DC promoter Jack Boyle passes aged 83
Washington, DC-based concert promoter Jack Boyle, who co-founded Cellar Door Productions and went on to become head of music for the first iteration of SFX Entertainment, has died aged 83.
Cellar Door Productions, which spun out of famed DC nightclub the Cellar Door, was at its peak in the ’90s one of the most important regional promoters in the US, with an annual turnover of $75 million. Boyle also owned several major venues, including the Nissan Pavilion (now the 25,262-cap. Jiffy Lube Live) in Bristow, Virginia, and the Sunrise Musical Theatre (3,732) in Miami, Florida.
In 1998, Boyle sold the Cellar Door companies to Robert Sillerman’s SFX for a reported US$105m, joining SFX as head of its music division.
SFX – not to be confused with Sillerman’s second, EDM-focused company of the same name, now known as LiveStyle – was later sold to Clear Channel and in 2005 spun off to form Live Nation.
“To say that Jack was one of the most important people in the music business would be an understatement”
Boyle later went on to a major role with Live Nation, reports THR, before retiring in 2006.
“I worked as Jack‘s assistant when he first began doing concerts,” recalls photographer Michael Oberman, who broke the news that Boyle had passed after a period of illness via his Facebook page. “Realising that the Cellar Door nightclub could sell out six straight nights of Gordon Lightfoot, [he thought], ‘Why not do one night of Gordon Lightfoot at Constitution Hall. Then the Kennedy Center, then the Capital Center and RFK Stadium…
“To say that Jack was one of the most important people in the music business would be an understatement. My condolences to his son, John, and Jack‘s many friends.”
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Indebted iHeartMedia ‘may not last 12 months’
iHeartMedia Inc., the troubled US radio giant which gave birth to Live Nation, has told investors it may not make it through another year.
In its most recent current report filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (h/t MBW), iHeartMedia vice-president Lauren Dean wrote that the company’s Q1 2017 financial results are likely to include a note casting “substantial doubt as to our ability to continue as a going concern for a period of 12 months”.
Despite preliminary results indicating an operating income of US$114.06 million in the first quarter (revenue was $1.33 billion), iHeartMedia’s debt load continues to grow, fast approaching the $20bn mark. Compounding matters, Reuters reports a group of the company’s lenders have signed a cooperation agreement opposing any attempt at debt restructuring.
The company’s Q1 2017 financial results will include a note casting “substantial doubt as to our ability to continue as a going concern”
iHeartMedia is the US’s largest radio broadcaster, with more than 250m monthly listeners, and, through its Clear Channel Outdoor subsidiary, one of the world’s largest billboard advertising companies. In a previous life, as Clear Channel Communications, it was also once the parent company of the Robert Sillerman’s original SFX Entertainment (not to confused with the ill-fated EDM-focused SFX 2.0), which it spun off in 2005 to form Live Nation.
It still promotes several music festivals, including iHeartRadio Music Festival and iHeartCountry Festival.
Much of the San Antonio, Texas-based company’s current financial difficulties stem from 2008, when private-equity firms Bain Capital and Thomas H. Lee Partners took Clear Channel private in $24bn leveraged buy-out.
It lost its senior VP of music, Darren Pfeffer, to Madison Square Garden Company earlier this month.
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