piddonkadonk
jake. the person, not the resume.
Creative strategist and partnerships operator. 25 years across music, large-scale live events, creator partnerships, AI, and Web3. Has operated as a music agent, artist manager and event promoter. St. Paul, Minnesota, after twenty years in Denver and Boulder.
The short version.
I spend my days figuring out how a thing gets built and who needs to be in the room for it to work. That has meant booking talent, designing spaces people walk through, running an agency, shipping software, and lately teaching machines to behave.
The through line is not an industry. It is the same job wearing different hats: find the people doing something good, get them the room and the budget and the cover they need, then step back and let it be theirs.
I am nerdy about systems and sentimental about people. I read a lot of fantasy. I think the fun part of any project is the week before anyone believes it will work.
“His desire for efficiency extends beyond his office walls and into festival crowds, tour buses, and even his own home.”
YAHTZEE!
“If an earthquake develops near Colorado, pin it on the eruptive activities of Jake Schneider.”
The longer version.
In order, with the parts that usually get left out. The dated, sourced version is in The Record.
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Iowa City, 2000
Talent buyer at nineteen
Nobody hands a teenager a booking budget. I learned it by being the person who had to make the math work on Monday, booking thirty to fifty shows a year for the University of Iowa and DJing four nights a week around it.
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Boulder, 2005
The interview I paid for
I put on a show that was phenomenal and did not sell. The normal move is to ask the agency for a reduction. Instead I called Madison House and said I would eat the loss if they gave me an interview. They did. I stayed more than a decade.
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Boulder, 2005 to 2017
The agency
Agent, then partner and Director of Agency Development at Madison House. I led agency growth and operations, with 100+ artists across the rosters I built and ran. Most of the work was routing, advancing, budgets, and the hard conversation at the right time. Some of it was a sold-out arena. Both happen in the same year.
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Rothbury, Michigan, 2011
Building a place out of a field
I was part of the founding team that built and launched the culturally iconic Electric Forest music festival. I booked the early years and helped design and curate the stages and themed areas. The lesson that stuck: people take care of a place if you give them a reason to love it.
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Software
Madmin, before the cloud was cool
I helped build and license Madmin, an early cloud booking CRM for the music industry, with three partners. I was the one in the seat entering tours that would not enter. Operators make good product people: if you have felt the pain at 1am on a Tuesday, you know which button needs to exist.
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St. Paul, now
Pointed at AI
AI solutions consulting and quality control work: rubric architecture, golden answers, model failure design, agent trajectory review. And Coursera courses on deal-making, because twenty-five years of negotiating should be something a stranger can practice against.
What I am doing now.
AI solutions consulting
Helping teams pick the right model, wire the right tools, and stop paying for workflows that a small script would handle better.
AI quality control
Rubrics, golden answers, agent trajectory review. The unglamorous discipline that decides whether an AI system is trustworthy or just confident.
Coursera courses
Writing courses on deal-making, business, and marketing. Twenty-five years of negotiations turned into something a person can practice.
Consulting and studio work runs through B1NARY H0RDE. This site is the personal side: notes, reviews, trips, and the occasional call to arms. The full career, dated and sourced, is in The Record.
On the record in
Forbes · Rolling Stone · Pollstar · Los Angeles Times · LA Weekly · CelebrityAccess · Magnetic Magazine · Hypebot · Rooster Magazine · EDM World Magazine
Spoken at
Pollstar Live · SXSW · EDMbiz · Canadian Music Week · SF MusicTech Summit · IMFCON · Cutting Edge Music Business Conference (2016 keynote)
“HUSTLE in a non-abrasive way. Learn from people. LISTEN. READ READ READ.”
POW!
Want to talk about something?
Ideas, collaborations, a tool I should test, a record I should hear. The inbox is open.
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