THE LIVE100

Since taking the helm of Live Nation in 2005, Rapino has transformed the concert promoter into a global enterprise spanning touring, ticketing, sponsorship, venues and artist management. That achievement reflects not just his strategic instincts and appetite for expansion, but a leadership style that has drawn widespread praise from investors and the financial community—and earned him uncommon loyalty among artists and their teams.

As a father-son duo in the music business, Irving and Jeffrey Azoff have few if any peers in the collective power they wield. More remarkably, they also seem to like each other. Spend time with them, and it becomes clear that their relationship is more caring and supportive than rivalrous and Oedipal; think Mufasa and Simba rather than Logan and Kendall Roy or Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. (Although Irving is obviously a Sith Master.)

As proprietors of The Azoff Company and Full Stop Management, the redoubtable paterfamilias and scion oversee the careers of artists including the Eagles, U2, John Mayer, Tate McRae, Gwen Stefani and Harry Styles, who took over Madison Square Garden with a record-setting 30-night residency, part of a tour that will bring him to sold-out stadiums around the globe in 2027.

We spoke to Jeffrey (from New York) and Irving (in L.A.) over Zoom. In the few moments they weren’t insulting HITS, they sometimes allowed us to sneak in a question.

In 1991 Grateful Dead fan Coran Capshaw gave the then-unheralded Dave Matthews Band a weekly residency at his Charlottesville nightclub, Trax. Matthews and his ragtag group would play anywhere for anyone, and they encouraged fans to tape their performances, virtues that immediately appealed to Capshaw. He soon signed on to manage his first, and still flagship, act.

From The Rolling Stones to Elton John to Taylor Swift, AEG Presents boss Jay Marciano has served as a trusted collaborator with headliners worldwide, a music head who—his calm, gentlemanly demeanor notwithstanding—is also among the most effective operators in the live sector.

Arthur Fogel and Omar Al-joulani represent two generations of the live business, but their careers share a common throughline: Think bigger, go further and, above all, make the artist’s ambitions the starting point.

It’s been two years since longtime agents Emma Banks, Darryl Eaton and Rick Roskin were elevated to co-heads of global touring at CAA. In that time, the trio has galvanized the nearly 200-member agent team by presiding over the signings of such acts as Adele, ADÉLA, Alicia Keys, Billie Eilish, Clipse, Drake, Florida Georgia Line, Ms. Lauryn Hill, ROSÉ and Stella Lefty, and bringing in industry-leading agents including Lucy Dickins, Tony Goldring, David Bradley, James Simmons, Devin Landau, Maxim Karlik and Beth Morton.

Working in conjunction with managing director Rob Light, co-head of contemporary music Mitch Rose and agency board member Katie Anderson, the CAA leaders oversee a touring roster that boasts many of the most influential artists in the world.

Roc Nation bosses Desiree Perez and Jay Brown, along with founder JAŸ-Z, have become a titanic force not only in the business but in the larger culture. The behemoth’s management clients in music include Rihanna, Lil Uzi Vert (whose “What You Saying” is due for Grammy love), Megan Thee Stallion, Alicia Keys, A$AP Rocky, Christina Aguilera, Fat Joe, The Lox and John Legend.

Since partnering with the NFL in 2019, Roc Nation has executive produced the Super Bowl halftime show, shaping the cultural conversation with bold performer choices—most recently JAŸ-Z himself, who will headline SB LXI.

At Live Nation, building a global touring business means knowing when to take an established superstar to the next level, when to bring a long-awaited comeback to the stage and when a genre is ready to conquer new territory. Jared Braverman, Colin Lewis and Hans Schafer have helped turn those opportunities into major live events, working across a roster that spans pop, hip-hop, rock and Latin music.

Avid marathon runner Danny Wimmer began his long-distance training in music when he opened the Milk Bar in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1993, where little-known local band Limp Bizkit often played.

After going as far as he could locally, Wimmer packed his bags for Los Angeles in 1999–2000, joining Bizkit’s Fred Durst in launching Flawless Records—an imprint of UMG through Interscope/Geffen. There, they signed such acts as Puddle of Mudd, She Wants Revenge and Ringside. Wimmer soon landed A&R gigs at Epic and Atlantic before returning to his true calling—concert promotion.

In 2007, Wimmer launched his first major festival, Rock on the Range, in Columbus, Ohio, and in 2011 he established Danny Wimmer Presents, growing it into one of the largest independent rock festival promoters in the world. For more than two decades, Wimmer has built a career around creating and producing live entertainment experiences that bring artists, fans and communities together.

Paul Tollett and Rich Schaefer arrived at the top of the live music business by very different routes, but their careers now intersect under the AEG Presents umbrella in a way that illustrates the breadth of the company’s touring operation.

Schaefer and Tollett represent complementary ends of the same AEG infrastructure—Tollett with an expert curator’s eye for the event and the artist mix, Schaefer with a manager’s eye for the career and a global touring network built to execute it.