Somehow it escaped me that my entry on February 23 marked the one year anniversary of my blog. Hopefully I have been generally informative and entertaining in that period. (Here is the first entry from way back when)
It has been very interesting taking part in this facet of self-publishing. More and more these days you read how blogs are trumping Mainstream Media and handling subjects they are afraid to engage.
I have a feeling there is going to be a big surge in popularity (along with some big scandal or controversy) in blogs beyond where it is these days and then the bubble will pop as it were and the form will begin to mature and find its niche in the culture.
Hopefully that niche will be one in which people can make actual money doing it!
The most attention demanding thing on my desk these days is a College Strategic Plan form I have to fill out. Essentially what it means is that I have to figure out how what the theatre is doing and what it wants to do fits in with the goals and objectives of the college as a whole.
As reluctant as I am to admit it, this is a good thing. The common wisdom is that most arts organizations write up their mission statement and then put it away in a closet only bringing it out to copy it down for grant proposals. This whole project forces me to look at the mission statement and think about how it can manifest itself in the context of the college mission.
This is not to say I want to do it. I pretty much spent 3 hours today skirting around the edges of it, allowing myself to be distracted from it to deal with other concerns.
Eventually I got down to business and to my surprise, found that I actually had a lot of ambitions that fit into the goals and objectives.
Now my problem is writing justifications for what I want to do. The vogue these days is student learning outcomes and since I am a non-instructional unit falling under a non-credit division. One of the unrealized goals of the last strategic plan was to upgrade the position of the theatre clerk to a classification that reflected the job she actually does.
This time around however, I have to fill in a box that describes how student learning will benefit. I just don't think it would be wise to note that paying for the job she is actually doing will prevent her from venting her frustrations with a shotgun thereby securing the safety of the students.
Speaking of unrealized goals, looking over the old strategic plan and discussing it with the clerk and my predecessor, I came to realize there were a lot of goals in there that other divisions are probably only vaguely aware they were supposed to be accomplishing in conjunction with us.
My predecessor decided to respond to the politics of the college by finding every opportunity she could think of to propose programs and projects, many of which included other divisions and departments. Her strategy was to get the theatre mentioned in as many places a possible so that the 99.5% of the faculty, staff and administration that never attended performances would at least gain the impression that a lot was moving and shaking over there.
So I am reading over the old document and am getting really impressed by the ambitious plans people had. I am on my way out the door to talk to our once and future partners about revisiting these goals for the future when the office manager stops me and sort of sheepishly informs me that she and the old theatre made the goal up with minimal consultation with these other people.
Now I am sitting here thinking what a good idea some of these things are (which is probably why they were among those that made the cut to be included in the last plan) and wondering if I will have the staffing to pull it off and should I maybe go and consult with these other folks in earnest.
Courtesy of Artsjournal.com, I read a partially satiric, partially serious article from The Guardian. The author pokes fun at the types of people who attend those mega-art shows that you have to reserve times to see.
But his more serious point is that these type of art shows are really no way to view art. Do you really get a chance to understand what you are viewing with hordes of people passing through and subtle encouragements to move along and make space for the next tour group.
He also points out, quite correctly, that there is something of a herd mentality about needing to see the works at a certain time and place when the show is in progress, but feeling no desire to do so when the pieces are ensconced in their home museums.
It attaches, also, to the self-defeating way in which we choose to appreciate art. That is not to say that we must have conditions that enable us to spend as much time in front of a painting as Wollheim, but the herd instinct the modern blockbuster show produces does not do the greatest paintings justice.This point became clear to me the other day when, in the National Gallery, I shared a room of Titians with a security guard all but uninterrupted for half-an-hour. In that room were some of the same paintings that I had struggled to see at the National's Sainsbury wing temporary exhibition of Titian in 2003.
The reason this piece caught my fancy today was that just last week I was thinking that I was glad I had taken the opportunity to visit the Dali Museum
when I was in Florida rather than having to be in a position of viewing his art with a horde now that the pieces are in the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Okay, granted, I don't live near Philly any more--but if I did...! Visiting the Dali in Florida would still be worth it after doing the Philly show since I presume the side of a barn size pieces found there didn't make it to Philadelphia.
Going to see a Dali show at all would be worth it. I think that my visit to the Florida museum was the first time I realized just how crappy a job posters and other reproductions did at revealing the subtle and not so subtle elements of art work.
I had some people from the state disabilities board come visit my theatre at my request today. When they visited last about 6 years ago to provide input into renovations, there were apparently some miscommunications. I was told that my predecessors were told we couldn't have reserved seating in the theatre because of ADA standards. The people from the board told me the only reason they would advise that would be if people with disabilities couldn't order reserved seats and everyone else could. Certainly that is not the case with my theatre.
They also came to assess two locations on row E that clearly appear to be seating for people in wheelchairs. Six years ago we were told that we couldn't have people in wheelchairs there because it wasn't up to code. Unfortunately, it was a verbal comment so no one knew how the problem could be fixed. In addition, because it appears to be a place for wheelchairs, is closer to the stage and doesn't require a slow ride up on a chair lift, people really want to sit there.
The preliminary comments of the gentlemen who were assessing the space was that it can clearly accomodate wheelchairs without fear of them falling to the level below. However, other people in the row might not be able to pass them. This was sort of disheartening because my theatre pretty much has the widest row of any theatre on the island.
If they are right, it may require knocking a couple seats off near the location and building an extension so that people could pass in front of them. I would really consider losing the 2 seats on either side of the theatre because the locations really make it easy for everyone involved, theatre staff and customers both. We rarely have to use the chair lift because we only have 2-3 wheelchairs at any one time in the theatre. And we haven't sold the theatre out so often that we would be wishing we had those last 4 seats to sell.
Now I just have to wait for the offical report. At least if they say I can't seat people there, I will finally have it in writing.
Of course, while they were there, they noticed a few other little problems. None of them were really serious and a few of them are fairly easy to fix by simply moving some signs a few inches. One of them ironically was a very specific fix that their office had suggested 6 years earlier.
Interestingly enough the ADA standards are a little racist and sexist. A lot of them seem to be based on the size of white Anglo-Saxon males. As a result, to be in compliance, I have to move some Braille signs to a place that is natural for someone of my build to read, but could be a little stretch for the generally shorter Asian and Polynesian population which comprise the majority here on Oahu.
It never occured to me until the guy pointed the spot out and I realized it would be above the heads of quite a few of those who use the restrooms. He commented that the standards were based on Mainland norms.
I also learned that there is no grandfather clause exemptions for ADA requirements. While age of a building will exempt a building of other architectural requirements, the best you can do with ADA requirements is meet them to the fullest extent possible.
Overall I felt good about having them come out. For every little flaw they found, they also found an element of our set up which most other companies did not have.
Also, it is probably good to have an assessment like this periodically so that one can be a little proactive about making changes and show good faith effort if someone accuses your organization of being deficient.
In case you missed seeing it on Artsjournal today because it was a holiday for you, an article appeared from Wired suggesting that the future prosperity of the US lay in right brain activities.
The author foresees that as more left brain logic based jobs either get off shored or relegated to increasingly sophicated software, a demand for people with intuitive and empathic skills will emerge.
There was an interesting section that might mean good things for the arts organizations able to fulfill an apparently emerging need people are beginning to feel-
For companies and entrepreneurs, it's no longer enough to create a product, a service, or an experience that's reasonably priced and adequately functional. In an age of abundance, consumers demand something more. Check out your bathroom. If you're like a few million Americans, you've got a Michael Graves toilet brush or a Karim Rashid trash can that you bought at Target. Try explaining a designer garbage pail to the left side of your brain! Or consider illumination. Electric lighting was rare a century ago, but now it's commonplace. Yet in the US, candles are a $2 billion a year business - for reasons that stretch beyond the logical need for luminosity to a prosperous country's more inchoate desire for pleasure and transcendence.Liberated by this prosperity but not fulfilled by it, more people are searching for meaning. From the mainstream embrace of such once-exotic practices as yoga and meditation to the rise of spirituality in the workplace to the influence of evangelism in pop culture and politics, the quest for meaning and purpose has become an integral part of everyday life.
This may present an interesting turn of events. I have been reading articles of late that talk about people skipping college or going into technical training to gain specific skills. While it is certainly true that colleges could do a better job at endowing their graduate with practical skills, if this Wired artice is correct, it may be time to shift one's concentration back to liberal and fine arts degrees to gain marketable skills.
Okay, I was looking at the NEA site today looking for more information on their Fast Track grant program and one link led to another and a found a number of interesting links I thought I would share.
The first is the Cultural Policy and the Arts National Data Archive. This is a sorta interesting place to visit because as the name suggests, it has a lot of statistical survey data that researchers might be interested in. But it also has a quick facts section with reports on some interesting things like how dancers transition from a career in that field into another area of activity (dancers apparently retire at age 34).
It also contains sections on topics like the public's perception of arts, change of newspaper arts coverage from 1998 to 2003, religious buildings and libraries as cultural programming venues. There is a lot of generally interesting stuff and this site could provide a source of info for those doing arts advocacy.
Another really interesting site was Arts Anonymous. The site applies the classic 12 step program to the arts to provide support to those practioners of art who feel guilty about doing it and enjoying it.
The problem signs which indicate one might need help are:
1. We grew up in an atmosphere of invalidation which resulted in ambivalence about our artistic expression.2. In any given twenty-four hour period we find ways, consciously or unconsciously, to avoid doing that which gives us the most joy -- expressing our creativity.
3. We have withdrawn from our art by investing ourselves in lifestyles, relationships and work activities incompatible with our artistic purpose. Our creative energy has often been diverted into destructive compulsions toward alcohol, food, sex, money, drugs, gambling and preoccupation with the past.
4. We have made needless sacrifices for our art and yet are afraid to make the necessary sacrifices. We are unable to balance the significant areas of our lives -- Physical, Financial, Social, Love, Family, Spiritual and Creative.
5. Self-defeating thoughts and societal myths turn in our heads: It's too late -- I'm too old -- I'm not ready -- I am not enough -- Art is not practical -- Artists are neurotic -- You'll starve. We have accepted these as true when, in fact, they are not.
6. We have felt intimidated by other artists' success. Jealousy, envy, fear, self-pity, perfectionism, resentment and other character defects block our creative expression.
7. We stand always on the edge of a beginning, afraid of commitment. Fearful of pursuing our creativity as a means of earning a living, we get caught in the Amateur syndrome. The concept of supporting ourselves through our art has seemed overwhelming. We are unable to determine the monetary market value of our art.
8. We have thought of our art as divorced from reality, denying ourselves the right to follow our dream. We forget that artists are entitled to their right work and deserve the happiness and success that right work brings.
9. We deny our responsibility to fully develop and realize our talent. We do not feel worthy of the success we achieve or desire. We feel like a fraud.
10. Being multi-talented, we have difficulty discerning our true artistic vision, making a commitment to it and establishing the priorities to fulfill it.
11. We have difficulty following through on projects and frequently sabotage our efforts. We want to work at our art but don't know how. We become impatient with the process, forgetting that the results come in God's time, not ours. Our time is unmanageable.
12. We have been afraid of our creative energy and have mistrusted our creative instincts. Lacking spiritual awareness, we have not seen ourselves as channels for the infinite creative process. Our art is a gift to be shared.
Gotta admit, I have been there on most of the points and quite a few occasions.
I think I have mentioned the NY Foundation for the Arts. Though they are nominally focussed on the arts in NY State, I have to say that 80% of what you find on their website is pretty helpful in the rest of the country. You will find some of that information on this links page which has some interesting pages listed like the Support Center for Non-profit Management and Alliance for Nonprofit Management , Alliance for Nonprofit Governance and The Nonprofit Genie (among others, of course)
Another NYFA link I wanted to point out was their Marketing the Arts In Nonprofit Organizations. It has some sample press releases, promotional materials and a marketing guide. Mostly, I just like it because the page opens with the line "If you present a program and no one comes, did it really happen?" and I am easily amused.
If you read reports on why people are no longer attending arts events, inevitably television, video games and computers will be mentioned.
What isn't mentioned is that there is sort of a conservation of creative energy going on over the internet. Even though people are online more, there is a creative itch that they seem to need to scratch. Take for example the MUD Achaea (FAQ on MUDS here). They are a text based mud meaning no graphics are provided over the screen--all the colors, textures, etc are created within the player's mind from the description presented.
However, for the past 5-6 years they have held monthly artisianal and bardic contests where players create visual representations of life in this text based game or songs/stories/poems reflecting the same. Considering that they also award runners up and merit awards, that is a fair bit of art being created to give tribute to an imaginary world.
Even more--they have a sophicated mechanism that allows players to create their own plays in game on a stage in one of the towns. It even goes so far as to allow you to set ticket prices, reserve private boxes, build sets and costumes and employ special effects.
This can give some hints as to the direction technology and theatre may be headed together.
Using MUDs for something other than entertainment has long been contemplated as seen in this paper on their use in education written a decade ago.
And the theatre world has been using a form of MUDs called MOOs to hold meeting and forum for almost as long. The Association of Theatre in Higher Education created ATHE MOO to provide opportunities for discussion and debate to those who couldn't attend their annual conferences.
Andrew Taylor touched on a topic today that was close to my mind. He discusses a new trend in search processes that is more akin to roleplay than interviewing.
The topic of interviewing processes has been in my mind recently because it appears I might finally have an assistant. (Joining in time for the last two performances now that I have finally gotten half the hecticness under control!)
However, despite my happiness at having found an assistant, I have begun to question the search process. To begin with, despite all the paperwork that had to be filled out, the question of whether she was allowed to work in the US was never asked until after the offer had been tendered. Now I am in the process of filling out visa paperwork because she was still a fairly strong candidate. Whether we can get it approved and in time remains to be seen.
There were also a couple other little things that have happened that have been nagging in the back of my mind about the process that has had me wondering if other elements should be altered. Nothing major, just a few little tweaks that we might be able to effect to provide us as interviewers with a clearer picture of the abilities of the person before us beyond how adept they might be at interviewing.
The way the director of human resources told us to frame our interview questions was as "what if" situations where we could assess the answers rather than as yes/no questions like--"Do you enjoy doing X" The answer may be no, but the person may be very good at doing it. They just truthfully don't enjoy it. Ask a parent if they like changing diapers--then witness the love with which they do it.
What Andrew Taylor points out extends that a bit further--make them perform in the "What if" situation. The only weakness of this approach is that you can only use it in person. If you don't have a lot of travel funds available for recruitment, it may be difficult to give all promising applicants an opportunity to strut their stuff.
I found an article from the Rocky Mountain News noting that a local PBS station had chosen to air the controversial "Sugartime" episode of Postcards from Buster.
In case you have missed the hordes of articles and news stories on the subject, Buster is a cartoon rabbit who travels the country sending back reports as it were on different activities around the country. The episode in question depicted maple sugar making on Vermont farms headed by lesibans. Though there is apparently no mention or appearance of any sort of romantic relationship between the women, the Secretary of Education applied pressure to PBS to yank the episode. A number of stations have chosen to show it anyway.
What made this article so interesting to me was that one station on Channel 6 chose to show the episode at 11:30 at night so parents could judge whether to allow their children to see it. (There was an implication that it would air again at some point) However, PBS channel 12 (KBDI) which is apparently the other Denver PBS station chose to air it at 7 pm and follow it with a 90 call in panel discussion show.
Thinking that perhaps there was a lesson here for arts organizations to perhaps use controversy to move regularly scheduled talk back/Q&A sessions away from mundane questions like "how do you remember all your lines" to more gripping discussions, I visited KBDI's website to see how the Feb. 9 experiment turned out. I figured being a PBS audience there might not be the explosive confrontations one would find on Jerry Springer and some good discussion might emerge.
There wasn't any video footage to be viewed, but they did have a comments board. Most of the comments fall between Feb 9-11 (just so those of you visiting in a few months can get a sense of how far you may have to scroll down.)
The biggest lesson that one might derive from the feedback is that when hosting an opportunity for discussion about a controversial event so that you can convince people you don't champion the causes of a perceived liberal elite -- you should actually include people on the panel that represent both sides of the issue.
It is not entirely clear whether the host was berating people because of their views or if he was always like that and people who complained hadn't watched the show before. It does seem like the views represented by the panel itself were decidely one sided.
It is tough to be yelled at in ones own house to be sure. It seems to me that in an age where the public can change the channel to one that expresses the views of the niche to which one subscribes, there is an opportunity and perhaps duty placed upon live performance venues to provide a forum for intelligent discourse since their settings are not so easily escaped.
But--it needs to be well-balanced and moderated and I imagine that would be tough to do these days. When you see and hear people relentlessly berating each other on television because that holds the ratings, you think that is the way one engages in discussion about topics with which one disagrees.
I am sure our Founding Fathers were not as cordial in their dealings as we imagine them to have been. (Just think of how many must have muttered something about going Aaron Burr on someone's butt) I imagine they might have held themselves to some level of civility though.
This could be a great service arts organizations provide to society. Live discussion doesn't allow you the anonmity of the internet or a phone call in. Done with the proper respect and care, arts events could become a welcoming venue for people who don't necessarily view themselves as arts intellectuals, but who crave balanced intelligent conversations about issues of the day.
Doesn't this happen on college campuses one asks. Well, currently Ohio is considering a student bill of rights to ensure those with views that conflict with those of their professor aren't intimidated into keeping quiet.
Besides, as much as tickets to arts events cost. It is still cheaper and more accessible to a wider portion of the population than paying for college credits.
In the spirit of my entry praising easy grant applicant processes, my award for the easiest, most organized company to work with this year goes to....Dayton Contemporary Dance Company.
Actually, I may be a bit too premature since they won't arrive for another couple months. However, I have to say they are the most organized group I have worked with this year. Not only do I have the contracts and riders returned and signed, back in November they sent me a rooming list and a list of all those flying out so I can make interisland airline arrangements for them. They actually forgot they had been so efficient and in an attempt to be organized, sent me another copy this week.
Actually, truth be told, they are almost frighteningly well organized. They have been ready to have a discussion about outreach programs with me since the fall and have been eager to set up a call with their artistic director to make sure the outreach program suits my needs.
This is all rather annoying--I am used to be feeling smug and superior to the performers I have contracted by being more organized than they. I am usually the one asking for information and having people get back to me!
Having the illusion that I am better than everyone else is the only bright spot of my day that makes all the crap I face tolerable! Damn them for stealing that from me!!!
Hee hee, this is kinda fun. Though it does occur to me that we haven't discussed catering yet broaching that subject with them tomorrow will allow me to salvage a little arrogance.
In any case, the old adage that forewarned is forearmed is so very true when you are presenting performances. Knowing stuff like this so far in advance makes doing a show so much easier -- unless you have no intention of providing what the performer asks for and like to take advantage of lack of organization to plead ignorance.
So far, DCDC is a model of organization and professionalism and I would recommend them on that basis alone. However, I will try to remember to do a follow up report on them in April.
The title of today's entry is something of an addendum to the "grass is always greener..." saying. Today I found myself watering my neighbor's lawn as I wrote a letter of support for a grant application.
The artist in residence for my theatre is the artistic director of a contemporary dance company We will be developing a new dance work for 2006 based on a Hawaiian myth. Right now he is applying for a Rockefeller Foundation grant to help underwrite the development of the piece. As one of the organizations involved with the work, I was asked to write a letter of support.
I spent about 4 hours on this letter polishing and honing it to sing the praises of the group with which I was going to partner. At around hour 3 I realized, much to my chagrin, that I had spent more time discussing the value of the dance company's work in terms that were aligned with the foundation's goals than I did on the last grant I wrote.
I don't know if it was because I had a little more time to write than I did when my last grant application was due (and I didn't have the budgetary questions looming ahead of me) or because as an outsider who doesn't know all organizational flaws the dance company has it was easier to be effusive. Or maybe it just feels less sincere when you are writing about all the ambitious plans you have while there is a voice in your head that wonders whether you actually have the organizational capacity to pull it off.
On the flipside though, even though the money won't go to me directly, I will benefit if the company receives the grant because I have a greater assurance that the show will be good if they aren't focussed on fundraising.
And I will say one thing--this guy is good about lining up support early. In his playbill this past weekend, he had a flyer soliciting funds for the development of this piece two seasons hence, perhaps at the expense of his upcoming seasons.
I have really been looking high and low for more people who blog about their experiences in theatre. I haven't been terribly successful, but I will admit, the signs look promising. People seem to be realizing the potential for the blogs.
For example, a Google search found this nascent blog for The Playmill Theatre in Montana. You can't actually get to the blogs from the theatre's homepage. In fact, the home page itself is rather undeveloped at the moment. It just goes to show though that someone was thinking and wanted to get the cast and director (and perhaps the community) writing about their experiences.
I also found a very short, sparse attempt at a production blog for Aristophanes' Acharnians.
The British seem to be doing the best job of blogging about their lives in the theatre. In addition to My London Life which I cited in an earlier entry, I have found yet another British director faithfully chronicling his experiences running his own company. (Yeah, I know, I could be doing more of the same myself. I suppose you all want to hear about my shopping trips to buy cases of water and soda for performers, eh?)
I also found a culture blog by a Brit who is something of a Terry Teachout of England (though not as prolific an author/journalist/everything)
I was very happy to see that a theatre in San Francisco was taking the idea of bloggers as the new critics to heart and offering free tickets to bloggers with a fairly significant daily readership who agreed to write a review within 24 hours. May have to follow up with them to see how well it worked.
I also found a blog in Portland, OR that does nothing but list upcoming shows and provide links to many of the local theatres. One might think that this might be useless since the local paper prints essentially the same information. And that may be so. However, the format for the listings are so simple that it is very easy to log on one Friday night and scroll back through a page or so to find out what is going on--or follow the link to a favorite performance group to find out what in particular they are currently doing.
More to come...let me know if you have a favorite arts blog out there that has gone unmentioned by me.
Those of you who have been reading since October may be aware that I belong to a block booking consortium (some previous entries here and here)
Last Monday we had the longest meeting to date trying to hammer out schedules for performers. Near the end, one of the newer members asked if it was always this difficult to resolve the scheduling. Some of the other members said this was the worst because there were now more members than ever before and their organizations were becoming more ambitious and doing more performances.
For me, however, I somehow emerged worse off than I entered. I had come in expecting to make final arrangements for 7 groups and then having to contract another 3-4 on my own. Somehow I walked out with only 5 groups and the prospect of scheduling 5-6 more on my own.
What happened was this-my consortium and another consortium, the Hawaii Arts and Music Soceity, hold joint meetings because of the 90% overlap of membership. Since they tend to do a lot of classical, early music and opera, I am not a member. Most of the other big presenters hold dual membership and with more people wanting to do more, they easily filled their schedule and as a result decided to postpone presenting two of the people I wanted.
This actually might turn out for the best because I am thinking that instead of trying to make up the difference with acts whose airfare from the mainland I might have to do pay, I might look into putting together some sort of interesting programs with local performers. The Knight Foundation article I quoted last week mentioning the San Diego Symphony's "Can Classical Music Be Fun" program got me to thinking that perhaps I could talk to the symphony or ballet about putting together an interactive/fun program to be presented on this side of the island. Who knows, perhaps it will grow into an annual event or lead to further partnerships.
So I was checking my visitor stats for January. The report only shows the IP addresses of people who visited, but it does give me links to websites through which people clicked through to find me.
Turns out that people have been linking to me via the blogs maintained by a paid arts blogger, I reported on in an earlier post. The blog entries in question come from Worker Bees Blog and 42nd St. Moon.
In the former blog, she talks about the importance of monitoring your statistics and how she can now track my blog and my references to her. I imagine we will now do a humorous little turn at watching each other watch each other.
In the latter entry, she mentions how 42nd St Moon is becoming powerful at leveraging blogs. This is quite true because by visiting that entry, I then clicked through to the other related blogs, one of which is focussed on the benefit of technology to arts organizations.
Given that this whole series of events was predicated on my search for other arts blogs beyond artsjournal.com, I am starting to look at my whole effort at blogging as something of a success which is gaining momentum.
Since the December holiday season I have gotten email from people whose neices have turned them on to my blog and from an administrator at the National Dance Project because someone brought my comments to their attention.
Makes me realize that there are a lot more people intentionally visiting the website than I realized. The web stats report tells you what keywords people used in search engines to find your website. My only comment is to look at the first word in my blog's name. I will let you infer some of the bizarre search terms people are using from that.
I was visiting the Knight Foundation website and came across the aforementioned article, "Smart Concerts: Orchestras in the Age of Edutainment" by Alan Brown.
It offers some interesting reading about the tension between offering classical music in a manner that is appealing to new audiences while adhering to the expectations of long time audiences. (Of course the lessons learned are applicable to all the arts.) The former doesn't attend often, but constitutes the future of your organization. The latter frequently attend, donate much needed monies in the face of declining foundation support and sit on your board. All of which can make it difficult to innovate.
Brown gives a number of examples of innovations that orchestras are using, including Concert Companion with which readers of Greg Sandow's blog may be familiar.
He also recounts the resistance that some of these programs have faced, including booing at the Minnesota Orchestra.
A little more about that in a bit.
Brown makes some familiar observations about arts attendance. One thing he notes is that consumers want a more intense experience in a shorter time because they have less time. Thus the prevalence of extreme sports and standing ovations. People want to feel that they have had a good time in the time they had.
Another observation is that while technology makes so many more musical options available to people with the ability to download opera as easily as the latest pop single, it also allows people to continue to reinforce their own tastes by providing them with so much material, they never get tired of listening and experiment with other options.
One section I found particularly interesting:
In his book "Who Needs Classical Music?," Julian Johnson argues that classical music, fundamentally, is discursive in nature and requires careful and complete listening in order to be fully appreciated. Instead, he says, most consumers “use” (or misuse) classical music to alter or underscore their mood, or just to fill empty time.2 Mass culture’s appropriation of classical music may be good or bad, depending on your point of view, but there is a larger idea here. Much of music’s allure derives from the relative ease with which it can be selected and programmed by the listener. In focus groups, music lovers describe how they listen to one kind of music for vacuuming, another kind of music for cooking, another kind of music for exercising, and so forth. Consumers understand what it means to be your own curator, and derive great satisfaction from arranging art around them to the satisfaction of their own aesthetic – especially music and visual art.
I really appreciate Julian Johnson's views. The last artistic director I worked for wouldn't recommend musicians to people who wanted live background music at parties and receptions. His feeling was that a musician works too hard at his/her craft to be ignored and spoken over. And it reinforces the idea that their product is worthless and disposable. He felt that it was better to get a good CD player and sound system.
I also like the idea though that consumers know the value of being their own curator. I am not quite sure how to execute it, but I sense there would be great value to an arts organization in a program that validated this sentiment and empowered patrons in some manner.
The four tactics that Brown says are being employed by orchestras are: contextual programming, dramatization of music, visual enhancements and embedded interpretation. Of these, I would imagine that dramatization and visual enhancement might be considered most sacreligious by long time concert goers.
Dramatization is "theatrically produced in service of a larger concept or purpose using some combination of narration, drama, dance, scenery, lighting and video. But the music remains the main attraction.
Visual enhancement, which he describes as the most controversial, "...can be divided into two categories: visual enhancements that add an artistic element to the concert, and visual enhancements that (literally) magnify the performers. It is not unusual for orchestras to introduce visual elements such as banners, flags, projections and ambient lighting to the stage, sometimes in service of a theme or special occasion."
Since these programs try to "sex" the music up by adding new elements rather than allowing the music to stand on its own merits, I can understand why people might be upset.
Contextual programming he defines as "contextual programming as the practice of selecting programs, series and even whole seasons around unifying ideas – topics, themes, genres, idioms, artists and other constructs – however focused or oblique. Contextual programs have more conceptual glue holding them together."
One thing he points out is that unless you are a long time attendee or a musician, you might be hard pressed to understand why a particular mix of music from different composers was chosen for performance. (Lord knows, I have always wondered) Contextual programming offers some sort of narrative that explains this. As noted, it could also be oriented to a theme like The San Diego Symphony's Light Bulb Series program, "Can Classical Music Be Funny?" (Lord knows I have wondered that as well.)
Embedded Interpretation encompasses elements which are part of the performance itself, such as the Minnesota Orchestra where the conductor provided some explaination about why the pieces were put together (many loved it, some booed) and the Philadelphia Orchestra where the musicians share insights about music during their summer programs. Of course, there is also the Concert Companion which provides commentary synchronized to the music broadcast to a handheld PDA.
The whole article is worth reading because I only touch on some of the examples given and I think many of them can inspire programs for other organizations.
A short entry today since a new nephew joined the family a few hours ago.
It occurred to me today that while there are articles, classes or at least textbook chapters on pretty much every aspect of arts management from company to fiscial management, I have never really read any good information on donor relations, specifically wooing them. I was having lunch today for the first time with one of the bigger donors to my theatre. It was essentially just an opportunity for him to meet me as the new theatre manager, etc.
I was taking a fairly low key approach, letting him talk about his trips to Southeast Asia, etc and his 18 years of experience as the grandfather in a production of Nutcracker. The development person who was with us apparently thought the conversation was moving too slow and about 5 minutes into the meal says "So, Joe, tell us about your plans for the theatre." and later "So X, what do you think the theatre should be doing?" And when he got up to go to the salad bar, she started to tell me what to ask him when he returned. (Which I didn't)
I actually had to keep from laughing because it really felt to me like a sitcom where people are on a blind double date with friends and the friend that did the setting up tries to find common ground by commenting on the interests of those who were set up.
Some friends of his told me he was of the mind that he would give when he wanted to give so I didn't feel pressured to really sell him, especially at our first meeting.
Despite the fact that I thought the development person was a little more pushy than was warranted, I was sitting there weighing all my options. Was I being too quiet by letting him talk about himself? Since he has been associated with the theatre longer than I have, I am really in a place to tell him about the theatre and not come off as condescending by telling him things that are patently obvious to him? Should I be talking more about my vision, or now that I have sketched a basic outline of my goals, just allow him to ask if he wants additional information?
In some regard, it is actually easier to be in a situation where you want to make donation request. In such a case, you know the goal of the meeting and you know what the successful outcome will look like. I have been on those meetings and meetings that were precursors to them.
What happened today was more like a meet and greet reception or a party where you mingle and make contacts. Only in this case, you don't have the option of moving on to speak with another person when the conversation lulls. Yet with a development person sitting there, the situation isn't entirely casual either. His/her presence introduces an element of expectation into the mix.
I don't know if there are any correct set of guidelines for meeting with potential and existing donors like "If the goal of the meeting isn't to make an ask of money or aid in recruitment of other donors, then you should be this aggressive, if it is, then do this." I am sure it has as much to do with the local culture and the person as anything else. Some people don't appreciate a run around and appreciate directness, others want to have a relationship developed with them as a person.
If I do find a good bit of text on donor relations, I will let you folks know! (Likewise, let me know if you already found one!)