Born in Sydney in 1937, Kevin Jacobsen began his working life in a chartered accountant’s practice. An adept piano player, he devoted all his spare moments to music.

In 1957, he and his brother Colin, joined with John Bogle, Lawrie Erwin and Dave Bridge to form the KJ Quintet. After some success changed their name to Col Joye and the Joy Boys, adding younger brother Keith.

Almost immediately they scored a booking on Bill McColl’s Jazzarama concert in October 1957. After this came an engagement to play at the Capitol Theatre in Sydney as a curtain raiser for the film The Tommy Steele Story, an appearance on TV’s Bandstand and a recording contract.

While Col Joye went on to become a ‘teen idol’ and an enduring pop legend, Kevin left the band and began managing artists and promoting concerts. He and Col set up Col Joye enterprises and their own publishing company. In 1965, with Col and Tony Brady, Jacobsen founded ATA Allstar Artists, which encompassed a record label, a recording studio, event promotion and production, and artist representation.

Initially Jacobsen presented local acts – including, of course, Col Joye and the Joy Boys – but before long he began importing overseas attractions. It was to mark this change of direction, that ‘Kevin Jacobsen Productions’ was created. He claims that in the 1970s and 1980s he toured more artists than any other Australian promoter. Eventually he started producing theatrical shows and arena spectaculars, frequently working in partnership with other promoters. Among his early successes was a tour by the affable Irish comedian Dave Allen; one of his disasters was The Evil Knievel Thrill Spectacular, whose infamous American daredevil star failed to deliver either thrills or spectacle.

In 1987 Jacobsen presented Michael Jackson’s first Australian tour. In 1988 he was commissioned by the Queensland Government to mastermind ‘Queensland Day’ celebrations in the presence of the Duke and Duchess of Kent, and by the Federal Government to produce the Royal Bicentennial Concert in the presence of the Prince and Princess of Wales. In 1989 he presented the sell-out concert event Legends of Rock.

In 1995 he was the first promoter outside the USA to be invited by the Disney organization to present the stage version of Beauty and the Beast. Its run of two years in Melbourne and 15 months in Sydney grossed $58 million. Also that year he produced the television series Gladiators for the Seven Network. The gross takings for his 1997 presentation of The Three Tenors at the Melbourne Cricket Ground were the largest in Australian history for a single concert – $15 million. In 1999 he presented The Bee Gees – One Night Only, the first live performance at Stadium Australia – the Olympic Stadium.

In 2000 Barbra Streisand’s four stadium concerts in Sydney and Melbourne achieved the highest grosses anywhere in the world for this artist, more than $23 million. The year 2001 brought Shout! – The Legend of the Wild One, an all-Australian production based on the life of Jacobsen’s old friend, Johnny O’Keefe. It toured Australia to record crowds, winning Mo and Green Room Awards and an ARIA for Best Cast Album. In 2002 Jacobsen presented a sell-out Elton John concert tour, plus Fame – The Musical, which toured throughout Asia, and two sensationally successful arena shows: the classic Australian rock anthology Long Way to the Top and the brilliantly innovative The Man from Snowy River Arena Spectacular.

Other Jacobsen theatrical ventures have included Oscar Wilde’s Diversions and Delights, Girls’ Night Out, A Chorus Line, Camelot (with Richard Harris), Lend Me a Tenor, Return to the Forbidden Planet, Walt Disney’s World on Ice and Stars of the Bolshoi Ballet, as well as massive open-air productions of Aida and Turandot.

Among the many artists who have toured under the Jacobsen banner are Slim Whitman, KISS, Simon and Garfunkel, Bob Marley, Shania Twain, Billy Joel, John Denver, Pearl Jam, Cyndi Lauper, Julio Iglesias, Ba