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About the Winner

Business is booming for Tom Ingrassia, who escaped the grind and set up his dream business, Ingrassia Artist Management, a talent management agency. In 2001, at age 48, and just days before the 9/11 terrorist attacks, he chucked a successful 25-year career culminating in a role as assistant dean at a university business school, and pursued his lifelong vision of working in the entertainment industry. Today he represents a roster of 15 eclectic artists ranging from classical and jazz musicians to an actor and a children's edu-tainment act. Along the way, he's worked for and with some of the legends of 60s pop music, including Mary Wilson of The Supremes, Arlene Smith of The Chantels, Barbara Alston of The Crystals, Carl Gardner of The Coasters, and June Monteiro of The Toys -- the very people he grew up listening to and idolizing. He admits proudly, "I am living, breathing proof that dreams DO come true! And I have never looked back."