Tour promoter
Encyclopedia
Tour promoters are the individuals or companies responsible for organizing a live concert tour or special event performance. The tour promoter makes an offer of employment to a particular artist, usually through the artist’s agent
or music manager. The promoter and agent then negotiate the live performance contract
. The majority of live performance contracts are drawn up using the American Federation of Musicians
(AFM) standard contract format known as the AFM Performance Agreement.
, concert hall, entertainment centre
, theater, nightclub
or arena
bookings; (2) pricing the event or tour; and (3) providing air, sea or land transportation (optional). However the promoter must have upfront cash and or sponsorship financing to pay for advertising the tours of the artists. Such advertising costs, usually referred to as a Media or Promotional Kit, commonly include television
and radio advertisements, poster
s, newspaper
and magazine
adverts, online marketing and so on.
(previously known as Clear Channel Entertainment) is the number one concert promoter in the world according to figures released by Pollstar Magazine in 2006. The Beverly Hills, California
-based corporation accounted for about $1.3 billion in concert box-office sales during 2005, according to Billboard magazine's tracking. Anschutz Entertainment Group
(AEG Live
) was ranked second with $417 million, followed by House of Blues
(HOB Entertainment) at number three with $245 million. Tour promoter On July 5, 2006, Live Nation purchased HOB Entertainment for $350 million, further expanding their market share in the live-music business.
While average ticket prices jumped to roughly $57 in 2005, the number of tickets sold for the 100 biggest tours dipped 3.5%, to 36.3 million. Some fans have complained to government officials, particularly after they found tickets to the same concerts or sporting events available - sometimes at many times the face value - on secondary sellers like Stubhub.com and TicketsNow minutes after the public sale began. After hearing from some would-be ticket buyers, the Missouri
attorney general
announced the state was suing three ticket resellers on charges they violated state consumer protection laws. That same day, the Arkansas
attorney general said he was seeking documents from five resellers. And the attorney general’s office in Pennsylvania
is also looking into the ticket sale business after receiving several hundred complaints over the recent sale of tickets for a Hannah Montana
concert in Pittsburgh.
.
Live Nation, the largest concert promoter, and Ticketmaster Entertainment, the No. 1 ticket seller, announced merger on February 10, 2009. Then on January 25, 2010 the US Department of Justice approved the merger with terms that include that Ticketmaster sell Paciolan, its ticketing and software services unit, to Comcast's sports and entertainment firm or "another buyer suitable to the department."
Ticketmaster must also license its software to Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), the company’s largest customer. With a copy of the Ticketmaster software, AEG will be able to market an attractive ticketing system to venues, according to the DOJ. Under the settlement terms, both companies will be able to compete head-to-head with Ticketmaster, according to the DOJ.
http://www.businessinsider.com/ticketmaster-and-livenation-get-approval-as-one-giant-music-ticket-monster-2010-1#ixzz1PenCQbOG
http://www.businessinsider.com/ticketmaster-and-livenation-get-approval-as-one-giant-music-ticket-monster-2010-1#ixzz1Pen2IHiu
has a college marketing department, which promotes records released by Sony and by their independent label affiliates. Other music marketing companies such as Cornerstone Promotion focus on college marketing. Cornerstone Promotion hires representatives from colleges all around the country to implement small scale marketing campaigns on their campuses.
Artists began breaking into the college market in the 1990s. Billboard Magazine published articles dating back to the early-mid nineties urging artists and agents to take advantage of the college market. Artists such as Dave Matthews Band
and R.E.M. played college shows to increase their presence in the college market in the nineties. Billboard Magazine has emphasized the extent to which college concerts can help an artist in multiple articles.
offers a Certificate in Meeting, Conference, and Event Management, and a Certificate in Sports Marketing.
Talent agent
A talent agent, or booking agent, is a person who finds jobs for actors, authors, film directors, musicians, models, producers, professional athletes, writers and other people in various entertainment businesses. Having an agent is not required, but does help the artist in getting jobs...
or music manager. The promoter and agent then negotiate the live performance contract
Contract
A contract is an agreement entered into by two parties or more with the intention of creating a legal obligation, which may have elements in writing. Contracts can be made orally. The remedy for breach of contract can be "damages" or compensation of money. In equity, the remedy can be specific...
. The majority of live performance contracts are drawn up using the American Federation of Musicians
American Federation of Musicians
The American Federation of Musicians of the United States and Canada is a labor union of professional musicians in the United States and Canada...
(AFM) standard contract format known as the AFM Performance Agreement.
Services
Included among the tour promoter’s various job responsibilities are: (1) obtaining venueMusic venue
A music venue is any location used for a concert or musical performance. Music venues range in size and location, from an outdoor bandshell or bandstand or a concert hall to an indoor sports stadium. Typically, different types of venues host different genres of music...
, concert hall, entertainment centre
Entertainment centre
An entertainment centre is a venue similar to a theatre in that it hosts concerts by musical artists or comedians and such. Entertainment centres usually range up to around 30,000 people. Many entertainment centres usually have small snack stands in which people can buy food and drinks...
, theater, nightclub
Nightclub
A nightclub is an entertainment venue which usually operates late into the night...
or arena
Arena
An arena is an enclosed area, often circular or oval-shaped, designed to showcase theater, musical performances, or sporting events. It is composed of a large open space surrounded on most or all sides by tiered seating for spectators. The key feature of an arena is that the event space is the...
bookings; (2) pricing the event or tour; and (3) providing air, sea or land transportation (optional). However the promoter must have upfront cash and or sponsorship financing to pay for advertising the tours of the artists. Such advertising costs, usually referred to as a Media or Promotional Kit, commonly include television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
and radio advertisements, poster
Poster
A poster is any piece of printed paper designed to be attached to a wall or vertical surface. Typically posters include both textual and graphic elements, although a poster may be either wholly graphical or wholly text. Posters are designed to be both eye-catching and informative. Posters may be...
s, newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
and magazine
Magazine
Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...
adverts, online marketing and so on.
Promoter compensation
There are no figures available concerning how much an average concert promoter makes annually. Like most music industry professions, compensation depends on the level of artist the promoter works with, location, and what a given market will bear. The promoter assumes all the financial risk in putting on a show, so compensation also depends on how successful the promoter is at negotiating with vendors and creating sold-out shows. Additionally, in-depth knowledge of their operating market and audience characteristics are critical success factors for any tour promoter.Industry overview
The rise of large corporation mega-promoters over the past ten years has made it much more difficult for aspiring tour promoters to break into the industry. Live NationLive Nation
Live Nation is a live-events company based in Beverly Hills, California, focused on concert promotions. Live Nation formed in 2005 as a spin-off from Clear Channel Communications, which then merged with Ticketmaster in 2010 to become Live Nation Entertainment....
(previously known as Clear Channel Entertainment) is the number one concert promoter in the world according to figures released by Pollstar Magazine in 2006. The Beverly Hills, California
Beverly Hills, California
Beverly Hills is an affluent city located in Los Angeles County, California, United States. With a population of 34,109 at the 2010 census, up from 33,784 as of the 2000 census, it is home to numerous Hollywood celebrities. Beverly Hills and the neighboring city of West Hollywood are together...
-based corporation accounted for about $1.3 billion in concert box-office sales during 2005, according to Billboard magazine's tracking. Anschutz Entertainment Group
Anschutz Entertainment Group
The Anschutz Entertainment Group is a sporting and music entertainment presenter and a subsidiary of The Anschutz Corporation. It is the world's largest owner of sports teams and sports events, the owner of the world’s most profitable sports and entertainment venues, and under AEG Live the world's...
(AEG Live
AEG Live
Anschutz Entertainment Group Live is a live entertainment promotion subsidiary of Anschutz Entertainment Group. It is the world's second largest live show promoter....
) was ranked second with $417 million, followed by House of Blues
House of Blues
House of Blues is a chain of 13 live music concert halls and restaurants in major markets throughout the United States. House of Blues first location was in Cambridge's Harvard Square. It was opened in 1992 by Isaac Tigrett, co-founder of Hard Rock Cafe, and Dan Aykroyd, star of The Blues Brothers...
(HOB Entertainment) at number three with $245 million. Tour promoter On July 5, 2006, Live Nation purchased HOB Entertainment for $350 million, further expanding their market share in the live-music business.
While average ticket prices jumped to roughly $57 in 2005, the number of tickets sold for the 100 biggest tours dipped 3.5%, to 36.3 million. Some fans have complained to government officials, particularly after they found tickets to the same concerts or sporting events available - sometimes at many times the face value - on secondary sellers like Stubhub.com and TicketsNow minutes after the public sale began. After hearing from some would-be ticket buyers, the Missouri
Missouri
Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...
attorney general
Attorney General
In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general, or attorney-general, is the main legal advisor to the government, and in some jurisdictions he or she may also have executive responsibility for law enforcement or responsibility for public prosecutions.The term is used to refer to any person...
announced the state was suing three ticket resellers on charges they violated state consumer protection laws. That same day, the Arkansas
Arkansas
Arkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...
attorney general said he was seeking documents from five resellers. And the attorney general’s office in Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
is also looking into the ticket sale business after receiving several hundred complaints over the recent sale of tickets for a Hannah Montana
Hannah Montana
Hannah Montana is an American television series, which debuted on March 24, 2006 on the Disney Channel. The series focuses on a girl who lives a double life as an average teenage school girl named Miley Stewart by day and a famous pop singer named Hannah Montana by night, concealing her real...
concert in Pittsburgh.
Live Nation & Ticketmaster
On December 21, 2007, Live Nation announced it would acquire the software and services to ramp up its ticket-selling operation, potentially positioning the company to compete directly with its longtime contractor, TicketmasterTicketmaster
Ticketmaster Entertainment, Inc. is an independent American ticket sales and distribution company based in West Hollywood, California, USA, with operations in many countries around the world. In 2010 it merged with Live Nation to become Live Nation Entertainment...
.
Live Nation, the largest concert promoter, and Ticketmaster Entertainment, the No. 1 ticket seller, announced merger on February 10, 2009. Then on January 25, 2010 the US Department of Justice approved the merger with terms that include that Ticketmaster sell Paciolan, its ticketing and software services unit, to Comcast's sports and entertainment firm or "another buyer suitable to the department."
Ticketmaster must also license its software to Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), the company’s largest customer. With a copy of the Ticketmaster software, AEG will be able to market an attractive ticketing system to venues, according to the DOJ. Under the settlement terms, both companies will be able to compete head-to-head with Ticketmaster, according to the DOJ.
http://www.businessinsider.com/ticketmaster-and-livenation-get-approval-as-one-giant-music-ticket-monster-2010-1#ixzz1PenCQbOG
http://www.businessinsider.com/ticketmaster-and-livenation-get-approval-as-one-giant-music-ticket-monster-2010-1#ixzz1Pen2IHiu
College Concert Market
Colleges can provide “dedicated fans, an excellent testing ground, eager workers, [and] loyal fans.” The college market provides a network of new potential fans that artists, labels, agents, and managers could focus on for promotion. The major record labels have departments dedicated to college promotion and hire students as representatives for all the artists on these labels. Sony Music EntertainmentSony Music Entertainment
Sony Music Entertainment ' is the second-largest global recorded music company of the "big four" record companies and is controlled by Sony Corporation of America, the United States subsidiary of Japan's Sony Corporation....
has a college marketing department, which promotes records released by Sony and by their independent label affiliates. Other music marketing companies such as Cornerstone Promotion focus on college marketing. Cornerstone Promotion hires representatives from colleges all around the country to implement small scale marketing campaigns on their campuses.
Artists began breaking into the college market in the 1990s. Billboard Magazine published articles dating back to the early-mid nineties urging artists and agents to take advantage of the college market. Artists such as Dave Matthews Band
Dave Matthews Band
Dave Matthews Band, sometimes shortened to DMB, is a U.S. rock band formed in Charlottesville, Virginia in 1991. The founding members were singer-songwriter and guitarist Dave Matthews, bassist Stefan Lessard, drummer/backing vocalist Carter Beauford and saxophonist LeRoi Moore. Boyd Tinsley was...
and R.E.M. played college shows to increase their presence in the college market in the nineties. Billboard Magazine has emphasized the extent to which college concerts can help an artist in multiple articles.
Education
There are numerous degree programs and academic courses focusing on concert promotion and venue management. Some of these are full degree programs, while others are certificates offered for post-graduate studies. For example, New York UniversityNew York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
offers a Certificate in Meeting, Conference, and Event Management, and a Certificate in Sports Marketing.
See also
- Music industry
- Music management
- List of basic music topics
- Live NationLive NationLive Nation is a live-events company based in Beverly Hills, California, focused on concert promotions. Live Nation formed in 2005 as a spin-off from Clear Channel Communications, which then merged with Ticketmaster in 2010 to become Live Nation Entertainment....
- TicketmasterTicketmasterTicketmaster Entertainment, Inc. is an independent American ticket sales and distribution company based in West Hollywood, California, USA, with operations in many countries around the world. In 2010 it merged with Live Nation to become Live Nation Entertainment...