Live music industry is the oldest and often the most critical branch of the music industry for an artist’s success. Without live performances, touring, and sharing of one’s talent with music fans face-to-face, the chances of succeeding in the music industry are minimal. The process of live concert organization is a complex and multi-layered activity, generally coordinated, managed, and controlled by booking agents, artists’ managers, and concert promoters. From choosing venues, booking artists, and obtaining permits, to promotion, ticketing, and production, the process requires wide industry knowledge and skill set. Government regulations, contract negotiations, financial management, personnel administration, and technical requirements are some of the major considerations in this activity. As such, the live concert organization and management process, as well as the professional interrelations between agents, promoters, and managers, and their roles and responsibilities, are the topics we will focus on in this module. But before we move on to the methods and practices, let’s look at the roots of the live music industry in the United States, and see how we got here at the first place. In the module on music publishing, we have already talked about the birth of Vaudeville as America’s first mass music entertainment vehicle. By the late 1800s, Vaudeville’s theatres, its music and its stars are ubiquitous, and are not only big entertainment, but big business as well. Though New York’s legendary Tony Pastor, the “Godfather of Vaudeville”, and his theater, at first on Bowery and then up on 14th Street, propelled the Vaudeville’s family friendly variety show to popularity, it is the partnership of Benjamin Keith and Edward Albee that made it an industry. Keith and Albee built a chain of Vaudeville theaters starting in Boston and New York, and spreading throughout the area east of the Mississippi river. Instead of booking each performing act separately, and paying a per-show fee, they formed touring groups of artists that would travel their theater circuit, performing approved programs, and earning fixed weekly wages. The Keith and Albee circuit grew by incorporating other theaters throughout the area, built by local businessmen and promoters, into the circuit, and securing for them the performances by their Vaudeville artists. Though the competition developed, and theirs was not the only theater circuit in the country, it was certainly the biggest and the most powerful. They eventually controlled over 1,500 theaters and dominated the live music industry of the time. It was their stronghold and control of the artists and the bookings that earned them such a dominant position. In May of 1900, Keith and Albee formed the Vaudeville Managers Association, consisting of the Vaudeville theatre owners belonging to different circuits across the country. Headed by Keith and Albee themselves, the Association centralized and coordinated all the business and the dealings of the circuits. The most important ramification of the Association was the centralized booking system, which was formalized in 1906 by the establishment of the United Booking Office (UBO). Not surprisingly, being organized by Keith and Albee, Edward Albee served as the director of the UBO, which quickly became the largest and the most important booking agency in the country. The UBO signed their agents and acts under exclusive agreements, where no one but the UBO could contract their services. They offered free franchises to the agents throughout the United States, who would book their acts only for the theaters across the country which agreed to work exclusively with the UBO, and whose mangers were willing to relinquish the control of the programming of their shows to the UBO bookers. Of course, the refusal of such an offer would mean being cut out from all the viable stage talent thus controlled by the UBO, and being forced to book from among the thin choice of leftovers. Very few theaters could afford such a gamble, and most joined in. Even the Orpheum circuit, the largest western United States Vaudeville circuit, operated by the legendary West Coast manager Martin Beck, the strongest of Keith and Albee circuit competitors, booked their acts through the UBO; the fact that proves that Keith and Albee’s stronghold and control of the market was not only dominant, but virtually complete. The United Booking Office system relied on its own operational methods and on a number of checks and balances between its components in order to remain stable, efficient, and most importantly of course, profitable. The theater managers could request certain acts for their shows, but had to rely on the agents and the bookers for scheduling and pricing. More often, though, the agents and the bookers presented the programs to the theater managers who usually accepted them as the best available possibility at the time. The UBO agents were responsible for representing the acts, coordinating tours and schedules, and making sure the acts are routed optimally. Being that they worked on commission, the agents of course aimed to get the highest pay possible for their clients. The UBO bookers, representing a number of the theaters in one area, negotiated the artists’ pay, usually fixed touring salaries, with the agents and their acts, and naturally, being the buyer, aimed to pay as little as possible for the talent they booked. The UBO itself, collected a commission from the theaters and the agents, and made sure that the prices were kept appropriate and reasonable, thus assuring the exchanges between the agents and the bookers, which triggered its commissions. This centralized mode of operations allowed for various data collection, which was used in the management of the programming, negotiations, pricing, and fees. How many tickets were sold for which program in which area and in which theater? What did the reviews say about which act and where? Which acts were difficult to work with? Which theater managers were accommodating and which were not? Which agents were willing to lower their acts’ salaries if necessary, and which were not? Which bookers were booking which acts more, and which less? All of this was valuable information available to the UBO, which directed its management, demands, expectations, and approaches accordingly. The acts rose through the theatre circuit ranks, on the back of this data. The more tickets sold, the better the reviews, and the more positive the reports to the UBO headquarters from the theater managers regarding the act, the higher the acts’ salaries and the more prestigious the tours and the theaters that those acts would be booked for. The more the agents work, the bookers book, and the theaters sell, the higher the commission the United Booking Office would get. Personal preferences and subjective views were thus minimized, and the numbers spoke louder than words. Data became the great equalizer. Other words, the business of the show business became too big of a business not to be treated like business. That’s the real ground zero of today’s live music industry, and its methods and practices. That’s the original strand of its DNA, which eventually made it into what it is today.
