Friday, September 28, 2012
Our Opera Does It Right
ABQJournal Online: The day Charles MacKay took over as the Santa Fe’s Opera’s new general director back in 2008, the stock market dropped 500 points. Austerity followed at the Opera as in many other places: salaries were frozen, staff vacancies went unfilled, the retirement program was suspended, and old sets from past performances were reused.
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3 comments:
After being there this summer this article is true. Their fundraising team is amazing and their donor list is deep and diverse. We had to hold house several nights because they were trying to get more people into standing room. They also have great community involvement which helps them fill out the house. They also have a strong financial team that is very cautious which seems to have saved them from the downturn. The fact that they can get people to come to Santa Fe is truly mind blowing because as a city there is almost nothing else there to attract anyone. It is beautiful landscapes and the sunset framed by the theatre architecture is truly magical every night at the top of show. I guess that you can make an opera house in the middle of the desert succeed.
A pat on the back to the Santa Fe Opera for not only making it through the recession intact, but practically *thriving* in the recession. I give a lot of credit to the marketing department for being able to make what is (technically) a superfluous expense, something that people would still want to spend their money on during a recession. It's sad to see the arts lose during economic downturns, but those who do survive these downturns come out all the better. It brings a little hope to the arts world to hear of a company thriving, instead of another one gone down the financial drain.
This article lays out the advances the Santa Fe Opera has made that are apparent when you look at it externally... Huge ticket sales, producing new works, transforming into a tourist attraction, but it leaves out all of the internal progress that has been made. In the past few years they have also improved their apprenticeship programs and even have donors who sponsor specific apprentices. They are at the height of passing on their knowledge to up and coming industry professionals, and hold a very high standard for the work that is produced. Spending the season as an apprentice there two summers ago was one of the most beneficial things I could have done at the time to enhance my education of our industry.
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