Photo credit: Elise Bakketun; Marcy Stonikas, Sarah Larsen; Seattle Opera’s Consul
A lot of ink has recently been spilled about the demise of opera. Audiences are supposed to be drifting away; the number of subscribers is dwindling; people generally are not interested in our art form; all is gloomy, and opera has been described as being pushed off a precipice by public disdain and disinterest.
Based on my experience as a General Director of a major opera company for thirty-one years and in the business of opera one way or another since 1965, I disagree. I have often said that the tradition of opera lovers looking backwards to seemingly rosier times caused our ancestors at the first performance of Monteverdi’s Coronation of Poppea, in 1642, to tell their friends that if they thought this was good, they should have been at Orfeo some thirty-five years before. They also probably complained about so many older people in the audience, reasoning that the new art form was headed for the dustbin. It certainly wasn’t true then, and it isn’t true now.
The United States (and most of the world) has been through a terrible Recession. Most opera companies had to cut back on what we intended to do; if we didn’t and still kept producing at the same level, we would now be in financial trouble. At Seattle Opera I told the audience that we would reduce the physical productions but never skimp on the singers or music.
Did we lose subscribers? Yes. Did we lose single-ticket buyers? Yes. But have these lost, vital members of our audience begun to return? Absolutely. We have worked hard to encourage them both by keeping up artistic standards and by intriguing them with new ideas. They have responded in every way. We have fewer subscribers now than we had in 2008, but this year our subscription renewal rate was the highest since 1998. When bad economic times hit–and I have seen quite a few blips since 1983–I would say that considering the severity of this crisis, we have found the audience coming back at a surprising rate both as subscribers and as donors.
The age of the audience is, as I suggested, a shibboleth that has been around forever, and it is very explainable. When men and women get married and have children, they don’t have the time or the money to buy opera tickets. When they are older, they can more easily afford to come to the most expensive artistic entertainment that exists. If we look back at the early 80s, the audience at Seattle Opera was older on average than it is now. This improvement has come from a vigorous educational program. Schools rarely expose their students either to orchestral or vocal classical music, and it is up to us to do the job. Our education department is twenty-five times more effective than it was when I came. At Seattle Opera in fiscal 2014 we had over 500 education events to all ages, from Kindergarten through retirement communities, all of which encouraged people to discover and explore more about opera.
Marketing uses every possible avenue to attract audiences. Though newspaper advertising is still important, our company uses social media extensively. It isn’t my area of expertise, but we have very aware men and women to keep us up-to-date on Twitter, Facebook and whatever new kind of social media is popular.
Seattle Opera’s board is very active in overseeing our financial condition; the finance committee meets frequently, and we have to present budgets that are balanced and that work. No one on our board has ever tried to get into artistic decision making; they leave that to those of us who are hired to do it. But they require us to be financially realistic.
I believe that one of the ways to keep an opera company in good shape is to keep the public informed of the opera’s financial situation. In the darkest days of the Recession, I made a series of talks in public and on our website explaining what we were doing and why. I have no idea if they helped, but at least we took those interested in Seattle Opera into our confidence. When we then asked them for help, they knew what we were doing to keep alive.
In an earlier blog I pointed out that if since 2008 Dr. David DiChiera has kept a large opera company alive in Detroit, possibly the most depressed large city in the United States, any opera company should be able to do it. I still think that, and I know I live in a city that while it suffered in the recession has a lot of youth and vigor in its business and in such corporations as Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks, Costco, and of course Boeing. Although the amount that each of these corporations contribute directly to Seattle Opera varies greatly, they employ lots of people who both attend and contribute. Still, we have had to work hard to keep and bring in new donors and have tried consistently to turn out a product that people really want to experience. We have, I think, stuck to our core beliefs, the most important of which is quality, and we have kept producing a variety of opera so that our subscribers would never get bored.
We still have financial problems and live very much on the edge; we are after all an opera company. I’m writing this at the beginning of fiscal 2015. Like all non-profits we start every fiscal year at zero. But I know that everyone who works for Seattle Opera, both our union and non-union employees want the Opera to continue and succeed. I further believe that as long as there are people who love the sound of the human voice, unamplified, and are excited by emotional music and live theater, opera will continue to be performed. We are the most expensive art form in the world, but we have the most devoted audience. To say that we are doomed is to forget or ignore how intensely our audiences love opera and how new audiences, if given the access, are moved by what we do. That love based on what Mozart, Verdi, Wagner, Puccini, and all the others have given us, plus a lot of hard work on our part, gives us an exciting future.
I wonder why Seattle has the 25th largest metro GDP in the world, but ranks 167th for opera performances per year. Perhaps this points to a larger issue than just opera, such as America’s unique and isolated system of funding the arts by donations. Statistical data seems to suggest that public funding systems work better for supporting an expensive form such as opera.
I don’t think the Gross Domestic Product is the way to understand the popularity of opera performances. One factor that skews the percentages is the size of our houses. In Seattle our theater holds almost 3000, a very normal size in the United States for opera houses; in Europe most theaters are built for between 700 and 1500 people. The tradition of operagoing in most European countries is much more established than in the United States as well. Public funding systems mean that politicians have a say in how the opera house is run and its leadership. In America private boards are composed of donors who generally are concerned only with the company’s finance and do not meddle in the art. Or at least that’s the way it is in Seattle. Furthermore when you talk about public funding, never forget the charitable deduction for donations to non-profits, something that does not happen in Europe. This is a very, very important part of how American operas function. This is a huge question, but I would personally rather not be controlled by bureaucrats.
If you’re going to claim European politicians interfere in programming, then you need to give us some documented examples to show it is a significant pattern. I’ve lived in Europe for the last 35 years and I can think of only one instance when politicians became involved in a production. It involved an opening scene of a Regietheater production depicting Jews being gassed. I’m not expecting any documentation from you, because the type of “interference” you describe doesn’t exist. We should speak here as intellectuals, not Fox News.
It’s true that many European houses are smaller than in the USA, exactly for the reason that even small cities have full time, year-round opera houses. I love going to the 500 seat houses in cities like Lucerne (pop. 76,0000) or Pforzheim (pop. 118,000) because I can hear opera with the acoustic and intimacy it was intended to have. This cannot be achieved in 3000 seat stadium-like halls which are a gross aberration of what most operas were meant to be. Name one American city with a population of 76,000 or 118,000 that has a full time opera company, much less a dedicated opera house.
A system of funding the arts by donations from the wealthy concentrates the arts in a few financial centers where the extremely wealthy live. That’s why, unlike Europe, smaller US cities can’t have significant numbers of opera performances, much less dedicated houses.
Charitible deductions are a terrible way of funding the arts. The numbers starkly reveal this truth. The USA ranks 39th in the world for opera performances per capita, behind every European country except impoverished Portugal. We are in a class only with third world countries. Costa Rica, for example, comes in at number 40, right behind us. Even Istanbul, Turkey, has more opera performances per year than Seattle – 55 vs. 44.
Seattle only does about one quarter of the number of productions and performances that major European houses do, and its budget is only about one quarter theirs, and yet it claims to be a major company. Such claims are the norm for America, and I personally find them fraudulent.
You make some very good points. I really wish Speight would respond rather than ignore your comments.
I find it quite generous that he published my harshly critical comments at all. The American opera world remains extremely silent about its poor and very revealing comparisons with Europe. Perhaps Mr. Jenkins will address some of the issues I mention in future posts.
Thank you, Mr. Osborne. I am planning to write a blog soon discussing the interesting points that you have made.
Speight Jenkins
Check out this NY Times piece from 1993.
http://www.nytimes.com/1993/05/03/arts/opera-sacred-opera-writhes-in-italy-s-web-of-troubles.html
Nothing seems to have changed much, if anything it has gotten far worse. Not exactly the rosy scenario you like to promote, Mr. Osborne. As for the venues themselves, most of the great opera houses in Europe are 19th century survivors, or replicas as when a contractor elected to destroy La Fenice to make more money rebuilding it than remodeling it. Otherwise, one often finds bad acoustical venues like the Bastille among modern construction.
There may well be political interference in Europe and elsewhere. But in dragging up a NYT column from a score of years ago purporting to describe the situation in one country, where political mayhem and corruption is rife, Brian Bailey’s has struck a flat note.
As for unions tangling with management, what’s new? In any case, the report/column/opinion piece is biased for, while blaming unions, writer John Rockwell seems to have disregarded the basic journalistic rule of presenting both sides by not seeking any quotes .
from union sources.
Nor does Rockwell detail one case of political interference but rather describes the usual tiffs between managers and the problems that face management during tough times. .
Mr. Bailey may well be correct in his claims but, to support them, he’ll have to do better than this.
And here is something more recent, up to the minute.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/23/arts/music/turin-operas-music-director-threatens-to-leave.html?ref=arts&_r=1
“…The uncertainty at the Teatro Regio comes at a delicate moment for opera in Italy, the birthplace of the art form. While many Italian companies have been chaotic for years, the challenges have grown much more serious recently, as the heavily indebted country has struggled to comply with rules on budget deficits imposed by the European Union. These have resulted in less public money for many opera houses, which have long relied on large public subsidies.”
As usual, the New York Times article is propaganda that echoes the neo-liberal economic politics of Wall Street (policies of extreme privatization and free trade.) As such, Europe’s public funding system for the arts is to be demeaned at every turn of the road — something that fits Mr. Baily’s conservative views.
In reality, the Teatro Regio (where my wife worked before joining the Munich Philharmonic) is not even a norm for Italy, much less Europe. And even at that, two-thirds of its funding is still coming from the government — a situation extremely unlikely to see significant change — much to the chagrin of American neo-cons.
Turin is a rich industrial town (home of Fiat) and hence has cultivated some private funding, but the system still has no comparison to the situation in the States. It would be unthinkable for an American government to supply 2/3rds of a house’s funding.
This also explains why Italy has 14 major opera houses (all in effect owned and operated by the state) while the USA with about five times the population only has about 6 or 7 genuinely functional houses, A private funding system will never be able to effectively support an expensive art form like opera.
Italy thus ranks 20th in the world for opera performances per year, while the USA ranks 39th — behind every country of Europe except impoverished Portugal. On the positive side, we beat out Costa Rica in position 40.
Under the American system, opera houses can only exist in a few financial centers where wealthy donors are concentrated. If Italy ever moved to an American system, 12 of its 14 major houses would likely close leaving only Turin and Milan with houses. The Italians will never let that happen. Nor will any other European country.
Of course, we will not hear a word about any of this in the NY Times or any other mainstream US publication. The stable numbers for European public arts funding even under the current US created economic crisis shows that the European system is far more effective, generous, and stable than the system used in the USA. I can provide hard documentation if needed.
Yes, so successful, a model to be emulated, that a fine artist HD Mr. Noseda’s calibre is alienated and fed up with it. Osborne’s insistence that government funding and interference solves everything doesn’t seem to play out in the real world all that well.
The man behind the curtain is a bit of a,fraud.
The we-have-big-houses-and-thus-less-performances argument isn’t going to pan out. A quick calculation of seating capacity times number of performances shows America still lags far behind.
Entirely agreed.
When sponsors call the tune – and more importantly, when they spike other repertoire – then the tail is wagging the dog.
Congratulations on your success. Maybe Peter Gelb and the Met Opera Board in New York would like to attend some of the education events. Maybe if it isn’t broken, it shouldn’t try to be repaired.
Grand Opera is exactly that. As a newbie to the opera medium, I certainly appreciate the classics. They are what made opera grand, as well as the great voices.
The production shows the story. The orchestra and soloists and chorus bring the characters to “life”.
They ARE the product.
I almost never comment on anything, but it just felt that I must thank you for this article. As Chair of the MET Orchestra Committee, it really is encouraging to hear this… Thank you!
When the priorities of an opera company are, as you say, “[to] reduce the physical productions but never skimp on the singers or music.” the priorities are correct. If the singing, conducting and playing are thrilling…. people will come…. hugely elaborate stage machinery or “scandalous” directorial concepts are really NOT what puts people in the seats. And certainly being a prophet of doom is never a way to entice people to give it a try. Bravo to you for your leadership in Seatle and for your clear thinking and for your love of the art.
Thank you for your thoughtful and positive article. I agree that like every company in the world you have to be fiscally responsible and not run a muck.
If you take catchment areas into account, the proximity of urban centres in Europe compared toNorth America makes it easier for the the former to attract ticket buyers.
Generally true, but not always. The Northeastern seaboard has a population density comparable to the densest areas of Europe. 18 million in the NYC area alone. And there are metro areas like LA with around 15 million people, or the SF Bay Area also with countless millions. The difference might be that Europe’s populations are much more uniform in relatively high levels of general and cultural education, why the urban areas of the USA have millions of people living in standards only found in Third World countries.
The USA illustrates that societies that neglect the arts also neglect the general educational levels and well-being of their citizens. A brutal fact, but true.
I believe you are probably wrong in generalizing European educational superiority to that of the United States, but what you say about opera is quite true. More Europeans are exposed to opera at early ages; it is much more a part of European culture than it is in the United States. That underscores why you have more of an opera infrastructure there, with greater willingness for state subsidies. It may not have the same level of support as it once did, but that simply is the case. Most of us who love opera got an exposure to it early on, and it stayed with us. But it has never been large enough to form a political base for subsidies. However, it has less to do with cultural depravity than preferences. What’s frightening here is the sea of seniors I see at every opera performance, and one has to ask where the future audience will be.
What came first? Is it the many fans of opera in Europe that create the political basis for public arts funding? Or is it the accessibility and affordability of publicly funded opera that created the fan base in the first place? Perhaps both sides need to be worked at the same time.
Germany has 83 fulltime opera houses while the USA with four times the population has about 6 or 7 genuinely functional houses and the longest season is only seven months (at the Met.)
See this interesting map of Germany’s opera house landscape. Note how in the densely populated Ruhrgebiet there are 11 full time opera houses within a 35 mile radius:
http://www.miz.org/dokumente/musiktheater.pdf
Dear Mr. Jenkins,
Thank you for your insightful article and, for a singer like myself (who started out in your chorus during my studies at UW), encouraging point of view.
There are as many people who say, “I’m not that into opera” as people who say “I’m not that into country music/thrash metal/hip-hop, etc.” So we mustn’t let that attitude deter us from sticking with classical music and opera.
Although I find Mr. Osborne’s comments accurate (I’ve been living and working in Europe for 16 years now, directly after leaving Seattle), the downward spiral of funding for arts is beginning over here, too. Nowhere on this Earth is there an artistic administrator who isn’t at least a tadbit nervous about his or her upcoming season(s).
But lastly, we should never believe that audiences will dwindle completely. The young will always get older, and older audience members are more open than one might think to new ideas and interpretations. I enjoy my chats with senior opera-goers about the many different versions they’ve seen, and the experiences they’ve collected.
Best wishes to you on your retirement, and thanks once again for remaining active in this way, as an ambassador to our art form!
Christine Graham
You cut back your seasons (and presumably the compensation offered to your chorus and orchestra) by 25% in 2013-2014 and the company, continuing after your retirement, plans a 20% cut in programming (from five operas to four) in 2014-2015. You canceled this summer’s Meistersinger and scheduled a Wagner competition instead. And now that you are safely drawing a pension, you make fun of those who say opera is in crisis, this after you’ve more than decimated your own company’s activities just to keep from going bankrupt. What a hypocrite!
Hypocrisy or not, your comment, and most of those on your blog, illustrate the tendency of Americans to look at results without correctly analyzing the systemic problems that are the causes. In short, opera is far too expensive to be effectively funded using a private funding system. That’s why the USA ranks 39th in the world for opera performances per capita, behind every European country except impoverished Portugal. We may never have a public funding system, but that doesn’t change the fact that it is the only solution. And let’s not fool ourselves, with adequate funding for programming, educational programs, and affordable tickets we could fill our houses just as the Europeans do. Any ideas on how we can develop a public funding system? Perhaps you could ask your many readers for suggestions?
La Cieca / James Jorden: I have respected your work as an opera critic and enjoyed your opera blog. However, your comment here is mean-spirited and inaccurate. As a long-time Seattle Opera subscriber, I’ve seen Speight Jenkins build Seattle Opera into the excellent company it is today. When the recession led to a budget shortfall for the first time in 19 years, he did the right thing and took a pay cut, as did Executive Director Kelly Tweeddale. He asked singers to reduce their performance fees, and they all agreed to do so. Why? For the same reason Speight and Kelly took a cut: they love Seattle Opera and want it to remain successful. Meistersinger was to have been produced in Speight’s honor, and his decision to cancel it was a great sacrifice. If he were a selfish hypocrite, he would have let Meistersinger go on. His pension was assured either way, and the budget would have become the problem of his successor. Instead, he has handed over a financially healthy company with broad community support and a roster of first-rate singers whose loyalty he has earned.
Being a Seattle Opera attender, I take issue with the above comment. A majority of opera companies that didn’t take quick yet painful actions during the worst recession since the Great Depression are no longer operating. Seattle Opera’s board and staff took temporary measures to assure the legacy of the art form. Innovation ensued with introducing new operas to the public, although not considered grand in scale, an important part of the repertoire. The company stayed true to its mission and continued with its 2013 Ring cycle, one of the most successful in its history, and perhaps the only U.S. company to be able to do so and stay in the black. Staff and artists have been informed that the canceled opera will be back and efforts are underway to program for summer of 2015.
Just like we all took measures to make sure our own affairs were in order as we battled the economic downturn, Seattle Opera did as well. It didn’t assume that someone else would step in and write the check or dig it out of a black hole. I think those measures should be applauded rather than spending time in a fantasy world that prioritizes name-calling rather than reality. I for one am happy that we have a company that puts long-term goals of having opera in our community ahead of short-term disappointments.
“La Cieca,” or James Jordan, as we all know him, has shamelessly accused Speight of passing judgment on Bieto’s Boris without having seen it and here he is passing judgment on Speight without knowing any of the facts. How typical.
I was in Seattle Opera’s chorus both before and after the cuts he references and can personally attest that our compensation was not affected by the Board’s decisions to take precautions to ensure Seattle Opera’s future. Speight realized that if he were to plan Meistersinger, his favorite opera, the company would not be able to balance its budget in FY15. I was in the meeting where Speight announced to the company, with tears in his eyes, that he would have to cancel it and place the Young Artists Program on hiatus. Without being asked by the Board, he gave himself a significant pay cut and in addition, donated tens of thousands of dollars to the opera. Mr. Jordan knows nothing of Speight’s pension. His statements betray his ignorance, the compensation of the Seattle Opera chorus, orchestra, or anything of the sort.
Speight hasn’t “made fun” of anyone in his blog. He has shared a perspective you disagree with. Those who cannot do, critique. Perhaps Mr. Jordan is experiencing jealousy because no one is asking him to run opera companies following his very mild successes as a critic, unlike Speight, who was appointed General Director of Seattle Opera after his career as an opera critic. This kind of commentary is sickening.
The problems are many in opera whether it be in the USA or the rest of the world and most of it is down to Corporate Governance. Too many boards are stuffed with the great and the good with a lack of vision and a lack of professional skills. How many on the boards of Opera Companies have a marketing qualification? The CEO’s are no better with most of them inheriting the crown from an artistic background or a Zooligist as is the case of one major UK opera company.
In USA many opera companies have become over reliant on wealthy philanthropists and in the UK too much dependency on Arts Council England. This has led to complacency in opera with money perceivably available on tap every year.
Also too much power lies on the artistic side with too many directors outliving their usage such as Ian Campbell at San Diego Opera (31 years) and John Berry at English National Opera (20 years). This can lead to staleness and entrenchment.
Opera companies need to have better qualified people at all levels of the business and they need to have vision or a long term strategy to reduce their reliance on handouts but without dumbing down to the audience.
Now is the time to go back to the Directuer-Entrepreneur where they have the expertise of marketing and a great enthusiasm for opera, who can build good relations with all stakeholders and bang a few heads together if need be. Couple this with a strong financial control and creative flair and you have a winning combination.
John Simpson
CEO Opera Marketing Research