CALL MY AGENT

(The accompanying illustration was created with the assistance of AI, imagining a fictional music talent agency inspired by—but entirely distinct from—the world portrayed in the Netflix series Call My Agent!)

The title deliberately evokes the witty and captivating French Netflix series that offers a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the glamorous—yet often chaotic—world of talent management. This article draws on that premise to explore the less visible machinery of the classical music profession: the organizations, foundations, artist managers, and institutions that shape careers on both sides of the Atlantic, with particular consideration of its centers in New York and Berlin.  

A prior version of this article, by Ilona Oltuski, was previously published on August 14th on Classical Post.

Few professions rely so heavily on representation as classical musicians do, yet so little is understood about how representation is won. Drawing on conversations with artist managers, public relations professionals, presenters, and performers, this article aims to reveal why agencies have become increasingly selective, what qualities they now seek beyond artistic excellence, and some of the different models of career development beginning to emerge in response to a changing career landscape. Along the way, the article introduces the Althafen Foundation in Berlin and its approach to helping musicians navigate different stages of their careers, offering a behind-the-scenes glimpse into today’s classical music profession.

A Japanese pianist living in Berlin recently asked me a deceptively simple question: How does one persuade the managers one most admires to attend a concert?

He had already established a successful career in Japan and was performing regularly throughout Europe. Yet his invitations to managers to attend his local recitals, in the hope of securing even an introductory meeting afterward, had produced little more than unanswered emails and polite silence.

The obstacle was not musicianship.

It was access.

His predicament, shared by many, points to a larger question that shadows the profession itself: How are careers in classical music actually made?

The Representation Paradox

Across the classical music profession, accomplished performers frequently discover that excellence alone does not guarantee opportunity. The long-held belief that talent, discipline, and perseverance naturally lead to a sustainable international career only rarely corresponds to reality. Representation remains one of the profession’s defining thresholds, yet the path toward it is rarely transparent.

Recording companies, conservatories, competitions, festivals, orchestras, conductors, mentors, and increasingly social media all influence who comes to the attention of those capable of shaping careers. Together they reveal the many ways talent is recognized, developed, and, occasionally, discovered at precisely the right moment.

The relatively small number of musicians who secure long-term relationships with managers, publicists, and booking agencies remains the exception rather than the rule. In the best-case scenario, these organizations do far more than arrange engagements: they become trusted intermediaries between artists and presenters, developing careers that may unfold over decades.

Yet the landscape presents a striking paradox.

At precisely the moment when the system produces more technically accomplished young musicians than at any point in its history, securing the representation needed to transform promise into a durable international career has become increasingly difficult. For many graduates of elite conservatories and winners of prestigious competitions, finding an agent has become an uphill struggle rather than the natural next step.

Their stories are remarkably consistent. A Dutch violinist, fresh from a major competition victory and glowing reviews, spends months sending carefully considered emails to agencies without receiving a single reply. A New York conductor, already appearing with respected orchestras, struggles to secure even one meeting with an artist manager. Such stories circulate quietly throughout the profession, reminders that achievement and opportunity do not always advance together.

How did representation become such a narrow gateway? Has it always functioned this way, or has the profession itself fundamentally changed?

From Impresario To Modern Management

Once the domain of the great impresario, as James Inverne observes in The Impresarios,

“The nineteenth century—and well into the twentieth—produced remarkable figures who combined the roles of entrepreneur, promoter, patron, financier, negotiator, artistic adviser, and confidant. Men such as Sol Hurok, Harold Holt, and Judson O’Neill did not merely book concerts. They built careers, took chances on unknown artists, and in doing so helped shape musical life itself.”

Today’s profession is considerably more fragmented. International touring has become more expensive, more institutions fight for fewer available subsidies, presenters are increasingly risk-averse, and artist management has become more specialized, strategic, and data-driven. Artists themselves are expected to assume a far more active role in shaping their own careers.

Yet there are still individuals whose influence extends far beyond booking engagements. The late Charles Hamlen, who co-founded IMG Artists with Edna Landau in 1979, belonged to a generation of managers whose artistic convictions matched their entrepreneurial instincts. In Germany, Sonia Simmenauer built one of Europe’s most admired agencies through long-term relationships founded on artistic judgment and trust rather than short-term transactions. Under the leadership of Arnold Simmenauer, that philosophy continues today at Berlin’s Impresariat Simmenauer, while Sonia went on to serve as president of the BDKV, Germany’s Federal Association of the Concert and Event Industry.

Organizations such as Young Concert Artists suggest yet another evolution. Founded by Susan Wadsworth in 1967 and now led by composer Daniel Kellogg, YCA combines artist management with long-term professional development through an integrated competition, bridging exceptional young musicians and the increasingly complex profession they hope to enter.

Most competitions incentivize medalists with short-term management, following their win. Recently, the renowned Van Cliburn Competition has integrated its own management services, devoted to its victorious candidates, instead of leaving development and management to others.  

But if the great impresarios once embodied many of these functions in a single person through influence and instinct, today’s system usually distributes them across a much broader network. Management, public relations, career development, institutional support, and artistic mentorship increasingly overlap. To understand what representation looks like now, it helps to step inside the profession itself.

Inside The Profession

Today’s artist managers operate in an environment that has become considerably more complex. Touring, public relations, digital communication, branding, fundraising, and artistic planning increasingly overlap, requiring agencies to think well beyond the traditional task of booking concerts.

Yet despite these changes, one question remains remarkably constant: what persuades a manager to devote years of time, reputation, and strategic thought to a single artist?

One person who has watched the profession's transformation from close quarters is Katy Salomon (Photo), Vice President of Public Relations at PRIMO ARTISTS in New York. Salomon joined the agency in 2022, bringing her extensive PR experience along. Under founder Charlotte Lee’s leadership, PRIMO itself has become an example of how artist management has evolved. Originally established in 2008 as a boutique management agency after Lee’s departure from IMG Artists, the company gradually expanded beyond traditional representation to include public relations, digital strategy, social media, website design, and recording campaigns, offering artists a more integrated approach to career development.

“This makes a direct and smooth interaction between the management and PR services possible,” Salomon explains. “It is holistic. With our concerted management and PR efforts, we can offer the client anything they might need, from booking and management to communication and visuals. We do a great deal of recording PR and Grammy campaigning for our clients, and we also work closely with presenters in Europe through our London office. Our teams are simultaneously coordinating touring while also providing artists and institutions with robust public relations support.”

Listening to Salomon, it quickly becomes apparent that agencies see themselves as far more than intermediaries between artists and presenters. They increasingly function as long-term strategic partners, helping musicians form every aspect of their professional identity.

“PRIMO is particularly great at looking at the macro lens of an artist’s career with a laser focus on their individual goals. What are their unique strengths and passions? Do they want to tour internationally? Or would they rather build a career closer to home? Every artist is unique. Every artist has different connections. Our job is to understand those ambitions first.”

Seeing The Bigger Picture

Salomon repeatedly returns to artistic direction and identifying individual focus, not necessarily intrinsic to their craft.

“In the PR division, the qualities we are looking for are artists who are doing things that feel relevant to our time. We look for people who are forward-thinking in the way they build programs.”

She points to organizations such as the AMERICAN COMPOSERS’ ORCHESTRA (ACO), whose commitment to new commissions has broadened audiences through adventurous programming, and the SPHINX ORGANISATION, whose work demonstrates how artistic excellence and social impact can reinforce one another. Both, she suggests, illustrate that today’s audiences respond not only to exceptional performances but to artists and institutions with a clearly articulated purpose.

Perhaps the most revealing observation comes almost in passing. Asked how new artists find their way onto PRIMO’s roster, Salomon smiles.

“Almost all of them come through referrals.”

It is a deceptively simple remark. In an era dominated by websites, streaming platforms, and social media, careers still depend heavily on personal recommendation and professional trust. Relationships remain the profession’s most valuable currency.

When Does Management Begin?

If artist management has become increasingly selective, another question naturally follows. At what point does a musician actually need management? For many young artists, securing an agent is regarded as the next logical milestone, opening doors to engagements after conservatory or a major competition. Managers often see the trajectory rather differently.

Typically, management enters not at the beginning of a career, but when an already developing career requires a broader strategic framework.

“Charlotte remarked on something vital during the pandemic,” Salomon recalls. “You don’t need a manager until you are at the point where you simply cannot manage the quantity of engagements, and you don't need a publicist until the publicity surrounding your performances is at a mass you are unable to manage on your own.”

Until that point, she believes careers are built differently.

“It is about making connections with conductors if you are a soloist, through mentors, or through competitions. It is really about having the right people lift you up. But the quality must already have reached that threshold before a manager will consider taking you on as a client.”

This observation quietly overturns one of the profession’s most persistent assumptions. Rather than creating careers, management often enters only after the artist has already begun developing artistic momentum. Representation, in this view, does not replace years of patient artistic growth; it amplifies it.

PRIMO’s own philosophy reflects this approach. Unlike many larger international agencies with extensive artist rosters, the company deliberately remains comparatively small, favoring long-term relationships over rapid expansion.

Listening to Salomon, one begins to understand that today’s managers are not searching for artists who simply play exceptionally well.

They are looking for musicians whose careers have already begun to acquire direction, purpose, and momentum.

Once artistic excellence is taken for granted, what distinguishes one remarkable musician from another? And if managers and presenters are looking for artists whose careers have already begun to gather momentum, what exactly convinces them that a musician is ready?

Few people have spent more time reflecting on that question than Monica Felkel.

The Heart Of Artist Management

During more than two decades as Director of Artist Management at Young Concert Artists, four consecutive terms on the Board of Directors of the International Artist Managers’ Association, and now through her consultancy firm Monica Felkel Creative Partners, Felkel has helped shape the careers of several generations of musicians. Among them – not even counting her early years at YCA – are artists as diverse as Jeremy Denk, Julia Bullock, Fazil Say, Ray Chen, and Kevin Puts. Few people have observed the profession from so many different perspectives.

Ask Felkel (Photo Credit: Matt Dine) what artist management involves, and she describes a profession that encompasses artistic direction and programming, administration, fundraising, finance, publicity, marketing, board relations, human resources, and, above all, an intimate understanding of the landscape in which artists build their lives.

“COVID created a very realistic view of how the industry actually works,” she reflects. “The margins are very thin. No money changes hands until a project is completed, which can take years. Nobody does anything alone.”

That final observation returns repeatedly throughout our conversation. Management, she suggests, is not simply about finding concert opportunities. It is about enabling an entire ecosystem to function.

The Invisible Work

Much of that work remains invisible to audiences.

“Having a manager as a gatekeeper is still enormously valuable,” Felkel explains. “Imagine a pianist arriving to perform Rhapsody in Blue, only to discover that there is no grand piano waiting, but an electronic keyboard instead. Someone has to negotiate those situations. The artist should not be placed in the middle of them.”

The anecdote illustrates a broader point. Much of an artist manager’s work consists of protecting artists from the countless practical and interpersonal difficulties that arise before a performance ever reaches the stage.

“The basic job is still booking concerts,” Felkel says candidly. “If we are not doing that, nobody earns a living. If presenters don’t fill their halls, they cannot pay the same fees they once could.”

Yet booking itself is only the visible outcome of a much larger process. Managers constantly balance the expectations of presenters, audiences, orchestras, donors, and artists, while trying to create circumstances in which all parties can succeed.

“You have to understand the artist and read the room,” Felkel explains. “You can never place someone in a situation where they simply don’t fit.”

Programming therefore becomes far more than artistic taste.

“You have to understand the presenter, the audience, and what works where. Some orchestras find that films performed with orchestras attract their audiences more successfully than traditional programs. In that situation, presenting a purely classical soloist might simply be the wrong artistic decision.”

According to Felkel, management begins to resemble an act of continual interpretation. Every engagement requires understanding not only the artist, but the institution, the audience, the repertoire, and the cultural moment in which they meet.

Building A Career

If managers today rarely “discover” artists in the romantic sense associated with the great impresarios, they nevertheless remain deeply involved in shaping the long arc of a career.

More than twenty years ago, while still at Young Concert Artists, Felkel observed that it generally takes about three years for a career to become sustainable. Experience has not changed her mind.

Competitions may open doors. They rarely build careers by themselves.

“Some artists win competitions but never really tour,” she says. “That is perhaps the biggest learning curve. Touring itself demands an entirely different set of skills. Living out of suitcases. Working with constantly changing orchestras. Maintaining physical and mental resilience. Remaining artistically curious while rarely being at home.”

These are challenges that conservatories cannot fully prepare musicians for.

The Artist Beyond The Instrument

Both professionals return repeatedly to curiosity, character, and artistic identity as part of an artist’s individuality.

“For me, what really counts is that I enjoy the artist’s musicianship, but just as important is the person. I need to be able to have a conversation about something other than music.”

Musicians, she reminds me, spend much of their professional lives representing themselves away from the concert stage: at donor dinners, in airport lounges, with presenters, with orchestra administrators, and with the driver sent to collect them from the airport.

“Everyone you meet on this journey is important,” she says with a smile. “The person who collects you from the airport today may one day become the executive director of an orchestra.”

This advice is characteristically practical, yet it reaches beyond professional etiquette. Artists, Felkel suggests, must learn to connect authentically both on and off the stage. That applies as much to the relationships they form as to the programs they develop and genuinely believe in.

Reading about many of the great performers of the twentieth century, one is repeatedly reminded of how much of their artistic development took place away from the instrument—in books, museums, nature, and encounters with the wider world. Such experiences nourished the cultural imagination through which they understood and communicated their art. They remained curious.

Perhaps that, more than any carefully constructed career strategy, is what audiences ultimately recognize.

The Artist And The Instrument

With festivals, competitions, and academia providing major markets for instrument makers, branding, through the ambassadorship of famed or interesting new musicians, plays an important role in selling the unique merits of their instruments.

“Our artists are a constant source of feedback and information that we share with our production sites in Japan, if it’s for Yamaha, or Vienna, if it's for Bösendorfer,” says Bonnie Barret, Director of Yamaha Artist Services in New York City(Photo). “I am not an agent at all. I sell our products, working with artists who put remarkable music out into the world.”

She, of course, knows the inner workings of the profession from all its angles, having worked in Artist Management at CAMI, as well as in marketing, media relations, and A&R, in the recording industry for Sony, EMI, and MBG. Since 2010 at Yamaha in NYC, she says she carefully picks her opportunities to sign an artist to the name.

“They have to be professional musicians who are actively performing and/or are fully affiliated with academia; it's not going to be the local piano teacher, and we don’t sign someone to the brand – as our competition does at times - just because he owns a Steinway,” she laughs, ” I am just going to say it like this.”

Often, these artists show great entrepreneurship as stewards of festivals, competitions, and concert series, but also by branching out into innovative and interdisciplinary genres.  

However, because of limited resources, including inventory and funding, Barrett chooses her branding opportunities carefully.

“We work with a handful of festivals, like Bravo! Vail, and the wonderful Anne McDermott, who is just leaving the festival,” she mentions. High-visibility recordings and media events like this create the prominence we seek, but we constantly reevaluate to make sure we focus correctly. Our brand was the first to fully embrace technological innovation, and we see this reflected in the many artists who bring diverse styles and impulses to their music. Artists are expanding their audiences and are breaking out of the traditional trajectory, and we are here to support that.”

New Career Pathways

Where do young artists acquire the broader understanding needed before management enters?

Conservatories are exceptionally well equipped to develop musicianship. Yet many of the questions that outline a professional life—How do I define my artistic identity? How do I build meaningful relationships within the profession? What kind of life do I actually want as an artist? —do not fit neatly within a traditional curriculum.

A growing number of foundations and artist-development initiatives are attempting to address that gap. Among them, the Althafen Foundation in Berlin has developed an unusually comprehensive pipeline of global support across different stages.

The Althafen Foundation

Established in 2021 by entrepreneur and real estate investor Vitali Kivman, the Althafen Foundation is a German nonprofit organization that offers curatorial and professional support to artists at various stages of their development. Its programs include the Althafen Graduate Fellowship, AH Talent Studio, AH Project Accelerator, AH Artist in Spotlight initiative, and AH Social Advocacy program.

The AH Talent Studio focuses on emerging classical musicians, while the AH Project Accelerator supports promising projects as they move from conception toward realization. The AH Artist in Spotlight provides promotional and curatorial support to artists at a more advanced stage in their careers. The programs can therefore serve artists independently at different points in their development, while also allowing an individual artist’s trajectory to extend across several stages. Together with the Graduate Fellowship and Social Advocacy program, they create a wider continuum of educational, artistic, and professional support.

More ambitiously, the foundation aims to give artists a broader and more differentiated view of the world they themselves help to envision.

“The big difference is that there is no competition, because there is no claim of ownership,” explains Artistic Director Mark Prikhodko, an accomplished cellist and cultural entrepreneur who joined the foundation in 2023. “Althafen does not manage any of the artists it supports.”

Under Prikhodko’s artistic direction (Photo Credit: Marcelo+Moraes), the foundation has increasingly adopted an international outlook, connecting artists with cultural institutions and experienced voices from different areas of the profession. Instead of requiring young musicians to pursue managers and advisers from a distance, the program brings those experts directly into the conversation, showing different points of view from within.

In May, the foundation launched the AH Expert Sessions of its Talent Studio, bringing a cohort of twenty-seven young artists into conversation with figures from across the profession, including pianist and composer Nicolas Namoradze, artist manager Sonia Simmenauer, mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, and violinist and educator Leonid Kerbel, alongside other leading artists and industry professionals. Taken together, the list reflects not only the caliber of the experts involved, but the unusually broad range of perspectives to which the young artists were given direct access.

The twenty-seven musicians were selected from 160 international applicants through a structured review by members of the foundation’s honorary and advisory boards. Prikhodko says participants responded especially strongly to the direct access the sessions provided, with several reporting that introductions made through the program had already opened professional doors. More broadly, the experts offered young artists an unusually candid view of the profession, drawing on practical realities and insights accumulated over years of experience in different countries and across different areas within the classical music world.

The sessions are not designed to offer a single formula for building a career. On the contrary, their range suggests that there may be no such formula. Instead, they draw on widely differing experiences to explore how individual strengths, interests, and circumstances might develop into a sustainable artistic life.

Rethinking Artistic Identity

Pianist, composer, and educator Nicolas Namoradze (Photo Credit: Nathan Elson) opened the first Expert Session with a conversation titled Rethinking Artistic Identity—Innovation, Curiosity, and the Mind. Drawing on his own unconventional path, he explored the intersection of artistry and cognitive science and argued that artistic identity is shaped by continued inquiry rather than fixed at the beginning of a career.

Namoradze’s own trajectory included deliberately stepping away from the limelight during his doctoral studies and pursuing neuropsychology during the pandemic. For young musicians accustomed to measuring progress through competitions, debuts, and increasingly visible achievements, his path offers a different model: one in which stepping sideways—or even temporarily stepping away—can become part of artistic development.

“I remember reading an article about Michael Phelps, the record-breaking Olympic swimmer. He spent as much, if not more, time on mental practice as on actual swimming. I remember thinking: this swimmer is devoting far more attention to the mental dimension of his training than I am to mine. It made me realize that, as musicians, we spend so much time refining technique while often overlooking the other half of the equation: hearing, understanding, and shaping the music in our minds.”

The point reaches beyond mental practice. It challenges what Namoradze describes as the “competition-winner mold”—the assumption that a successful young artist should follow a recognizable sequence of achievements. A more individual career may require a broader horizon and a more holistic artistic portfolio.

The Artist In The World

This insistence on looking beyond the boundary of the profession is echoed by Sonia Simmenauer, the pioneering artist manager and long-standing advocate for what she calls the “long-term artistic life.”

Her advice to the next generation is clear: protect artistic identity, accept the trial and error inherent in growth, and preserve the inner drive that made one an artist in the first place.

“The most important thing is that an artist does not see himself as an island, but as part of the world. The message you carry in your music should never be separated from the world you live in, and it begins with learning how to connect with people—the community you build over time. What matters is strengthening not only your artistry, but everything that surrounds it. Every piece you play has a story behind it: where it comes from, what it reflects, and how it came into being. To understand that requires digging, thinking, and questioning. In the end, it is not separate from the very act of life—it is life.”

For Simmenauer (Photo Credit: Classeek), artistic identity is not simply a matter of branding, nor is curiosity an ornamental quality. Both are vital ingredients of the artist’s individuality, the substance, how artists identify with their repertoire, form relationships, and locate themselves in the world around them.

Growth As Consequence Not Goal

Marc Scorca, President Emeritus of OPERA America and a prominent figure in North American opera, approaches the question from the perspective of cultural institutions.

Drawing on decades of experience at the center of the opera field, Scorca explores institutions' decision-making processes and the growing pressure to move beyond preserving tradition toward more actively considering the future. For artists, that requires more than ambition. It requires intellectual curiosity, strategic awareness, and an understanding of the people and organizations that make the profession function.

His advice, however, is strikingly resistant to the contemporary obsession with acceleration.

“I encourage artists to grow their careers as slowly as possible. Growth should be a consequence of good work. If the work is good enough, there will be growth. But growth as a goal, in my view, is an unworthy goal.”

A career may require strategy, visibility, and relationships. But when growth itself becomes the objective, the work that gave the career meaning in the first place can easily become secondary.

An Artist’s Perspective

What happens once representation is in place, and how does the relationship function from the artist’s perspective?

For pianist Drew Petersen (Photo Credit: Mario Acosta), management entered at precisely the kind of moment Katy Salomon had described earlier: when artistic momentum was already beginning to accelerate. In all fairness, he also grew up a prodigy.

“I was 23, just finishing my master’s degree and continuing studies at Juilliard for my Artist Diploma, when I won the American Pianists Awards in 2017. On the heels of winning the award, I was offered many concerts and was approached by Opus 3,” Petersen recalls.

His experience offers a practical view of what happens next. Because his manager, Jenny Vogel, Executive Vice President of Opus 3 Artists, is based on the West Coast, the two typically meet in person only once or twice a year, either around some of Petersen’s concerts or over lunch in Los Angeles or New York City. Their communication, however, is frequent, sometimes involving several emails a day and phone calls when something is more time-sensitive.

The day-to-day mechanics of his career are shared across the management team. Administrative assistant Sarah Larson handles itineraries, schedules, communication with presenters, and the countless practical questions that arise on tour.

“Would I be comfortable replacing a performer who fell ill, performing a concerto on three days’ notice? Where is a piano for Drew to practice on tour? She is the boots on the ground and checks in with me about how I am doing,” Petersen explains.

Vogel, meanwhile, negotiates contracts, plans the season, and cultivates relationships with presenters. Over time, Petersen says, they have developed a clear understanding of who becomes involved in what. Yet that division of labor does not mean the artist withdraws from the relationships on which a career depends.

“I am also building relationships on my part, and then we fit it together into the calendar,” he says. “It is certainly a business in the sense that we are reminding people of our existence. We—and our music—are products, and we need to be in front of an audience and develop new fans, which is a valued way of coming together.”

Petersen values what he describes as his manager’s “long-view perspective,” shaped by years of experience in the profession. But his own view of the artist’s responsibility begins with the purpose of the work itself.

Artistic Purpose

“What do we do as artists? We communicate and connect,” Petersen says.

For him, artistry lies not only in the intellectual understanding of music but in the individual interpretation and emotional communication that give it expressive meaning.

“I hope that there is always a role for artists in any medium to be among the trailblazers of this empathic connection. With my music, I would like to convey my interpretation and narrative, and find creative ways to highlight them. Obviously, there is so much that is intellectual, but the emotional part distinguishes each artist and the art form, and there is still so much uncharted territory ahead of us.”

Programming

That individual perspective also shapes Petersen’s approach to programming.

“When it comes to building a profile, programming is of course a vital part of what it’s all about,” he says. “I feel it is most important to be true to who you are. This is eventually what you will be sharing with the public, whether it’s a small room of people or a great concert hall.”

Rather than constructing a project around what he believes the market might want, Petersen prefers to lead audiences on his own journey.

“Some people want to curate a certain angle for a project. I am trusting what genuinely excites me to guide me in sharing my output. If I come out of the experience fulfilled, it usually is a good experience for the audience as well.”

The same selectivity applies to sharing his artistic process on social media.

“Lately, everyone is very interested in following the process, behind-the-scenes looks, and so on. I am actually not sure how much of the process the audience really wants to see—because if I shared every step involved in my practice videos, for example, I would probably lose much of the audience along the way,” he laughs.

Instead, Petersen focuses on short, specific glimpses into his work—perhaps a question of pedaling, tempi, or color—rather than sharing every aspect of what he practices for himself.

“What works best in my experience are these little clips of ninety to 120 seconds. The rest does not really resonate with most people. These are geared to invite them in.”

The Artist’s Role

For all the value Petersen places on management, he resists the idea that securing an agent relieves an artist of any shared responsibility in building a career.

“The biggest puzzle remains, of course, how to actually reach audiences and get presenters to invite you. We have been conditioned to think that getting an agent is somewhat like winning the lottery when you are left to your own devices, but clearly, the agent cannot do all of the connecting on their own. And it makes sense, because, after all, it is the artist people want to engage with; it’s a mistake to think that this is happening without you. And why would we not want to be the ones making the connection, speaking for ourselves?”

Social media, in his view, is part of that same ecosystem—not a substitute for artistic work, but no longer something artists can simply ignore.

“The opportunities come from everywhere,” Petersen says. “But for them to appear, we have to be attentive, network, create, and continue relationships, and that does not happen through the agent alone. Often, I make the initial contact with a presenter, and then we come together with management and discuss. It’s a little silly that it is all measured in numbers, and I don’t think we need millions, but you also cannot have zero followers. The game has changed and shifted to social media, and that’s why it is as important as your mailing list. That’s where you grow your fan base, and it is an important metric. Publicity lives where the audience lives, and today that’s on the iPhone. That’s where you find them.”

The manager, then, has not disappeared from the equation. But neither can the artist disappear behind the manager.

Access Revisited

After Wataru Hisasue (Photo Credit: Janine Guldener), the young Japanese pianist asking for advice on how to best contact management, was accepted as one of this year’s Althafen Foundation’s Talent Studio, he excitedly reported back:

“I was truly impressed by the wide range of professionals from all sectors of the field, and by the frankness with which they addressed us. With the amount of material introduced to us in such a short time, I felt a little overwhelmed at first. But the more I heard people talk about a day in their lives, and how they are adjusting to shifts within the industry, the more it opened my eyes to the changing conditions in which we operate,” he explains.

What emerged was not a formula for securing representation, but a broader understanding of the artist’s own role in shaping a career.

“I have understood that the artist relies much more on a process of curation that grows out of understanding one’s own path, abilities, and interests. We need to find new ways to connect to our art, to build bridges across fragmented audiences, and to retain cultural relevance for the field and for our art,” he says.

For Hisasue, that requires genuine curiosity, entrepreneurship, and a willingness to explore innovation and collaboration—qualities he also found integrated into the Talent Studio program.

His original question has not disappeared. Access still matters. So do managers, presenters, institutions, advocates, and the relationships built over time. But perhaps the larger question is how that access can become less accidental—how more comprehensive structures might allow artists to encounter professional knowledge, guidance, and meaningful relationships as part of their development, rather than leaving them to find their way into the system largely on their own.

The models explored here offer no single answer, nor should they. But they suggest that the distance between artistic training and professional life need not remain quite so difficult to bridge. Whether these new pathways can develop into more sustainable structures remains to be seen. At the very least, artists may become better equipped not only to understand the terrain, but to participate more fully in shaping what comes next.