How To Make Sure We Don’t Have An Audience in 20 years – Part The First
For the past 20 years or so there has been a constant stream of critics bemoaning the fact that there won’t be any audiences in 20 years for classical music. Here we are 20 years later and there are at least some people coming to hear us perform. But despite all the warning signs about our business there is still a whole swathe of folks in our business who seem intent on driving away as many people as possible. Thanks for your help.
Quick Takes: The Gold Medal for the greatest Orchestra goes to…..
Another attempt to pit Orchestras against each other in an unofficial “Olympics” at Carnegie is a real head scratcher. What is the prize, who actually cares and what is the point? Thankfully Alex Ross provides some sanity but what is interesting is how Orchestras making the Carnegie pilgrimage seem to think it is a magic bullet to spur ticket sales back at home……
Those Who Can’t Do Redux – Maestro Myths
As I expected there was some very interesting feedback from my recent conductor rants. Personally, I find the fact that the secret society of The Golden Baton didn’t send the Mahler Ninjas to disrupt my concerts last week quite surprising – whether that means that I’m just too small time to merit their attention is a subject for another posting. But back to the feedback – boy, there are still some serious Maestro Myths out there.
Passing the Buck(eye)….
Why is it always surrender? Why can’t it be retreat to re-engage, re- strategize to re-connect with a community, or rebuilding instead of tearing down? The Columbus Symphony is going a very strange route and is in danger of being on a one-way street with no turning back allowed by essentially giving over day to day operations (and possibly more) to another group. The problem is indicative as the orchestra world grapples with economic realities, but again I say let’s stop being victims and start taking action. We need to stop waiting for the tide to turn and start making some waves!…..
More ASS in clASSical – Unexplain This!
So I’m late in getting to the widely panned Philly marketing campaign Unexpect Yourself. Now to their credit it has created a lot of buzz in the blogosphere but whether it translates into sales and repeat business….well time will tell. What marketing in general seems to lack is creating a connection to relevancy with this and many other tag lines going for a just try it kind of E Harmony vibe. There is an incredible study out there that marketers should take note of that is not sexy but is relevant and might change the philosophy of sending out the message into sending out the messenger(s)…..
Even More STATisfying! – part 2
Yesterday I wrote of our 80%+ concerts that are free of charge, today I want to take my hat off to the biggest donor group (outside of our board) so far this season. This is another stat that made us very proud, and it was also a surprise to them! They are……..
Ron Spigelman wrote:
Keith Hoffman wrote:
Randall Davidson wrote:
Jeffrey Biegel wrote:
JW Turner wrote: