lunch with tony p

I have tasked myself to "Eat lunch with 10 people I look up to". 1 down as of last week. Had lunch with my good buddy Tony Patoto, who I truly believe is one of the most brilliant, compassionate, caring, and encouraging individuals I know.

Tony is a Canadian, but lived most of his life in the UK, hence really cool accent. Got his start in the music industry starting a distribution company over in the UK, and then happened upon a young band called Delirious. Tony managed Delirious for about 10 years or so, crafting them into the worldwide success that they are today. About a year and a half ago Tony moved to Nashville to take part in a project EMI was working on, which has since gone south, but it's music - can't win all of them.

So I met up with Tony last Friday, had ourselves some good Italian food, and talked about life. He had some good encouragement regarding the business ventures I'm throwing myself into, and was particularly excited about what I'm doing with music:nuvo. We talked about Steph and the fact that she's applying to vet school, so a lot of long term stuff is up in the air considering we could be leaving town in 12 months if she gets accepted:

He said, "Most people look at a time constraint like that as a negative thing. You should look at it as a postive and an incredible motivator to really focus on getting music:nuvo and your management career to a place where it is sustainable... because you can do those things from anywhere in the country. You don't have to be in Nashville to do that. Use those time constraints as a motivation!"

Good thoughts Tony, and thanks for lunch!!


1 Lunch of 10 Complete