The Bounce Music Festival has become one of the largest international touring EDM festivals to date. Headliners have included every hitter in the EDM scene from Tiesto to Avicii. Two partners, Brandon Silverstein and Jared Lyons, put their minds together to create what would become a festival to not be reckoned with.

When and how did you come up with the idea for the Bounce Music Festival?

I was sitting on a couch with my roommate who has been my partner for about 3 years prior to us creating Bounce. We always put on big events at clubs in Manhattan and the Hamptons but the energy just wasn’t enough. We knew the only place we could get more energy would be building our own festival. So we came up with Bounce Music Festival.

Hosting a festival as big as Bounce must have required some help. Could you tell us a little about the team around you?

We have such a great team. My partner, Jared Lyons who co-founded Bounce, is the perfect compliment to what I lack and vice versa. We brought on Jonathan Schwartz as a partner, who has tremendous experience in the EDM area through running the talent booking for venues such as Marquee and Lavo in Manhattan. Bryan Epstein, leads our branding and design department and Zach Oakes keeps our company in shape and handles our contracts.

Who were your most influential mentors when you were on the road to creating the Bounce Music Festival?

Noah Tepperberg of Strategic Group has been my most influential mentor/idol throughout the road to creating Bounce. Anything that man says, I will listen. I have a tremendous amount of respect for the brand he has built and I can only hope to achieve the level of success he has created with Strategic.

I interned at Strategic and soaked in all I could while working alongside Jonathan Schwartz, Andrew Goldberg and Rich Thomas. These guys are like family to me and have helped me get to where I am today. Jonathan has acted as a brother and being apart of the Lavo team influenced me to build Bounce Music Festival. Jonathan is now a partner at Bounce.

The Bounce Music Festival has grown to be a renowned international EDM phenomenon, and you started this all when you were in College. How did you manage to balance school and work?

It’s really tough. But I do it because it’s my passion. I am a very disciplined kid and I make sure I get everything done. When I’m not doing schoolwork, I’m doing Bounce. I am always thinking about the next festival or the new type of production we are going to bring to excite the fans to shock them even more.

You have quite a number of shows under your belt already. Which one would you say was your favorite? What made that experience unique from the other ones?

Bounce in April 2012 with Tiesto and Alesso was my favorite. Watching 10,000 fans Bounce on a “farm” with production that industry insiders called the best to ever hit the Midwest is something I’d like to call unique. This show really put us on the map.

MTV ranked us a top 5 electronic music festival behind Ultra and Electric Daisy Carnival. We followed up this this fall in 5 locations with acts such as Martin Solveig, Dada Life, Hardwell, Alesso, Rusko, Borgore, Michael Woods and more, but nothing will ever top the “we did it” feeling the Tiesto show gave us.

Are there any upcoming plans for Bounce that the people should be expecting?

We are working on something right now that we have been working on getting done for about a year and a half and we finally have our ducks in a row. It is going to be massive. Hello Little 500 in Bloomington, and look out New York City. We are coming for you. Summer 2013.

If you had to choose one other brand to collaborate with, who would it be and why?

Live Nation. Live Nation is the face of concerts. They have built a monster. Having Live Nation behind Bounce would be a gift to dance music. You have my promise if that happens g*d bless any venue we are at.

Any last words for college entrepreneurs who are looking to build their own brands?

Believe in yourself and go out and just do it. If you have a dream to do something, go do it. Don’t be scared of failure. Failure will lead to success if you remain persistent.

Serge E. | Elite.