Understanding the Business of Live Music and Touring
Moderator: Samer Jaradat
Speakers: Eric Bellamy, Adnan Joubran, and Jimi Elgohary
The live music industry operates through different mechanisms depending on the market and scale. This session will explore the structure of the ticketing and festival booking industry, highlighting the key differences between the MENA region and Europe. Participants will learn how to navigate the business side of live music, including securing bookings, working with promoters and booking agents, and understanding ticketing platforms and revenue streams. The session will provide practical strategies for building a sustainable live career and positioning yourself effectively in diverse markets.
Speaker Bios
Jimi Elgohary
With over 18 years of versatile experience encompassing event management, operations, and production, he has carved a niche expertise in the realm of entertainment production & management, cultural programming, and show management/direction across Egypt and the wider region. With a music career that spanned for over 15 years as one of the pioneers of Arab indie music in Egypt, Jimi's journey into the captivating world of Live Events & Culture & Entertainment Management began in 2005, and he has been passionately shaping experiences ever since.
Eric Bellamy
Eric Bellamy has been active in hip-hop in the Lyon region since the late 1980s. It was a period of effervescence, when hip-hop was not just about dollars, but first and foremost about expression through music, graffiti and dance. At first, he was known primarily by his alias ‘le sourcier’, under which he worked as a beatmaker with the rap group IPM. In 1997, he set up La Lyonnaise des Flows, the first rap label in Lyon. He soon branched out and began organising concerts.
Giving more and more space to the development of concert production, Eric Bellamy then embarked on the business of tour manager and developed a large number of artists from the French urban scene: Mafia K1fry, Rohff, Sefyu, Keny Arkana, Youssoupha, Casey, Sexion D'Assaut, Kery James, Disiz, Black M, Maître Gims... In 2009, he created Yuma Productions, the only concert production company specialising in urban music.
With diversification always in his sights, he has also produced comedy shows such as Le Woop (original troupe of Mister V & Hakim Jemili), Kevin Razy), urban dance (RAF Crew, Cie Paradox Sal, Turn Off The Light, Swaggers) and African music (Toofan, Viviane Chidid, Wally Seck,...).
Eric Bellamy has become a reference tour operator for rap in France.
In 2019, just as Yuma Productions was celebrating its 10th anniversary, it joined forces with Olympia Production/Vivendi Village, which acquired a majority stake in Yuma Productions.
Tayc, SCH, Damso, Dinos, Fally Ipupa, Aya Nakamura, Nej' and Souffrance are among the artists on the Yuma Productions roster.
In 2022, following the release of Covid, Olympia Productions/Vivendi Village decided to put an end to the activities of live touring artists, leading to the resignation of Eric Bellamy, even though Yuma won the Victoire De La Musique award for Best Concert Of The Year with Damso in 2023.
Regularly cited as one of the most influential figures in Hip Hop by the media outlet Booska-P, Eric set about creating a new company, Nouëva Productions, with new partners, and joined forces with the Live Nation France group, where he developed tours for Dinos, Aya Nakamura, Guy2Bezbar, RSKO and other artists from the Afro scene, including Burna Boy, Didi B, Arya Starr, Asake, Davido, Ckay and Oxlade.
2025 was a year of repositioning, as Eric parted company with his partners at Nouëva Productions and launched Noelya Records, an Afro music label, and Sold Out Services, a new show production company serving artists and projects with an international focus, particularly in Africa.
Adnan Joubran
ADNAN JOUBRAN - A world-music to a modern innovative Neo-Classical Oud player and composer, inspired by his native and traditional Palestinian roots and influenced by Flamenco, and Modern NeoClassical music. Born in Nazareth 1985 in a musical family, with a luthiers background of three generations and surrounded with siblings of music and Oud Players. Along with his brothers Samir Joubran & Wissam Joubran he has created the first TRIO of Oud in 2004, LE TRIO JOUBRAN a project that had many international winning awards, and grammy award nominations. With this trio Adnan had collaborated with top world musicians such as Coldplay, Roger Waters, Brian Eno, A. R. Rahman and many others. And composed a lot of music for films as well as touring and performing in the most prestigious concert halls in the world, such as the Carnegie Hall, Radio City Hall, Olympia, Salle Pleyel, Opera Dubai and more. In parallel to Le TRIO JOUBRAN’s Project, Adnan Has release a Solo Album Borders Behind with which he has ranked on top of all the world-music charts in Europe, and released several Singles trying to touch numerous genres of music as an added challenge to his career.
