Watching last night’s ACM Awards reminded me of a conversation a group of us were having at February’s Pollstar Live Conference. Everyone was asking what panel to go to. I said I was headed to the Country Music panel and a member of our group blurted out, “why, to hear Brian O’Connell tell us all how great he is”. At the same time, myself and a very prominent agent from Nashville said, “He is great”.
Ok so he dresses and travels (a tour bus with more large screen TV’s than your local Best Buy) like a rock star. If you helped develop the number of superstars he has, you could to. Let’s name a few…Jason Aldean, Miranda Lambert, Toby Keith, Blake Shelton, Luke Bryan, Rascal Flatts, Brad Paisley, Brooks & Dunn, Tim McGraw, and many more.
Brian created Live Nation’s “Mega-Ticket” which gives country music fans the chance to purchase tickets to all country shows playing their local amphitheatre at a significant discount. It works great. Most recently, he has launched The Faster Horses Festival which Brian described to Ray Waddell of Billboard as a “three-day hillbilly sleepover”. The event takes place July 19-21 in Brooklyn, Michigan and you can find out more at http://fasterhorsesfestival.com.
So you want to be in the country music business, you better know Brian…and Louis Messina @ AEG too, but that’s for another newsletter.
ASPEN LIVE 2013
The Aspen Live Conference, 2013 (December 12-15 @ The St. Regis, Aspen) will be going on-sale this Wednesday, April 10th at Noon Eastern / 9am Pacific http://www.aspenlive.com. Last year’s highlights included talks by festival streaming guru and CEO of Springboard Productions, Hank Neuberger, Andrew Dreskin, CEO of Ticketfly, John Boyle from EDM giant, Insomniac, and Q&A’s with The Lefsetz Letter’s Bob Lefsetz interviewing Live Nation CEO, Michael Rapino while Square Peg Concerts’ Dan Steinberg took us Inside the Agent’s Studio with The Agency Group, NA’s President, Steve Martin.
This year’s line-up is shaping up nicely. Due to demand, we are capping this year’s attendance at 200. You can find out more by following us on Twitter: @aspenlive Hashtag #aspenlive, Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/aspenlive, and Instagram: #aspenlive. To register Wednesday, go to http://www.aspenlive.com. The site also has information on special hotel rates, ski/snowboard rentals, activities and more.
Don’t miss out, space is limited and prices go up the longer you wait.
