Promoterobit: Frank Barsalona

Frank Barsalona, American gig promoter, has died.

Calling him a promoter rather underplays what he did - sure, he was the man who first brought The Beatles and The Stones to America, but really he did much to create the very idea of there being a "live circuit", helping establish a business which has proved to be more resilient than selling small plastic circles with music on them. As his New York Times obituary records:

Dave Marsh, the rock critic and biographer, called Mr. Barsalona a founding father of the rock business. “The most significant entrepreneur of ’60s rock was not a record company president like Atlantic’s Ahmet Ertegun or CBS’s Clive Davis, or even a sharp promoter like Bill Graham,” he once wrote. “That title belongs to a balding, rotund booking agent named Frank Barsalona.”

Frank Barsalona was 74; he died following complications related to Alzheimers.