16
MARC GEIGER, 53
Partner/Head of Music, William Morris Endeavor
Last Year’s Rank: 13
Under Geiger’s watch, the 100 agents in WME’s music department booked some 35,000 dates in 2015, up from 33,000 in 2014. Among the agency’s top performers at the box office and festivals (where WME claimed more than half the major headliners in 2015) were The Weeknd, Drake, Florence & The Machine and Luke Bryan. Geiger says spurring growth in his department in 2015 involved “making sure every room in the house is optimized.” WME’s hip-hop division, for example, added Grammy winners Macklemore & Ryan Lewis and Run the Jewels. Other key signings included Maroon 5, Haim and Brett Eldredge.
Biggest Issue Facing the Touring Industry: “The issues related to the live business are dwarfed by those in the recording-streaming-collections business, [but] there’s a major ticketing issue — regarding pricing versus actual demand — that needs a lot of work.”
