Pollstar Live! 2026: Power Players – When Flat Is Down, Up Is Awesome

Moderator: Dina LaPolt

Panelists: Colin Lewis, Live Nation; Rick Roskin, CAA; Rich Schaefer, AEG Presents; Kirk Sommer, WME

The whole premise of Thursday’s Power Panel is that the live market has gone flat after the post-pandemic supernova, a premise largely supported by Pollstar Boxoffice data. And there’s certainly one explanation for that.

“That’s because AEG doesn’t report their numbers,” Rich Schaefer, always good for a zinger, quipped.

Jokes — even well-crafted and pointed ones — notwithstanding, Schaefer and his fellow panelists — leaders among agents and promoters — agreed that perhaps the market isn’t actually flat at all.

“The business is bigger than ever, the opportunities have never been better. It’s kind of finally washed out (post-pandemic) but we’re continuing to grow,” Kirk Sommer said.

CAA’s Rick Roskin agreed that it’s more perception than reality. The post-COVID comeback never fell off a cliff as some had predicted it would and what may look like a plateau is really just an incline that’s slightly less steep.

It’s also that much of the growth is now spread over a far larger area. Live Nation’s Colin Lewis noted that the international market has become so widespread “there are availability problems in Singapore,” a market that wasn’t on many Western radars as recently as three or four years ago.

“There’e been an explosion of places for artists to play at all levels and that just feeds the growth,” Roskin said.

It wouldn’t be a Power Players panel without arch observations from Schaefer, whose Pollstar Live! appearances have a reputation for their forthrightness. In a discussion about holds — an arcane and “draconian” process that is wrapped in mystery and intrigue — Schafer bemoaned that promoters and agents are too often holding dates they never intend to use.

“We shouldn’t be lying,” he said, “and blocking dates but it happens more and more.”

None of his fellow panelists exactly denied the practice of over-holding — Live Nation’s Lewis said ultimately the venues themselves are “the referees” while Roskin said if he has an act with a held date that can’t be used, he stalks the halls of his office looking for a colleague who can take it before he “gives it up to the other guy.”

As for maintaining the growth that’s driven the tough competition for dates, the agents on the panel emphasized the need to build an artist’s career correctly. The old saw is, of course, “not skipping steps,” but with the ability to reach huge audiences much quicker than ever before due to the proliferation of streaming and social media, the ascent up those steps is faster and faster.

“The rate some of these artists are breaking at scale is so rapid,” Sommer said.

Roskin cited two examples of young artists who went from tiny clubs to major arenas in an almost unheard of pace.

“With a Gracie (Abrams) or Benson (Boone), we have to be smart and we have to hold something back so there’s growth and a career for someone blowing out arenas on their first tour,” he said.

The conventional wisdom might be to thrust an act who is selling out multiples at an arena right into stadiums and while the sheer ticket numbers may make such a move seem to make sense “there’s a big difference in entertaining 14,000 people and entertaining 65,000.”

“Saying ‘no’ sometimes is the most important thing you can do,” LaPolt said.