Tag: 10.01.03

Taking On Ticketmaster

A classic David-and-Goliath battle is shaping up over the way concert tickets are marketed and sold in the U.S., thanks to an ongoing dispute between ticketing behemoth Ticketmaster, and a wildly successful Colorado indie band known as The String Cheese Incident. The band has been doing something of an end-run around Ticketmaster, which has exclusive ticketing rights at venues across the country and often incurs the wrath of consumers with its famous “convenience fees” and handling charges which significantly boost the cost of tickets. “Ticketmaster’s dominance is increasingly threatened as technology allows more [musicians] to sell tickets for low costs.”

fFIDA On The Ropes

The largest non-curated dance festival in North America is in danger of shutting down. The fringe Festival of Independent Dance Artists (fFIDA), which runs for two weeks every August, says that it needs to raise $20,000 by the end of October in order to avoid bankruptcy. Funding cuts and poorer-than-expected revenues at this summer’s fFIDA led to the cash crunch, which organizers are trying to alleviate with an e-mail campaign asking for 1,000 individuals to donate $20 apiece. So far, the campaign has raised $2000.

Big-Time Funding, But At What Cost?

“While many companies jockey for the naming rights to large sports stadiums, General Motors Corp. during the past few years has set its sights on cultural institutions. And this fall, the company is partnering with the mother of them all. When the General Motors Hall of Transportation opens at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History on Nov. 22, it will be the largest one-time financial contribution the company has ever made to a cultural institution. It will also add fuel to the ongoing controversy of the Smithsonian’s acceptance of corporate gifts in exchange for naming rights.”

Big Grant For Lincoln Center

“Lincoln Center has received a $16 million grant from the Alice Tully Foundation toward the renovation of Alice Tully Hall, the center’s prime stage for chamber music and jazz. The gift, announced yesterday, is the largest so far by a private donor for Lincoln Center’s redevelopment project… The grant is contingent on Lincoln Center’s raising two and half times the $16 million for a total of $56 million. Reynold Levy, president of Lincoln Center, said yesterday that he was optimistic that the center could come up with the rest of the money.”

Still Walking The Pickets In Charlotte

It’s been nearly a month now since the Charlotte Symphony musicians walked off the job in the face of management demands for pay cuts, reduced benefits, and a shortened season. Maria Portone says that the musicians should not have to make up for the mistakes of the orchestra’s executives. “In my 23 years in Charlotte, the CSO has not mounted an endowment drive. As a result, its endowment is a meager $2.3 million. Similarly sized cities have far larger endowments, averaging $60 million, allowing them to support considerably higher budgets than Charlotte’s. Indianapolis, a city about 30 percent larger than Charlotte, has one in excess of $100 million.”

Closing the Gap in Florida

The Florida Orchestra, buoyed by a flurry of last-minute contributions, has cut its deficit for the 2002-03 season to $500,000. The organization had been expecting to run somewhere between $1 million and $2 million in the red, due to slumping ticket sales and a drop-off in contributed income. Last month, the orchestra’s musicians accepted a 16% pay cut in an effort to keep the orchestra afloat during the economic turmoil.

Charge: Government Starving UK’s National Gallery

Manager’s of London’s National Gallery charge that the government is starving the museum of cash. “The difficulties faced in making big acquisitions had almost reached ‘crisis proportions’, and the decline in the annual grant left ‘nothing to spare’. Taking inflation into account, the gallery would need an extra £2.5m on top of the 2002-03 government grant of £20.4m to match the support offered, say, eight years ago.”