Lou Pizante

In the thrilling, occasionally absurd, and frequently over-budget world of location-based entertainment,
Lou Pizante somehow balances legal strategy, financial discipline, and a deeply suspicious respect for
artistic chaos. His main job is to make sure the creative train doesn’t fly off the rails—or, when it
inevitably does, to draft the waiver.

Lou is a co-founder and partner of The Experientialists, a strategy and investment firm that operates at
the strange intersection of wonder and ROI. The firm invests scale-stage equity capital in location-based experiential enterprises and partners with real estate investors to reposition underutilized retail into next-gen entertainment districts. On any given day, Lou is translating impossible ideas into plausible
business models, preferably with good snacks. In parallel, he a strategic advisor to Lux Entertainment,
the global experiential studio behind critically acclaimed franchises like Balloon Museum, This Is
Wonderland, and Color Hotel. He also serves as fractional General Counsel and Corp Dev Lead of RPM
Raceway, where he is primarily responsible for the legal and existential implications of putting
high-powered electric go-karts into the hands of very confident teenagers and their highly competitive
parents.

Before all that, Lou joined a high-tech circus (Two Bit Circus, to be precise), where he managed risks
involving fire, physics, and facial proximity to drones. He once sold an actual tequila cloud to the Mexican government. He was also CFO/GC for Voice for Nature, a company technically owned by the planet, which raised some questions about board representation. Earlier roles include CFO at GOOD Magazine, CEO of Mavent Inc. (a fintech platform acquired by Intercontinental Exchange or “ICE”), and senior positions at Goldman Sachs, Deloitte, Greenwich Capital, and Nomura Securities.

Lou is an appointed member of the World Experience Organization’s Council, named to the Blooloop 50
Immersive Influencer list, and a 2025 XP Land X-List honoree and Council Member. He contributes
regularly to Blooloop, where his columns explore the strange beauty and operational absurdity of the
immersive arts. His LinkedIn newsletter, The Experientialist, is widely read by people who pretend to
hate LinkedIn but can’t stop scrolling.He holds a B.A. from UC Berkeley and a JD/MBA from NYU, where he mastered the ancient art of arguing with himself in two disciplines at once.

Maria Redin

In an industry that runs on equal parts imagination and operational discipline, Maria Redin has a rare talent for making both behave. She builds experiences that feel effortless to the guest and are anything but behind the scenes—where strategy, execution, and creative ambition are quietly negotiating with each other at all times.

Maria is a co-founder and partner of The Experientialists, a strategy and investment firm operating at the intersection of culture and commerce. The firm invests in and scales location-based experiential businesses while partnering with real estate owners to transform underutilized spaces into destinations people actually want to visit. Maria focuses on turning big creative ideas into systems that can run—consistently, profitably, and without requiring daily miracles. She is also the co-author of Cracking the X-Stack, a forthcoming book that codifies the business model underlying location-based experiential.

She also serves as Entrepreneur in Residence at Sensee Group, where she works at the intersection of strategy, innovation, and experience design to scale an investment portfolio of location-based experiential companies. In parallel, she co-leads North American growth for the Balloon Museum, one of the world’s most successful traveling experiential art platforms, helping translate its global success into scalable operations and partnerships in the U.S.

Before that, Maria served as Chief Operating Officer of Non Plus Ultra (NPU), where she led the activation of some of the most iconic and complex real estate in the country, including the San Francisco Mint and Palace of Fine Arts. There, she worked at the intersection of brand, architecture, and live experience—partnering with global companies like Facebook, Gucci, and Pepsi to deliver large-scale events and immersive environments that somehow managed to be both ambitious and operationally sound.

Her career has consistently lived in that tension. At Two Bit Circus, she helped build the future of entertainment using lasers, robots, and just enough chaos to keep things interesting. At IDEO, she developed business models for new products and services rooted in human-centered design. Earlier, at Mattel, she co-led a brand incubator that generated over $100 million in product sales—proving that even toys can have a very serious P&L.

Maria holds multiple degrees from MIT in computer science, engineering, and media arts, as well as an MBA from Wharton, which means she is equally comfortable discussing system architecture, brand strategy, and why your operating model probably won’t survive contact with opening weekend.

She is a member of the World Experience Organization (WXO), a 2025 XP Land X-List honoree and Council Member, and continues to work across the experiential ecosystem—advising, building, and occasionally preventing very good ideas from becoming very expensive cautionary tales.

Morley, weaves the threads of jazz, soul, and folk traditions into a singular tapestry of vocal and acoustic splendor — the sound wave of a life lived with uncommon devotion to human rights and environmental justice.

Raised in vibrantly multicultural Jamaica, Queens, and educated at the United Nations School, Duke Ellington High School for the Performing Arts and Alvin Ailey, Morley performs all over the world, both as a soloist and with her self – titled band. She is often called on to sing for and with visionaries on the frontiers of climate and social change.

Follow The Sound, Morley’s new album, co – produced with Chris Bruce, features contributions from Toumani Diabaté (kora), Meshell Ndegeocello (bass, percussion, vocals), Shara Nova a.k.a. My Brightest Diamond (vocals), Jon Cowherd (piano, vocals), Chris Bruce (guitar, bass, vocals, keyboard, drum programming), Arun & Trina Ramamurthy (violins), Jack DeBoe, Jay Bellerose and Abe Rounds (drums, percussion), Cole Kamen (trumpet), Justin Hicks, Kenita Miller, Jason Charles Walker and Alex Koi (supporting vocals) and Rashaan Carter (bass and sound engineer). Mixed by Ken Rich and Mastered by Greg Calbi, Track 3 “Where Are We” was arranged by Daniel Lanois

Morley and Chris recorded with Ken Rich at Grand Street Recording and Rashaan Carter at Looking Glass Arts and also engineered their own sessions remotely.

Follow The Sound was made possible by a generous grant from The Café Royal Cultural Foundation, and Artist Residencies from the renowned Baldwin For The Arts and Looking Glass Arts.

Morley’s music appears on network television, commercials and in human rights documentaries, Democracy Now, and has moved minds and spirits as diverse as His Holiness The Dalai Lama, Nelson Mandela, entrepreneur Richard Branson, Nobel laureates Jodi Williams, Mary Robinson and Ela Gandhi. Morley has graced stages as wide-ranging as the Nomad Women’s Festival in the Sahara Desert, to Carnegie Hall.

A featured performer and speaker for TEDWomen and several TEDx gatherings nation wide, Morley created and produces “Circle Round Dignity,Courage and Survival” a performance based round table which has been generously commissioned by Lincoln Center for Lincoln Center, over the span of four years. Morley spearheaded the successful fundraiser Borderless Lullabies that continues to be a source of revenue for the pro-bono legal defense fund, KIND: Kids – In – Need – Of – Defense, representing unaccompanied refugee minors in court after being separated by ICE.

To date, Morley has released seven albums of original songs via Sony, Universal and independently. She is a founding member of The Bruces and the cast of Toshi Reagon’s. “Parable Of The Sower – The Opera” and has penned songs for the great William Parker, Richard Bona, Youn Sun Nah, Lizz Wright and more. Morley and Chris Bruce wrote and performed the theme song for, “That Kindness – A play for and by the Nurses of America” V (Formerly Eve Ensler).

Morley also uses music as a tool when working with war veterans and survivors of domestic violence.