The Day the Music Promoter Died

Listen Now

By Ryan Warner

We listen back to two CPR interviews with a man who brought a lot of great music to Colorado, concert promoter Barry Fey. He died Sunday, at age 73. His client list read like a who’s who of rock. In fact, it included The Who. And the Doors. And Bruce Springsteen. And the Grateful Dead, Jimmy Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Led Zeppelin. We'll hear Colorado Matters host Ryan Warner talking with Fey about the concert he may be best known for, in 1983 at Red Rocks, with an up & coming Irish band named U2. That concert at first seemed cursed, but wound up making rock 'n roll history. First, how Barry Fey got his start. He wrote about that in his 2011 autobiography, “Back Stage Past.” Fey told Mike Flanagan, from CPR’s Open Air, that he started out booking acts on college campuses, but really hit his stride when he helped open a club called “The Family Dog” in southwest Denver.

Watch Part 1 of "Under the Blood Red Sky," the Red Rocks U2 video, here.