During the various orchestral crises of the last few years, the San Francisco Symphony has been a shining example of fiscal and artistic balance, having planned for an economic downturn which few others saw coming, and having posted surpluses as other orchestras ran deficits in the millions. But even the SFS isn’t immune to a 4-year economic slump, and this week, it announced a small deficit of $135,945 on a budget of more than $50 million. Most American orchestras would be overjoyed to run so slightly in the red (or to have a budget that even approaches $50 million,) and San Francisco executives say they aren’t overly concerned about it.
Tag: 12.10.03
An Authentic Shakespeare Audience, in Manhattan
This week, Lincoln Center Theater’s production of Shakespeare’s Henry IV played to a packed house – of public high school students. Student audiences are rarely a performer’s dream, but this one was apparently quite different. “Certainly they were not the usual Wednesday matinee crowd. They hooted, cheered, hissed and roared with laughter. They were probably closer to an Elizabethan audience at the Globe than anything the actors at the Vivian Beaumont Theater had ever faced. It was, in the language of the theater, a great house.”
NY Phil Musicians Rallying Behind Maazel
When Loren Maazel was appointed music director of the New York Philharmonic in 2001, the press groaned openly that the 70-year-old conductor was too boring, didn’t fit the Phil’s sound well, and would surely be only a stopgap director, given his advanced age. But at a board meeting this week, several Philharmonic musicians were invited to make a presentation, during which they rallied behind Maazel, calling him “brilliant,” and asking that the board not rush to replace him when his contract expires in 2006. The musicians clearly enjoy working with Maazel, but their support also appears to have much to do with the dearth of potential candidates to replace him at the moment.
Clamping A Lid On Iraqi Orchestra Musicians
The Wall Street Journal sends a reporter to meet with members of the Iraqi National Symphony during their visit to Washington DC. A small, but significant problem, though: how to get through the layers of officials to actually meet with any musicians? After a month of futile trying, Ayad Rahim finally gets a few minutes with three musicians, but nothing substantive. So much for “cultural exchange.”
Page: Remaking The Scottish Ballet
When Ashley Page was asked to take over the Scottish Ballet, his demands were uncompromising: “His bottom line was that he had no interest in running a cut-price Kirov or Royal Ballet. He envisioned Scottish Ballet as a small, flexible ensemble capable of performing modern dance and contemporary classical works. He wanted to be able to stage the neoclassical masterworks of Balanchine at one extreme and the austerely postmodernist choreo-graphy of Trisha Brown at the other. To drive this vision, however, Page insisted he would need a larger budget and “a major clearout of the existing dancers”.
In Defence Of BBC4 Culture
BBC4 is where most of the BBC’s cultural program now ends up. It is a popular target of critics from all sides. “It does not like to describe itself as highbrow – ‘We always try and avoid that word,’ says a BBC press officer – but it is pitched squarely at the class Keynes referred to as ‘the educated bourgeoisie’.”
Australia’s $39 Million To The Visual Arts
Australia’s various levels of government have united to pump an additional $39 million in funding to the visual arts. The money is the direct result of a Federal Government-initiated inquiry. In a joint announcement the governments said they would allocate the funds to support infrastructure, including giving more money to 40 arts and crafts organisations, expand the market through more art fairs and touring, give more grants to individual artists and provide more support for indigenous art.”