Spotify Monthly Listeners

Music pitch email subject lines

A music pitch subject line works when it carries the artist name and one specific fact in under 60 characters: the genre, the playlist fit, the venue or the release date. Avoid hype words, all caps, emoji and the phrase "press release". The subject sells the open; the first line sells the reply.

Updated 2026-10-26. Written by the team that operates this platform; no rankings, placements or listener numbers are promised anywhere on this page.

What a subject line is actually competing with

Your subject line sits in an inbox with thirty others, most of them from people the recipient knows. A curator or a writer scans sender name, subject, first line, and decides in about three seconds. That means two things: the sender name has to be recognisable or credible, and the subject has to contain information rather than enthusiasm.

The subject also does a job your body cannot: it survives in a search. A curator looking for last month’s Afrobeats pitch searches for the artist or the genre, not for "quick question". A descriptive subject is therefore both an open-rate tool and a filing system, which is why "New single" loses to "Waconzy — Afro-soul single, out 14 Nov".

  • Artist name first, because that is what gets searched later.
  • One fact: genre, genre plus tempo, release date, or playlist fit.
  • Under 60 characters so it is not truncated on a phone.
  • No emoji, no all caps, no exclamation marks.

Patterns that keep working

The patterns below are not tricks; they are ways of putting the information first. Use the one that matches your ask, and change the wording so it sounds like you rather than a template. If a subject could be sent by anyone to anyone, it is not doing its job.

  • [Artist] — [genre] single for [playlist name]
  • [Artist] — [track], [tempo] [genre], clean edit available
  • [Artist] — live session for [blog name]?
  • [Artist] — [city] show, press list for [date]
  • [Artist] — [genre] EP out [date], one link inside
  • Following your [specific post]: [artist], [genre], [city]
  • [Artist] — [one verifiable fact], new record attached

Words to leave out

Hype words are a signal that the email contains no information: "amazing", "incredible", "must-hear", "next big thing". Spam-adjacent words increase filter risk: "free", "guaranteed", "opportunity", "investment", "urgent". Format words describe the email rather than the music: "press release", "submission", "newsletter". And a subject that asks a question the recipient cannot answer from the subject ("Can you feature this?") is easy to decline without opening.

Also avoid the empty personalisation that everyone uses: "Quick question", "Following up", "Touching base". These are not subjects, they are the absence of one, and they read as bulk mail even when the body is good. If you are following up, put the artist and the new asset in the subject so the recipient knows why the thread moved.

Testing without wasting a wave

Do not A/B test subject lines on curators you only get one chance with. Test on your own list first, if you have one, or on a small segment of less important contacts. If you have no list and no volume, skip testing and use the clearest subject you can write — the effect of a subject line is small compared with relevance, list quality and deliverability.

The one thing worth measuring is replies, not opens. Two subjects that both open well but one produces three times the replies tell you the subject set a promise the body did not keep. That is the signal to fix the body, and it is more useful than an open-rate chart. The curator pitch template shows how subject and first line work together, and the deliverability guide covers the reasons a good subject still never arrives.

Published plans

These are the plans this platform publishes today, in US dollars per month. Every paid plan includes managed domain SMTP sending and email verification; the tiers differ in allowances.

PlanUSD / monthEmailsContactsManaged mailboxes
Starter Outreach$492,000 / month1,0001
Pro Industry$9910,000 / month10,0003
Artist Plus$19950,000 / month50,0005
Label$399100,000 / month100,0007
Agency$699250,000 / month250,00010
Enterprise$1000500,000 / month500,00015

Allowances reset on the first day of each UTC month. Prices are read from this site's own plan data, not estimated. See the pricing page for the exact feature list per plan.

Worked example: one release, four subject lines

The same track is pitched to four groups with four subjects. To a soul playlist curator: "Waconzy — Afro-soul, 96 BPM, for Slow Mornings". To a blog that reviewed a similar record: "Following your piece on the Bristol soul scene". To a radio show: "Waconzy — clean edit + instrumental, [show name]". To a press contact: "Waconzy — live-band EP, out 14 Nov".

Each subject names the recipient’s context and one fact about the record, and each is under 45 characters. None of them says "new music" or "please listen". The body is the same structure with a different first line, which is the only scalable way to run a wave without sending identical mail.

  1. 1Write the fact you want the recipient to know before the email is open.
  2. 2Put the artist name and that fact in the subject.
  3. 3Cut the subject to under 60 characters and read it on a phone.
  4. 4Make sure the first line of the body delivers what the subject promised.
  5. 5Record which subject produced replies, not only opens.

The numbers in this example are arithmetic on the plan allowances, not observed results.

Subject line checklist

Six of these are mechanical; the last two require judgement.

  • The artist name appears in the subject.
  • There is one specific fact, not a mood.
  • It is under 60 characters.
  • There is no emoji, all caps or exclamation mark.
  • No hype words or spam-adjacent words are present.
  • It is not the word "press release" or "submission".
  • It names the playlist, show, blog or city where relevant.
  • The body’s first line delivers what the subject promised.

What a subject line will not do

It will not rescue a bad list. A brilliant subject sent to five hundred mismatched addresses produces the same result as a bad one, with more complaints. It will not guarantee an open either: mailbox providers filter on sender reputation before the subject is ever considered.

It will not make a weak first line acceptable. The subject buys a few seconds; if the opening sentence is "I hope this finds you well", those seconds are gone. And no subject line on its own creates a relationship — it only decides whether the relationship gets a chance to start.

  • No guaranteed opens, replies or coverage.
  • No clickbait or misleading promises the body cannot keep.
  • No claim that subject-line testing replaces relevance or deliverability.

Questions people ask

How long should a music pitch subject line be?
Under 60 characters, and ideally under 45 so it is not truncated on a phone. Artist name plus one specific fact is the whole formula; anything longer usually becomes a description rather than a subject.
Should I put the artist name first?
Usually yes. It makes the email findable later, it tells the recipient whether they know you, and it avoids the pattern of bulk mail where the subject is a generic claim.
Do emoji help subject lines get opened?
Not for industry outreach. They render inconsistently, they read as marketing, and some filters penalise them. Use words that carry information instead.
What subject should a follow-up use?
Reply in the same thread, so the original subject stays. If you must change it, keep the artist name and add the new asset, for example "Waconzy — live session for Slow Mornings".
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