Lauric Songs (BMI) was established in 1978 by Canadian songwriter-producer Richard (Rick) Beneteau as the publishing company for his personal songs. During the 1980’s, his songs and co-writes garnered several major songwriting contest wins including Billboard Magazine‘s International Songwriting Competition in it’s first two years. He also had artists like Latin sensation, Wilkins (produced by Jon Secada and Emilio Estefan); Lenny Williams (Tower of Power vocalist) and the first Star Search Grand Champion, Catte Adams (produced by Charles Calello) among others, record his songs. He was member #300, and a Juno Award voting member, in the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences.
Sadly though, in the early 1990’s when things indeed looked very bright for Rick, his recording studio, writing gear and production company were usurped in divorce. But he continued on his musical path accepting the offer of starting the record company for a popular regional real estate mogul. After producing two albums with minor Canadian chart success, he opted to leave the business in the mid-90’s – to start a new career on the-then brand new Internet where he ended up co-founding a heavily-endorsed humanitarian non-profit in 2006. His full bio can be found here.
Although he was not directly involved in recording music for those few decades, his passion for creating music remained entrenched. He continued writing lyrics (many are offered for co-writing here), many of which are empowerment lyrics.
The great news is that Rick’s foremost songwriting partners back-in-the-day, Larry Thompson, a multi-instrumentalist and recording engineer, whom he wrote and demoed hundreds of songs with – several of which won some of the above-stated awards and were covered by recording artists – have embarked on a renewed mission to get their very best 1980’s retro songs (revamped, of course) and, write and produce broadcast-ready new songs for use in film and television.
Check out SkazMusic.com