Denise M. Stevens

Partner | Corporate
Co-Chair, Global Media, Entertainment & Sports

About

Denise Stevens is currently a Partner at Pierson Ferdinand where her transactional practice focuses on creative properties across multiple platforms, including music, publishing, touring, television and film.


Practices

  • Global Media, Entertainment & Sports

  • Copyrights

  • Trademarks

  • Entertainment

  • Hospitality

  • IP Transactions and Licensing

  • Commercial Transactions

  • Emerging Companies and Venture Capital

  • Latin America

Admissions

  • Tennessee

  • California

  • U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee

  • Tennessee State Supreme Court

  • U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit

  • U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California

  • U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California

  • California State Supreme Court


Education

  • University of California College of the Law, San Francisco, J.D., Dean’s Scholar, Senior Note Editor, Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly

  • American Jurisprudence Award in Trial Advocacy

  • University of California at Los Angeles, B.A., cum laude


Recognition

  • Named to Billboard’s “Top Music Lawyers” list (2024) and “Country Power Players” list (2021-2022)

  • Appointed by Tennessee State Governor, Bill Haslam as “Colonel, Aide de Camp,” the highest honorary commission granted to a citizen of the state of Tennessee (2018)

  • Awarded “Women in Music City Award” by the Nashville Business Journal (2017-2018)

  • Named in Chambers USA, America’s Leading Lawyers for Business, in Tennessee Media & Entertainment (2015-2026)

  • Named in The Legal 500 US in Media & Entertainment, published by Legalease Limited and John Pritchard (2022 and 2023)

  • Named in Variety’s “Music City Impact Report” (2014)

  • Named “Super Lawyer” in Entertainment and Sports by Thomson Reuters in the Mid-South (2014, 2016-2025) and Southern California (2025-2026)

  • Honored by MusicRow as a “Rising Woman on the Row” for her substantial contributions to the Nashville music industry (2012)

  • Named “Best Lawyer” in Entertainment Law, The Best Lawyers in America (2010-2026), and recognized among “Women of Influence” by Best Lawyers (2015-2017), published by Woodward White, Inc. 

  • Recipient, Nashville Songwriters Association’s President’s Choice Award (2007)

  • Extern, Honorable Charles Legge, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California (1992)


Affiliations

  • Board of Directors, Crescendo Foundation

  • Co-Chair 2010 Program and 2009 Alumna, Leadership Music

  • General Counsel, Nashville Songwriters Association International

  • Member, Past Board of Directors and Past Chairman & Treasurer, Copyright Society of the South

  • Member, Academy of Country Music

  • Member, Country Music Association

  • Member, Gospel Music Association

  • Member, National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences

  • Member, Association of Independent Music Publishers

  • Member, SOURCE

  • Member, Tennessee State Bar Association

  • Member, Nashville Bar Association

  • Major, Civil Air Patrol (United States Air Force Auxiliary) 

  • Past Board of Directors, T.J. Martell Foundation

  • Past Board of Directors, FilmNashville

  • Past Board of Directors and Secretary, Gospel Music Association Foundation

Experience

  • Loeb & Loeb LLP

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