The Power 50: Sahara Herald

Sahara Herald was the national event coordinator for Big Day Out for 18 years. In 2014, she moved across to Frontier Touring as tour coordinator. She was appointed tour director in November 2018, replacing Michael Harrison as he moved over to AEG Global Touring. In her time with Frontier, Herald has worked across tours for The Killers, Troye Sivan, Shawn Mendes, Lorde and more.

2019 marked Herald’s first full year as tour director and it was certainly a big one. “It’s helping deliver those magic moments that keeps me truly engaged and passionate about what I do,” Herald shared when she was announced in the role. Those moments were plenty across the sold-out Shawn Mendes national tour, with hundreds of thousands of fans flocking to arenas around the country to see the Canadian artist. 

The Chemical Brothers and the Making Gravy concert series (featuring Paul Kelly, Courtney Barnett, Kate Miller-Heidke, Marlon Williams and Thelma Plum) didn’t lack in them either. In April, Frontier Touring announced their newly minted strategic partnership with AEG Presents (the group behind festivals like Coachella, BST Hyde Park and more iconic events), seeing Herald join the AEG Global Touring team. Herald was a keynote speaker at BIGSOUND in September and took part in Support Act’s Prevention Summit in November.

“Delivering the keynote speech at BIGSOUND 2019 was a turning point for me both personally and professionally. To be that raw, vulnerable and honest in front of a group of my industry peers was ultimately fulfilling but totally terrifying in the moment. It’s very liberating to step through fear and own my own story in its every facet of guts, gore and tarnished glory. Thankfully that speech has opened the door to many ongoing conversations and planned action to help address issues of addiction, mental health and general wellbeing of workers across all aspects the industry, but particularly the live forum.”