2023 Women Of Live: Tina Farris

Bad Ass. (aka Tour Director, Producer, El Presidente) | Tina Farris Tours

Tina Farris can hardly catch her breath. In the past year she completed her master’s degree from the Peter Stark Producing Program at USC. She sold a pilot to Starz. And she operated three tours, including Steve Lacy and Chris Rock.

“Being able to operate three tours with my brand and style over the last year has been amazing,” Farris says as she reflects on all of last year’s accomplishments.

While this year has been filled with numerous successes for Farris, she also acknowledges the many challenges affecting the industry over the last few years. A lack of resources plagued the industry and many of the artists who were on the road in 2022. Farris shares she herself had a hard time obtaining buses for her artists, and it continues to be her most difficult challenge. She also admits more needs to be done to make the challenges less burdensome.

“We also need more people in the business,” she says. “It’s time to grab the keys from the gatekeepers and train more folks to be on the road.”

At the same time, Farris shares that “the industry is becoming more inclusive.” While USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative’s 2021 study sampling from 119 different companies shows that BIPOC women are one of the least represented groups on the business end of the music industry (particularly in live, where they make up just 1.7% of the workforce across all levels), more opportunities are starting to present themselves. Farris shares she wishes enough diversity existed so people could be more selective about which jobs they take.

“I would love if we lived in reality and got on tours that were right for the individual. It’s a marriage. You’re working with people. It’s not one-size-fits-all. That said, you wouldn’t marry just anyone, so why give your life on tour to just any band? I think people are in such a need that the folks coming up can pick and choose what environment they want to be in. That’s progress!”

As she dreams about what a better world for the industry would look like, Farris also shares tidbits of knowledge for the young women who hope to follow. She says, “Self care doesn’t mean don’t work hard. Being great is an action. If that’s what you want, do it.”