2024 Women of Live: Jennifer Yacoubian

Executive Vice President | Goldenvoice

Jennifer Yacoubian took a title bump in 2023. Alongside Stacy Vee — each woman frequently calls the other her best friend — Yacoubian was named executive vice president at Goldenvoice, AEG’s California venue and festival operator extraordinaire.

She joined Goldenvoice in 2009 — she’d previously worked in artist relations at numerous festivals, including Goldenvoice’s seminal and highly influential Coachella — eventually becoming a national touring talent buyer and the primary talent buyer for the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles and Splash House in Palm Springs.

Yacoubian’s a three-time nominee for Talent Buyer of the Year at the Pollstar Awards and she’s in the inner sanctum of one of the most interesting and important booking teams in the business: the group that sets the Coachella lineup that sparks conversations and dictates so much of what the rest of the festival year will look like.

Goldenvoice has led the way in the mini genre-festival game and here too has Yacoubian garnered praise. She books the new wavey, post-punky, gothy Cruel World festival (at the decidedly sunny and, uh, rosy Brookside at the Rose Bowl) and colleagues and competitors alike heaped compliments upon her for the lineups: Morrissey, Blondie, Iggy Pop, Bauhaus, Love and Rockets, Devo, Siouxsie & The Banshees and more took the stage for the first two editions, with weather throwing a wrench in the plans in 2023, extending the festival by a day and still getting rave reviews with a special Sunday set of Iggy Pop followed by an extended Siouxsie Sioux set. 

This year’s Cruel World looks like another winner with Duran Duran and Interpol headlining.

In her new-ish role, Yacoubian reports directly to Paul Tollett and she and her best pal Vee oversee the entire booking department, and Yacoubian can lift up the next cohort of leaders.

“Goldenvoice is a company that has endlessly supported my creativity and career growth,” she said in a statement when she was promoted. “I am beyond honored, and excited, to be in a position of leadership, where I now get the opportunity to support and nurture the next generation of rising stars at GV.”