Freddy Wexler
Creative output is the most unmanageable input most organisations rely on. Brand teams, product groups and content functions are asked to produce cultural relevance on demand, and the people inside them often cannot say why a given idea worked or how to repeat it. The gap between “we need a moment” and the practical craft of building one is where most marketing budgets quietly disappear.
Freddy Wexler is a Grammy-nominated songwriter and producer who works with leadership teams on the practical craft of building cultural moments, drawing on a catalogue that includes ten Billboard number ones and Billy Joel’s first pop single in three decades.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Freddy Wexler
- A working hit-maker, not a commentator. Ten Billboard number ones with Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande, Post Malone, BLACKPINK and others give him a verifiable claim on how popular taste actually moves.
- The Billy Joel case study. Coaxing a thirty-year creative silence into a Grammy-stage single, including the full marketing rollout and an AI-directed music video, is a rare example of cultural reactivation that buyers can study end to end.
- Talent identification with a track record. Wexler scouted and pitched Stefani Germanotta as a future Madonna while she was still unsigned, and signed Rachel Platten before “Fight Song”. Useful for audiences thinking about how to spot signal early.
- A view on AI and creative work shaped by shipping product. The “Turn the Lights Back On” video was a Webby-winning AI-led production, which gives him a practitioner’s read on where machine generation helps and where it does not.
- Commercial track record across formats. Founder of The Brain Music with joint ventures involving Disney, Scooter Braun Projects, Warner Chappell and Prescription Songs, plus a first-look television deal with Disney.
Biography highlights
- Grammy-nominated songwriter and producer with ten Billboard number one contributions
- Co-writer and producer of Billy Joel’s “Turn the Lights Back On” (Columbia Records, 2024), the artist’s first new pop single in roughly thirty years
- Album of the Year Grammy nomination for Justin Bieber’s Justice (2022); credited contributor on Laufey’s Bewitched, a 2024 Grammy-winning album
- Co-wrote “Stuck with U” by Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande, a Billboard Hot 100 number one that raised over five million dollars for first responders’ families
- Founder of The Brain Music, with joint ventures involving Disney, Scooter Braun Projects, Warner Chappell and Prescription Songs; first-look television deal with Disney
- Webby Award (2024) for direction of the AI-led “Turn the Lights Back On” music video; Golden Globe nomination for “Forbidden Road” from the Robbie Williams biopic Better Man
Biography
Billy Joel had not released a new pop single for thirty years when “Turn the Lights Back On” arrived in February 2024 on Columbia Records. The song was co-written and produced by Freddy Wexler, who spent more than a year developing the material with Joel from a CD of unfinished sketches. The track debuted at number one on classic hits and classic rock radio, picked up a Grammy-stage performance, and was packaged with an AI-directed music video that later won a Webby. As a worked example of how a dormant creative voice gets reactivated and brought back to market, it is unusually complete.
That collaboration sits inside a longer hit-making record. Wexler has ten Billboard number one contributions and Grammy nominations across three consecutive years, including Album of the Year for Justin Bieber’s Justice and contributor credit on Laufey’s Bewitched. He co-wrote “Stuck with U” for Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande, a Hot 100 number one that raised more than five million dollars for first responders’ families during the early pandemic. His writing and production credits span Post Malone, BLACKPINK, Selena Gomez, Halsey, Diana Ross and Celine Dion.
He is also a builder of companies. The Brain Music, founded in 2012, runs joint ventures with Disney, Scooter Braun Projects, Warner Chappell and Prescription Songs. The Freddy Wexler Company holds a first-look television deal with Disney and a slate spanning Nickelodeon’s Kid Cowboy, a Broadway production of The Last Five Years, and a Hulu special with Sebastian Maniscalco. The Variety Family Entertainment Impact Report has recognised the operation.
For organisations, the relevant point is access to a practitioner who can describe how a cultural moment actually gets made, including the writing room, the artist relationship, the rollout, and the use of AI in production. Few speakers on creativity can point to a specific commercial artefact and walk a senior audience through the craft behind it. Wexler can.
Key speaking topics
- Creativity as a working practice
- Storytelling across music, film and brand
- AI in creative production and music video direction
- Talent identification and early-signal spotting
- Cultural moments and the commercial rollout behind them
- Resilience and creative reinvention
- Philanthropy embedded in creative product
Ideal for
- Marketing, brand and CMO leadership teams thinking about cultural relevance
- Creative and content function heads inside media, entertainment and consumer companies
- Innovation and product groups exploring AI-assisted creative production
- Senior offsites and leadership conferences looking for a practitioner perspective on craft
Audience outcomes
- A working framework for how cultural moments are constructed, drawn from a specific recent case
- A practitioner’s read on AI in creative production, anchored in a Webby-winning video
- A more concrete sense of what early signal looks like in talent and ideas, before they are obvious
- Reference points from a hit-making catalogue that audiences can apply to their own creative briefs
Talks
A working account of how a dormant creative voice gets reactivated, drawn from the Billy Joel collaboration.
Key takeaways:
- What it took to bring a thirty-year silence back into commercial release
- How the writing and production process was structured around an artist who had stopped writing
- How the rollout, including the AI-led music video, was sequenced
Where machine generation helps creative work and where it gets in the way, from someone shipping product on both sides.
Key takeaways:
- A practitioner’s view of AI in music and video production
- How creative teams can integrate AI without losing authorship
- What audiences still respond to when the technology is invisible
The craft behind songs and campaigns that travel beyond their initial release window.
Key takeaways:
- What separates a hit from a release
- The role of timing, narrative and rollout
- How philanthropy and purpose can be built into creative product, drawing on “Stuck with U”