The New Bosses 2024: Yasi Agahnia, CAA

The 17th edition of IQ Magazine’s New Bosses, in association with Futures Forum, was revealed in IQ 129, recognising 20 of the most promising 30-and-unders in the international live music business.

To get to know this year’s class a little better, IQ conducted interviews with each one of 2024’s New Bosses, discovering their greatest inspirations and pinpointing the reasons for their success.

Based in Los Angeles, Yasi Agahnia specialises in booking shows for high-profile artists within the corporate and private events space. She began her career as one of the youngest editorial interns for Larry King in 2013, before interning in Paradigm’s music department. She joined CAA in 2018 as a mailroom clerk, and then worked for Robert Norman and Dave Aussenberg, helping to book shows during the pandemic.

The private events business flourished during the pandemic. Can you tell us a bit about that, and how it worked when the rest of the world was effectively shut down?  
During Covid, we were booking a lot of virtual events for companies or birthday parties even where the artist would pre-record or live perform a virtual set. And when we had periods in which covid laws would come down a little, and when people were doing private events at their houses or events we would have everyone be tested a few days out, and day of shows and show proof of vaccinations to minimise any risks.

You are passionate about the talent that is emerging from the Middle East. Are there any acts that you would recommend that colleagues around the world should be looking at in the year ahead? 
I would recommend listening to Bayou and Zeina. I feel that there is a new wave of music coming out and what I love about them is that any ethnicity can relate to and understand their music because they sing in English, French and Arabic, and have such an amazing beat and energy that we haven’t really heard on the radio before. It’s kind of similar to what we’re seeing with Latin music and reggaeton and what a huge music wave that genre has created over the years.

How does your role differ from that of a traditional booking agent? 
I get to work with our whole roster and I’m not routing tours or doing public ticket sales. Most shows I work on are completely private and high profile. Sometimes, there are gray areas like a public fundraiser or sporting and fashion events but mainly no one outside of the event knows and a lot of the time the artist is a surprise.

Where are the biggest areas of growth when it comes to the corporate and private events sector?
During Covid, while working for my colleague Robert Norman, I also worked for Dave Aussenberg who handles country and comedy private bookings. The rise we saw in country music and even comedy bookings went up exponentially! In fact, I believe during these a vast majority of our private bookings came from our country artists and we still are seeing so many bookings for them especially with artists like Jelly Roll, Shaboozey, and Zac Brown Band, to name a few.

What has been the highlight of your career, so far? 
I would say booking  about $20 million dollars gross in shows and being the only woman my age speaking at IEBA’s “What’s Next in Special Events” panel.

What advice would you give to anyone who is trying to find a job in live entertainment?  
I would say experience is everything. I was born and raised in San Diego and went to the University of San Diego as well, so there weren’t many opportunities for me to boost my resume early on. So every summer since I was 17, I would move to LA for the summer and intern to get experience. If that’s not possible for someone, I would say to try to create a club at your university – I was a part of the USDtv Arts and Culture show, where I mainly made it into a music show and was going to music venues and festivals in San Diego, interviewing artists and receiving press passes to film their sets and put them on YouTube. These videos would get 5,000-40,000 views per video, depending on the act and I was doing this with no experience – just cold emailing managers. When I interned at a talent agency, they told me they were more impressed with my music college show then my two internships with Larry King!

“I would love to see the industry work with more transparency across the board, as well as teamwork”

I presume your work involves a lot of non-traditional venues. Is there anywhere particularly unusual that springs to mind? 
We book a wide array of shows, spanning from someone’s backyard or a hotel, to a mega yacht, a stadium, or a palace in Morocco. The possibilities really are endless as long as you can fit a stage.

Your work, I’m guessing, involves a lot of NDAs. But are there any recent events or performances that you can tell us about? 
I can’t go into too many specifics, but we have booked events for brands like Dior, Alice + Olivia, Amazon Prime Video, high-profile weddings, NFT and crypto events, F1,  half time games and national anthems, Super Bowl after-parties, as well as events for big accounting firms.

Do you have a mentor, or anyone you rely on to bounce ideas off? 
Yes, Robert Norman, who is the head of our division. I’ve worked with him for years and he is one of the greatest, most put-together agents I’ve ever seen. He never yells, he’s always calm and he books our most sought-after acts, and is one of the most respected agents at our company. He is the reason I’m here today and I always come to him with any situation – big or small – and he always guides me and has my back no matter what. His patience and kindness is unmatched.

And what about meeting new contacts in the business – are there any conferences, festivals or other events that you have attended that been useful for networking?  
International Entertainment Buyers Association (IEBA) is extremely helpful – both in the private events world and for public shows. I actually spoke on their “What’s Next in Special Events” panel last year.

As a new boss, what one thing would you change to make the live entertainment industry a better place?
I would love to see the industry work with more transparency across the board, as well as teamwork. CAA’s motto is, “When we take care of each other, good things happen.” Here, clients are surrounded by a team of agents from every department and usually multiple agents in each department as well, therefore getting different views, feedback and connections from as many people as possible.

What would you like to see yourself doing in five years’ time? 
I would love to continue working in this part of the industry and working with even more established artists and expanding this department. I also hope to help some of our emerging acts get more corporate events as well and help showcase their talents to people that possibly haven’t discovered them yet. My goal is to start signing some acts for public touring as well, ideally in the Middle Eastern and SoundCloud rapper genres.

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