Alfred G. Rava and Steven Surrey are becoming the hottest behind-the-scenes names in Southern California’s arts world, but not in a good way. “Rava and Surrey’s connection with the arts stems mainly from lawsuits, or the threat of lawsuits, they have filed against performing arts organizations and for-profit businesses here over the past few years.” Most of the lawsuits stem from what the litigious pair claim is gender or age discrimination on the part of arts organizations which offer ticket discounts to women or young people.
Tag: 04.23.06
Revenue-to-Expense Is An Ugly Ratio in Baltimore
The Baltimore Symphony is the latest ensemble to be facing down a series of crippling deficits, and eyebrow-raising endowment raids aside, there don’t appear to be any easy solutions. “The symphony’s operating expenses have been more than twice its operating revenue… Paring debt will help expenses only marginally, saving maybe a million or two in annual interest, assuming whomever covered the deficits charged interest. What really matter are demand for the symphony’s product and the cost to produce it, and in these categories symphonic orchestras are working at a disadvantage in the 21st century.”
Could ENO Actually Have A Hit On Its Hands?
After years of absorbing seemingly endless criticism of its mission, its management, and its music, English National Opera may finally have scored a win with London’s famously combative critics. A new staging of Monteverdi’s Orfeo is “a magical mix of East and West which in no way impinges on the earthy drama of the score in all its filigree detail. The interaction of dance and music is, if anything, enhanced by their hieratic gestures, mirrored by the principals in more than usually convincing style.”