” featuring Zara Larsson. The song reached Top #5 in the UK and Top #10 in the official charts across 18 countries worldwide selling over 3 million singles globally. The following year they landed two records on Drake’s award winning album More Life, called Skepta Interlude featuring Skepta and worldwide hit single Passionfruit which has sold over 5 million singles to date while being voted the 28th most influential single in the world by Variety Magazine.

In 2018 Dani expanded his record label operations by signing an exclusive joint venture with Virgin EMI for his label Straight Forward Recordings where he was appointed as President of the fast-rising indie sub-label. Dani said he aims to fuse “the passion, ethics, hustle, and entrepreneurship of an indie, with the might of a major label to elevate artists globally”. Later that year Dani and Nana’s partnership elevated to new heights when he co-wrote on Drake’s record breaking Grammy nominated single Don’t Ma7er To Me featuring Michael Jackson which destroyed the single-day streaming record on Apple Music and Spotify, with Drake’s fivh Grammy nominated album “Scorpion” pulling in more than 170 million streams on Spotify, “Scorpion” pulled in over 132 million streams in its first 24 hours totalling over 302 Million streams, at the time it held both the US and global streaming record and became the largest single-day streaming total for any album on any streaming service. To top of an end to a very successful year he also produced “Good Bad” which featured on Ella Mai’s Grammy nominated album called “Ella Mai”.

In 2020 Dani signed the multi-Grammy award winning producer-engineer Shawn Source Jarrett, whose established himself as one of the top creatives in the world. Shawn continues he’s successful streak with Megan Thee Stallion by landing many official chart topping hits like Megan’s Grammy winning single Savage featuring Beyonce, Grammy nominated single Thot Shit, Body, Cardi B WAP and BTS “BUTTER” (Remix) featuring Megan Thee Stallion. In 2021 he achieved x4 Grammy nominations for his work on Megan Thee Stallion Thot Shit, Lil Nas X Montero, Nas King Disease 2 and Eric Bellinger New Light.

Furthermore, Dani recently consulted on the number #1 charting album by KSI called All Over The Place on the hit single called Number 2 which features rap sensations Future and 21 Savage, co-produced by Nana Rogues and Aaron Ferrucci. Nana also co-produced “We’re All Alone” on Dave’s number #1 chart topping album “We’re All Alone In This Together” landing two number one albums two weeks running. Dani also represents teen sensation Celina Sharma, Harris J, Lil Bilz and Aaron Ferrucci.

Recently, the trailblazing entrepreneur stepped into the Marvel universe to create the title song called “Nach Mera Hero” (or “Dance My Hero” in English), for the much anticipated Marvel Studios blockbuster production “Eternals,” a superhero film based on Marvel Comics. The movie follows the Eternals, an immortal alien race, emerging from hiding aver thousands of years to protect Earth from its evil counterparts, the Deviants. The music for the blockbuster is performed by Mugal Group’s rising star Celina Sharma and is the only original song featured in the Eternals film score and soundtrack.

Although now a multi-awarded music executive, Dani Stephenson’s career as a creative began when he studied music production and artist development at Christ Church University and Technology, Music Law, Media and Publishing at Open College Network. Next, he got his internship placement at AHBS Community Radio, where he worked as an assistant audio producer for the Ashford Hospital radio shows. Then, to further expand his horizon and experience in the entertainment industry, he got a second placement at Asylum Special FX Studios, a special effects company that worked on several hit films and adverts like Honey I Shrunk the Kids. His time at the company laid bare the wealth of opportunities in film and television and paved the way for a long successful career in the entertainment industry.

Dani would also add internships at BBC World Service to his impressive resume. He worked as an assistant audio producer for the African and Asian news broadcasts and at BBC Radio in Bush House at the studio. As a

producer-songwriter, he was a key contributor for the Billboard Top #10 hit single “The Mack” featuring Mark Morrison & Fetty Wap. The single was a global hit and topped charts all over the globe raking in over 500 million streams and in excess of 2 million single sales worldwide. He also worked on Don Diablo’s “Give It All” featuring Kelis and Alex Clare, Marc Anthony’s “Esta Rico” featuring Will Smith and Bad Bunny, and many more. From then on, it was chart domination year aver year.

To learn more about this innovative individual, Dani Stephenson and his company Straight Forward Music Group, visit the company’s website.