Profile: Chris Zacher

By Dawne Belloise

Chris Zacher knew he was always headed toward music, even when his resumé insisted otherwise. Long before he became a nationally recognized promoter and industry fixer, he was a youth raised on punk rock ethics and Rainbow Gatherings, both of which had deep suspicions of systems that shut people out. His start-ups in the music industry benefitted both artists and venues, but first, he spent many years in university and a variety of other careers. He now calls Crested Butte home.

Chris hails from a wooded St. Louis suburb. “We lived close to the bluffs that overlooked the Mississippi River,” where, as a kid, he explored the many caves there. “We didn’t have cell phones or trackers, we had bikes and more freedom in those days,” he says and tells that they were pretty much on their own as, “Gen Xers, who evolved from living the way the Boomers lived to creating the internet and a different world.”

He attended a Catholic elementary school through fourth grade then switched to a public school that had programs for his type of dyslexia. Bored with high school but not music, Chris was into bands like the Pixies, Sex Pistols, Misfits and the Urge. “I was somebody who was an all-inclusive person, I didn’t care about skin color or sexual orientation. I lived in a Midwestern Rust Belt city with a lot of racism there. Punk was a culture and way of life that was all inclusive. They treat each other with kindness. It was a great community of people to grow up with, but I hung out with everyone. Punks and hippies get along really well because it’s the same thought process, sort of anarchists in a way, not in a violent kind of way but more of a ‘screw the establishment’ way.” Now that he’s older Chris laughs that he feels more like a hippie.

It was after high school graduation in 1992 when Chris began attending Rainbow Gatherings and admits that he had no clue how the world worked or how to make money. “And I don’t think I cared,” he laughs.

He enrolled in St. Louis Community College for an associate’s degree in Human Services, intending to be a social worker. Chris was hired at an adolescent rehab center for teen drug addicts 17 years and younger. “I was really close in age to the clients so there was a connection, but it was hard because you’re teaching them how to live a sober life and then releasing them back into the same environment.” Chris then enrolled at Southwest Missouri State University, continuing down the social work path and after a year, transferred back to St. Louis. Life then sped up quickly.

In his early 20s, Zacher was married, had adopted his wife Rebecca’s two-year-old daughter Sidney, owned a home, and was juggling night school with medical billing jobs. Over the next decade, he earned a dual degree in sociology and psychology with a minor in archaeology from Maryville University. “It took 10 years,” he says. “I was working and had a family.” By the time he finished, he was a single dad with shared custody and still trying to figure out what to do with his life and how to earn a decent living.  “I was tired of being poor,” Zacher says.

He began another master’s degree program at Fontbonne University and received his MBA in Finance and Accounting in 2004 and took a job at an international architecture and engineering firm, managing operations and project finances. He also met Megan at a company conference. Chris moved to Denver that spring to be with Megan and they married in 2005. Their son Zander was born in 2008.

Denver became the place where Chris finally fused his business experience with his love of music and its culture. He joined the board of City Park Jazz and helped transform the series by expanding the music genres. Attendance exploded exponentially. Then Denver mayor Michael Hancock asked him to help reimagine Ruby Hill Park and Chris responded by creating the nonprofit Live Nation and raising $6 million to build an amphitheater. It was a 10-year effort that opened in 2017. The concept was that there would be 50 free concerts a year and then he and his partner would produce 20 ticketed concerts through Live Nation. “As a music industry, we take. Everybody in the industry is squeezing everything from the consumer, but my hypothesis was that there was a different way we could be successful as promoters by having a limited number of ticketed shows and a larger number of free concerts. We were building community through music. We can build a community of art and music lovers by taking away access barriers.”

Chris went on to create Colorado & Friends, showcasing emerging artists at music industry conferences. “We’d present artists to buyers, bookers and venues.” Simultaneously, he started the Colorado Music Collective to bring artists and music business professionals together monthly for panel discussions and talks about current issues in the music industry. “A lot of people came and it was quite popular. It was a great way for the music community to connect.”

Then Covid hit in 2020, threatening to destroy the livelihood of musicians and venues. Chris stepped up again and with some friends, created the National Independent Venue Association whose purpose was to save live music, “because once the lights go out in the clubs they stay out. We were most worried about losing the industry and not having rooms for artists to play anymore. A lot of these venues were heritage places, some existing for 60 years in places like New Orleans, New York, every city.”

They reached out and signed up everyone in the industry willing to join and partnered with YouTube and Bud Lite to put on a massive online concert. “We reached out to every artist we knew, from the Lumineers to Miley Cyrus, Foo Fighters, Nathaniel Rateliff. There were 50 big name artists performing in a two-day, live stream on YouTube and playing in venues across the country from the Boulder Theatre to the Whiskey A Go Go and other great venues across the U.S.” The event raised $16 million during the show, seed money for emergency grants for independent venues across the U.S. who could apply for funds to keep afloat during the pandemic. 

“We were working on lobbying Congress to provide financial grants for independent venues,” noting the economic impact on cities across the U.S. and the number of jobs lost if those venues closed their doors. The result was a successfully-passed bill called the SOS, Save Our Stages, that passed $16.25 billion (yes, billion) for the grant program. Chris adds that, “It was the largest bailout of an industry, outside of airlines, in U.S. history.” Venues could apply for funding through the program. “It completely saved live music and the venues.” The project drew the attention of major music magazines, from Rolling Stone to Pitchfork, as well as Colorado publications and TV, who interviewed Chris.

During all this, Chris had become an adjunct professor at the University of Colorado in Denver, from 2018 through 2022, teaching music business and venue and festival management. “I wanted kids to come out of school knowing how the industry works,” he says. As an expert in the music industry, Chris is now on the podcast and panel circuit speaking about his creative and successful endeavors to save the industry, how they did it, the future of live music and what happens next. He was speaking on a panel in Steamboat Springs about the future of live music when he met CB local Brooke MacMillan, who thanked him for his work since the CB Center for the Arts (Center) was a recipient of one of the lifesaving grants. The following week, he started helping the Center by booking music for them. Having never been to Crested Butte, he and his wife decided to check it out during the 2022 spring break. And they were smitten.

Chris had partnered with some friends in Austin to come on board with Texas Music Holding Company, which owned three businesses — AdVentures, Resound Presents, the booking company Heard Presents, with venues in Austin – The Parish and Empire Control Room & Garage. He was the CFO and part-owner and also owned a couple of festivals. On New Year’s Eve, Chris returned to CB to help Brooke with a show. “I wanted to see how their operations worked.” He had been thinking of moving to Crested Butte. He didn’t want his kid going to a Denver high school. They found a home in February of 2023 and relocated.

“I love it. I wish I could have done this 20 years ago but if you want a career in music, you essentially have to live in certain cities,” he acknowledges. “But I was already successful in the industry when I moved here,” which allowed him to move to the end of the road in CB. He started working for the Center booking music. “It was a passion project,” he says. But he has since moved on to fully focus on yet another project, the Workshop Agency, working with corporate and aggregate sponsors and independents to produce events and connecting talent buyers with artists.

Chris feels that there are magical things about Crested Butte. “There are so many families we’ve become friends with. My son loves it here. We love it here, and it’s our home. Where the road takes us periodically, I have no clue, but I think we’ll always be here.”