Born in Miami, and raised between the Magic Metropolis and Spain, Hans Schafer’s life soundtrack blends every part from Elegant’s sun-soaked rock to the romantic ballads of José José. Immersed within the enterprise of music from an early age — his stepfather is Jesús López, chairman and CEO of Common Music Latin America and Iberian Peninsula, and his mom was a label supervisor at BMG Latin — Schafer developed a worldwide outlook on the trade general. That perspective would turn into his edge, serving to him rise as a key architect in Latin music’s enlargement throughout worldwide markets.

Now senior vice chairman of worldwide touring at Dwell Nation, Schafer has spent the previous seven years shaping among the most groundbreaking moments in Latin music historical past. He helped orchestrate Los Bukis’ $50 million-grossing reunion tour and their historic all-Spanish-language residency on the Las Vegas Strip. He performed a pivotal function in launching the primary worldwide stadium excursions for Karol G and Unhealthy Bunny. Most not too long ago, the latter’s “Debí Tirar Más Fotos World Tour” set world information, promoting extra tickets than any Latin artist ever in Italy, France, Poland, Portugal, Sweden and the UK.

“It’s only a matter of time earlier than we begin seeing increasingly more Latin acts in bigger venues throughout the pond,” Schafer tells Selection. “The demand has been steadily rising, and as Unhealthy Bunny has taught us, the beauty of globalization is when you do break by means of in new markets, the chance to attach and actually cater to every new area individually is priceless. And that’s true not just for Latin artists, however any artist.”

Dwell Nation reported that fan attendance at its exhibits in Latin America was up by greater than 25% within the first quarter of 2025, citing that rising demand to be “supported by the worldwide rise of non-English language artists,” who the corporate says now signify twice as lots of its high 50 excursions in comparison with 2019.

Schafer additionally frolicked as director of Latin expertise at AEG Dwell, overseeing the corporate’s Latin enterprise and nationwide reserving technique underneath the route of Rebeca Léon (now founder-CEO of Lionfish Leisure, an artist administration and manufacturing firm), in addition to the branding and sponsorships division of Common Music.

“It was [Léon] who informed me I had a profession in dwell and touring,” he says. “From there, I moved on to Dwell Nation, when there was a chosen division for Latin artists. I keep in mind when Los Bukis booked the primary Latin stadium tour within the U.S. [in 2021], and the query was all the time, ‘Who else can do it?’ and that was a second when the floodgates had opened, and it’s turn into a lot simpler for any individual else to come back in and attain that since then.”

Under, Selection talked with Schafer about ongoing excursions, alternatives for progress and massive wins for such acclaimed acts as Feid, Shakira, Rauw Alejandro, Karol G, Kali Uchis and Tito Double P, amongst many others, beneath.

What’s the greatest false impression about worldwide excursions for Spanish-language artists?

Whenever you begin to have a look at the trade and the enterprise, the Latin music enterprise actually turns into concerning the demographic, and never simply the consumption of Latin music but in addition the consumption of different music. Throughout the firm of Dwell Nation, we’re not that Latin as only a silo of followers who devour that music. It’s a a lot broader dialog. How do you goal these audiences?

In the beginning, these excursions had been extra seen as investments. Giving your followers a possibility to see you reside holds quite a lot of delayed worth for an artist’s touring profession. I believe again to the audiences that bought to see Unhealthy Bunny play a 500-capacity room at a small membership; they put on that accomplishment like a badge of honor — and that degree of growth can solely occur with time. That step-by-step will provide you with longevity and a greater likelihood for a much bigger bounce. And we’re seeing increasingly more artists make that bounce internationally.

How have these excursions advanced over the previous few years?

Followers have been crossing over for a while now. And for so long as I’ve been working on this trade, this concept of crossing over was such a core idea to Latin artists and to the Latin trade — “How do you cross over?” We’re gone that now, and I believe one in every of our greatest priorities now’s selling these artists in an genuine approach, and doing so with persistence for the method.

At one level, you thought of turning into a supervisor. The place did that deep sense of duty to the artists start for you?

A supervisor is in a really distinctive scenario in that they’re serving to information an artist develop their profession, from the very middle, and I didn’t need to begin on the middle… I wished to see all the completely different points to the way in which their world works. Once I was working at Common Music with model partnerships and sponsorships, one thing I didn’t actually have a powerful background in that, however foreign money grew to become my data.

One of many offers that I’d say actually form of modified the route of my profession was one I did with MasterCard and Juanes, which wasn’t an enormous deal, nevertheless it was a touchstone, culturally. I grew to become near his supervisor on the time, Rebeca [Leon]. She sat me down and informed me I ought to pursue a profession in dwell [music], which on the time was nonetheless categorizing all Latin music as regional music. She made the enterprise greater by being among the many first to essentially push for bigger investments. She wasn’t afraid to say, ‘You guys are this with the incorrect lens.’ And she or he was so proper. Now look the place we’re.

What are among the challenges the dwell trade is going through?

I consider Latin music — and extra importantly, the traditions and evolution occurring now behind it — is able to make some constructive change. Kali Uchis, who’s so free creatively and [has no] language limitations in her music, is heading out on her first area tour. Then we had albums from Rauw and Unhealthy Bunny actually that basically got here from a culturally empowered place.

And the alternatives to carry out these tradition-charged albums internationally are wanting fairly wholesome, too.

After all, quite a lot of nations are going by means of troublesome instances traditionally that may make it tougher to proceed as our artists want — as we’ve seen with this new administration in the US. However there’s a actually thrilling demand in locations like Latin America and Europe, and for really world acts, we’re unlocking fully new markets. The world is a giant place, and we’re working to open as many bridges as attainable for artists who need to get there.