2023 Impact 50: Marlene Tsuchii

MUSIC AGENT & CO-HEAD, INTERNATIONAL TOURING
CAA

Marlene Tsuchii, a music agent and Co-Head of International Touring for Creative Artists Agency, works with many of the world’s top artists from Dua Lipa to H.E.R. to Foo Fighters. But what she’s especially passionate about is using her talent to elevate Asian artists throughout the industry.

She’s involved with not only artists, but brought major music company 88rising into the CAA fold as well as SM Entertainment, one of the largest K-pop agencies in the world, which houses artists including SuperM, NCT 127 and aespa. She also counts the Los Angeles-based, all-girl punk band The Linda Lindas among her charges.

Among the artists she also represents are Jackson Wang, NIKI, Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber, The Black Keys, Maggie Rogers, Rüfüs Du Sol, Daft Punk, Beck, Phoenix, Gorillaz, Tool, At the Drive In, Rise Against and many more.

Having guided so much talent to the table, Tsuchii doesn’t look to a single event or artist to define success in the last year.

“Last year, I had the privilege of working with strong female artists whose impact is undeniable – the highly anticipated return of Maggie Rogers, Dua Lipa’s successful global tour, H.E.R. touring with Coldplay around the world, Sabrina Carpenter’s stellar record and tour, aespa premiering on the main stage of Coachella and NIKI’s great self-titled record and tour,” Tsuchii says.

“There is a healthy appetite for live shows as evidenced by the unprecedented success of many big stadium tours,” Tsuchii offers, with a caveat. “However, consumers also have limited resources and are being much more selective about what they buy. It has been an interesting dichotomy in selling patterns. On the one hand, consumers appear to be focusing on major stadium and arena level artists and paying for spectacle.

On the other hand, many of our younger developing female artists are seeing explosive ticket sales moving from clubs to large theatres in one big leap. Since it will be a few years since the pandemic, I hope that 2024 will bring balance to the playing field.”