Chairman; Chairman/CEOLive Nation Entertainment; Front Line Management GroupTwitter: @irvingazoff The

   Chairman; Chairman/CEO  Live Nation Entertainment; Front Line Management Group  Twitter: @irvingazoff The Game Changer...  To hear the words "I have Irving Azoff on the line" and not experience at least a twinge of anxiety means a pulse check is in order. Azoff helms the world's largest promoter, ticketing company and artist management group from behind one desk. (OK, he probably has several desks, but you get the idea.) He has moved mountains in the worlds of film, TV and music; transformed mere artistry into superstardom; sustained and resurrected careers; and is a force of nature in the world of philanthropy. Music industry careers come and go, but Azoff's sphere of influence is enormous and ever-expanding.  The cultural touch points--and the business trends that followed--that can be traced directly back to Azoff range from 1980's "Urban Cowboy" film to famously shattering the $100-ticket glass ceiling (and, in the process, revealing true market value) for mainstream rock/pop acts with the Eagles' 1994-96 Hell Freezes Over tour. That tour sold every ticket, with Azoff famously saying at the time that the only people who complained were journo types who got their tickets for free. Regardless, the business never looked back. Azoff has found success as a movie producer, agent, promoter, label CEO, label owner and publisher. He remains many of those things and more.  But even though, from atop the silo, he commands companies with diversified areas of focus, most see Azoff as a manager at heart, and the manager's chair is where he seems most in his element. In consolidating management companies to create the unparalleled leverage of Front Line Management Group (before Ticketmaster and Live Nation were ever in the equation), Azoff was at the forefront of the shift in the balance of power from labels to managers and has shown that, in his world, labels can be valuable partners but aren't always necessary-because artists create the content, content is king and live is the thing.  Consisting of 13 management companies, Front Line bills itself as "the world's largest music management firm," but the number of artists affiliated with it seems a bit of a moving target. "Approximately 200" is a figure that's often used, and a large portion of those acts are arena-level headliners: Artists affiliated with Front Line companies include such established superstars as the Eagles, Christina Aguilera, Neil Diamond, Van Halen, Journey, Kenny Chesney, Fleetwood Mac and scores of other big names, developing acts and everything in between.  Azoff insists the affiliated managers maintain autonomy. Management is and will always be a personal business, the manager/client relationship is sacred, and it makes no long-term sense for Azoff and his team to be anything more than a resource to use if needed. But for this number of artists to be aligned in any way is a powerful statement.  Even if artist management is what he's best-known for, Azoff still has Ticketmaster and Live Nation under his watch, and both are reinventing the business as they fight to maintain supremacy and, in the case of Live Nation, consistent profitability. Live Nation is aggressively trying to improve the margins of live concerts by increasing revenue opportunities before, during and after the show, in ways that include venues, long-term multi-rights deals with artists, branding and merchandising, as well as marketing from global to local. And, of course, ticketing.

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Labels and performing artists are seeing good growth from digital performance royalties these days. But could they do better?  SoundExchange, the performance rights organization for non-interactive digital music services like Pandora and SiriusXM, paid out $95.8 million in digital performance royalties to recording artist and record labels in the second quarter of 2012.

Payouts of $204.4 million for the first half of 2012 put SoundExchange on track to easily top 2011's disbursements of $249 million. But the second-quarter payout was a noticeable drop from the $108.6 million the organization paid out in the first quarter. That record total, the only that has topped $100 million in a single quarter, was attributed to "data cleanup and technology overhaul efforts."

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Shares of Pandora Media Inc. P -16.71% tumbled Friday, following news that Apple Inc.AAPL +0.62% is in discussions to introduce a competing Internet-radio service.

"The 800-pound gorilla is pounding his chest, and people are starting to get nervous," said Richard Tullo, an analyst with Albert Fried & Co. "Apple has big competitive advantages. It already has a big reputation in the music industry."

Pandora's shares fell to as low as $9.95 before recovering slightly to finish the session at $10.47, off nearly 17%. Apple shares, meanwhile, rose 0.6% at $688.44.

Pandora, which went public last summer, has become a market leader in advertising-supported Internet radio. The company offers a widely used service whereby users can build "stations" that stream various songs based on selected artists.

However, the Oakland, Calif., company has struggled to become profitable as each additional user of its service tacks on more royalty fees paid every time it streams a song. In addition, Pandora has found it difficult to pull in advertising revenue at a rate commensurate with rapidly expanding use of its service on mobile devices.

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