Ep. 49: Ryan Soroka | Booking Agent (UTA)

Ryan Soroka is a well accomplished booking agent at UTA and dear friend of mine. He started his own booking agency (The Soroka Agency) at a very early age and grew it to be a huge success. From there he went on to work at UTA (United Talent Agency). His roster includes - flor, The Aces, slenderbodies, ONE OK ROCK, David Garibaldi, and many more. The common theme in his story has always been booking artists that he’s passionate about.

In this episode he tells his entire come up story and gives great advice to anyone looking to grow their professional career. Especially those chasing a path as a booking agent.

We also cover how to get the attention of a booking agent as an artist, how get better tours, and how to grow your own touring fanbase.

Stick around until the end to hear us get into some shenanigans and talk about his brand new podcast Reali-Tea which cuts to the core of the most important topics of reality television with his co-host and fiancée Tori Bachan.

Timestamps

2:00 Who you are and what you do?

2:30 The early days.

4:28 - Figuring out where he fits into the music industry (finding his lane as a booking agent)

6:39 - Working with his first signed artist

7:30 - Working for Bamboozle Music Festival

9:20 - When Ryan and I first met

11:11 - Starting the Soroka Agency with Brad Wiseman & Equal Vision Records in 2010

13:15 - Early “holy shit” moments // the difficulty of living in the moment

15:10 - The first moment of financial success

16:30 - Signing his first non-music artist (David Garibaldi)

17:40 - Hitting a critical point with The Soroka Agency

19:40 - The end of Soroka Agency and starting a new chapter

25:02 - Joining UTA

26:04 - Are there unexpected benefits to being with a larger company?

28:02 - Booking music he’s passionate about

28:48 - Ryan’s current roster

30:40 - What are the challenges of working in different genres of music?

34:00 - Advice to anyone in the music industry on how to properly network

37:04 - How to properly send an email

39:10 - Not forcing friendships or relationships in music

40:38 - How does an artist get a booking agent?

43:46 - How to grow your audience and touring fanbase

46:35 - Ryan & Tori’s new podcast - Reali-Tea

47:55 - Not taking life and work so seriously

51:15 - How COVID-19 is affecting live music and touring

54:00 - Where can people find you?

If you like this one, do us a huge favor and share it! I’m @andrew_ftw and he’s @ryansoroka