Touring is one of the most demanding parts of an artist’s career, especially when international performances, festival schedules, production requirements, and multiple teams come into play. For the audience, the experience generally begins when the artist steps onstage, but the work required to make that performance happen can begin months earlier.
German artist and tour manager Mariann Krott has spent over two decades handling those responsibilities for some of electronic music’s most recognizable names, and she is now expanding her work into other areas of entertainment where those same skills are increasingly in demand.
Her career began with Paul van Dyk and grew through collaborations with artists including Giuseppe Ottaviani, Ruben de Ronde, Jaytech, Pretty Pink, Robin Schulz, HUGEL, Genix, and KAAZE, as well as relationships with record labels, booking agencies, promoters, and international festival organizations. During that period, Krott worked across artist management, touring, production coordination, creative development, and the operational responsibilities that come with an increasingly international performance schedule. Having built her career primarily in electronic music, she now takes on projects involving sports personalities, digital creators, and recording artists outside the dance music industry.
The expansion is particularly interesting because these industries increasingly share similar operational requirements. A touring DJ, professional athlete, social media personality, and mainstream recording artist may work with different audiences, but each can require coordinated travel, production planning, brand management, rehearsals, appearances, and relationships with multiple commercial partners.
Krott’s experience handling those responsibilities within electronic music has created opportunities to apply her knowledge to a wider collection of clients, with additional projects already taking shape for 2027.
From Paul van Dyk’s Team To International Tour Management
Krott’s professional background includes formal event management training and early work within Germany’s live entertainment industry. She studied event management and worked at a local venue and promoter office in Cologne before joining Paul van Dyk’s organization, where she began developing the experience that would define much of her subsequent career. One of her earliest major projects involved van Dyk’s 2009 performance with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, which required coordinating the demands of an electronic music artist, a live orchestra, additional musicians, and a substantial production team.
That same period included work surrounding van Dyk’s performance at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate for the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, a VANDIT stage at Tomorrowland, and the development of the We Are One Festival at Berlin’s O2 Arena in 2010.
Those early projects exposed Krott to different types of production, from conventional DJ performances to concerts involving large instrumental ensembles and extensive technical requirements.
She later gained additional experience working with a promoter in Düsseldorf, including performances by artists such as Bon Jovi, Katy Perry, and Take That, before returning to van Dyk’s organization and eventually establishing her own company, mc MES, in 2016. Her client relationships expanded to include artists such as Jorn van Deynhoven, Talla 2XLC, Myon, RODG, Fatum, Roger Shah, Glockenbach, Marten Hørger, and many others working across trance, progressive house, melodic music, and commercial electronic production.
The actual responsibilities of a tour manager extend well beyond organizing travel and ensuring that an artist arrives at the venue on schedule. Advance coordination, technical riders, accommodations, ground transportation, production equipment, scheduling, promoter communication, financial settlements, and unexpected changes all require attention, sometimes across several countries within a relatively short period. We explored these responsibilities in our Industry Insider interview with Celina Rollon, tour manager for FKJ and Bishop Briggs, where she discussed the considerable preparation involved in international touring and the demands of coordinating complex productions across different venues.
Krott’s career has included many of those same operational responsibilities, plus the need to adapt to each artist’s different creative and technical expectations.
Pretty Pink, Groove Cruise, And Plans For 2027
Krott continues to maintain longstanding relationships within electronic music as she prepares for the next stage of her career. Her work with Pretty Pink now spans more than six years, while other ongoing relationships include Ruben de Ronde, Jaytech, and collaborations through Stefan Dabruck Management.
She has also worked alongside artists including Robin Schulz, Bennett, HUGEL, SOLTO, and Klingande, maintaining professional connections across different genres and markets.
Among the projects planned for 2027 are activities involving Pretty Pink at Groove Cruise and A State of Trance in Los Angeles. Groove Cruise is scheduled for January 21 through January 25, departing from Miami aboard Royal Caribbean’s Allure of the Seas, with Pretty Pink included in the festival’s announced artist lineup. A State of Trance will also bring its first two-day North American festival to Los Angeles on June 11 and 12, 2027, at Ace*Mission. The Los Angeles event represents an expansion of the established A State of Trance festival format, following previous American appearances including the 2022 ASOT 1000 event at Banc of California Stadium.
These events also illustrate the level of coordination behind Krott’s ongoing electronic music commitments. Groove Cruise introduces considerations involving cruise operations, boarding schedules, international travel, and performance logistics, while A State of Trance Los Angeles brings together multiple stages and large-scale festival production requirements. The exact scope of Krott’s responsibilities for the planned appearances has not been detailed publicly, but the projects connect directly with the international touring and production work she has handled throughout her career.
Looking toward 2027, Krott’s professional direction remains connected to the relationships she has developed over the past twenty years while extending into additional parts of the entertainment industry. Her experience offers an interesting example of how artist and tour management skills can remain relevant outside the genre or scene where they were originally developed.
The artists and organizations may change, but coordinating complex productions, managing professional relationships, and translating creative plans into executable projects remain central requirements. For Krott, the next stage of her career will involve applying that experience to an expanding group of clients while continuing to work with the electronic music artists and organizations that have been part of her professional history.
Will Vance is a professional music producer who has been involved in the industry for the better part of a decade and has been the managing editor at Magnetic Magazine since mid-2022. In that time period, he has published thousands of articles on music production, industry think pieces and educational articles about the music industry. Over the last decade as a professional music producer, Will Vance has also ran multiple successful and highly respected record labels in the industry, including Where The Heart Is Records as well as having launched a new label with a focus on community through Magnetic Magazine. When not running these labels or producing his own music, Vance is likely writing for other top industry sites like Waves or the Hyperbits Masterclass or working on his upcoming book on mindfulness in music production. On the rare chance he's not thinking about music production, he's probably running a game of Dungeons and Dragons with his friends which he has been the dungeon master for for many years.
