Production Live! Panel Preview: I Need To Call The Home Office – Decision Making, Accountability and the Need-To-Know Basis

Pollstar Live!, the world’s largest gathering of live entertainment professionals, returns to Los Angeles April 14-16 and will be held at Loews Hollywood Hotel. The three-day conference is a flagship event for Pollstar magazine with compelling keynotes, panels, roundtables and the Pollstar Awards, celebrating the best in the business, along with plenty of opportunities to network and engage in insightful discussions.

Pollstar Live! kicks off with Production Live!, the one-day companion conference that features panels on all topics related to staging live events, including lighting, video, stage management, sound technique, concert production, regulations, security and more.

Click these links for the Production Live! and the Pollstar Live! schedules. Register for Pollstar Live! here.

Moderator
Daniel Wright, Production Manager, Old Dominion

Speakers
Tina Farris, CEO & Owner of Tina Farris Tours, Goodtime Girl Media
Sahir Hanif, CEO & Tour Director, Ghost Tech
Bryan Hartley, Production Manager, Trans-Siberian Orchestra
Cort Lawrence, Founder, Raw Cereal
Kyle Martin, Client Advocate, Lockton

Since debuting in 2015 as part of Pollstar Live!, the one-day Production Live! Conference component has given a platform for and acknowledged the importance of those not only behind the curtain but actually getting the whole population of Emerald City across the Yellow Brick Road and on stage – on time, too, at least hopefully. 

From production manager “Zito” of Zito Production Services telling a story of helping save a fan’s life who had gone into cardiac arrest, to asking some of the big, unanswerable questions life has to offer, such as, “How much money do you want to spend on your show?” as asked by Raphiki Rhodes, a production manager at HansTolo Enterprises on a previous Production Live! panel.

This year, there may be some additional tough questions in store for the Production Live! panelists and attendees, as “I Need To Call The Home Office” can either get to the bottom of things or open up Pandora’s box down the rabbit hole of no return. An orthodox business sometimes leads to unorthodox problems and personalities, which relies on smart people, quick decisions and the ability to react and adapt on the fly, while on the road and with dozens of people and millions of dollars worth of crew at stake.

A live show consists of a series of decisions, some made well in advance and some necessarily made at the last minute. This panel examines chain-of-command, CYA, the bad news/good news equation, who decides what when, and when decisions can be made on the spot versus when it’s time to pass the buck to the “home office.”

The discussion will be led by Daniel Wright, a 20-year veteran of the live production touring industry who is most well known as a rigger and automation programmer for Kenny Chesney. He currently serves as the Production Manager for the band Old Dominion.

Panelists include production and tour managing pros like Tina Farris of Goodtime Girl Media and Ghost Tech CEO and founder Sahir Hanif, with additional input from the creative side from the likes of Cort Lawrence, founder of Raw Cereal, which, among other projects, is the creative production behind Cardi B’s blockbuster “Little Miss Drama Tour.” The panel also features Bryan Hartley, production designer for the Trans-Siberian Orchestra and Kyle Martin, client advocate for Lockton.