NYCB: taking care of the business side too

[Krystin]

Link to NY Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/17/arts/dan...=1&ref=arts

I saw this article announcing the creation of a new executive director position at NYCB to oversee all non-dance related matters, and I think it's fantastic! From the article it seems that the woman hired, Katherine Brown, is more than prepared to excel in the position, and kudos to NYCB for having enough guts to spend money on this woman in order to reap (hopefully) great rewards from her endeavors in the future. It is also mentioned that this will take a lot of administrative duties off of Peter Martins, which I think can only be a good thing. Artistic directors need to be just that...ARTISTIC directors. In the perfect world artistic directors shouldn't have to focus on financial matters, especially because there is usually a good chance that they do not have the experience or training to deal with the business side of a ballet company. This seems like great news for NYCB.

[abatt]

Since I'm not a big fan of most of the work that Martins has choreographed, I'm not sure that his additional free time to focus on "artistic" matters (choreography?) is necessarily a positive development. I also found it amusing that he said his dancers miss him. I'm not sure if you took a poll privately how many would actually say they miss P. Martins. Also, I think it's interesting that the article mentions that one of the goals is to attract "younger" audiences. I'm not sure this is such a big problem at NYCB. Compared to the opera, the audience at the ballet generally, and at NYCB in particular, seems relatively young. (My impression is that ABT tends to attract an older crowd that enjoys conservative rep, such as full length "classics".) It appears that NYCB's experiment this season of focusing on full length ballets is an effort to attract more people to the theater. However, I'm not sure it meshes with his goal of attracting a "younger" audience, unless by younger he is referring to little kids who are brought by their parents to see things like Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake. There seems to be an inherent contradiction in his puported goal of attracting a "younger" audience and his conservative (boring?) program decisions for this upcoming winter season.

[Simon G]

The bit that makes me gag somewhat, as it always does is the remit of "attract younger audiences" - it's the Holy Grail of fatuous arts admin speak. You can just see it bullet pointed at the top of a job spec.

The answer how to do this is actually incredibly simple. Make a ticket for the ballet no more expensive than a ticket to the cinema - of course that works contrary to the other top goal of decreasing the deficit.

Doesn't anyone on the NYCB board question the viability implicit in the double think of making an incredibly expensive product financially viable while at the same time promoting it to a low income demographic?

And another thing, what exactly is the age range of "younger" - if you had a audience predominantly made up of 80-90 year olds then an audience of 60-70 year olds would be practically spring chickens in comparison.

[papeetepatrick]

Since I'm not a big fan of most of the work that Martins has choreographed, I'm not sure that his additional free time to focus on "artistic" matters (choreography?) is necessarily a positive development.

I agree, it's a little late to develop genius at something you've already proved you're not. I'm not a big fan of any of the Martins works I've seen, although some of it has been okay, that old 'Valse Triste' that I saw Patricia McBride and Ib Anderson do. But that probably had to do with the dancers (I saw them do it maybe 3 times.) Otherwise, I can't think of a single Martins work I actually was moved by, although they are not really so much offensive as just pedestrian.

[abatt]

Could his desire to focus on "artistic" matters be connected to the fact that NYCB no longer has a choreographer in residence since Wheeldon left and Ratmansky turned down the job?

[ksk04]

I hope this isn't inappropriate but I wonder if this comes with a huge pay cut for Martins...the speculated reasons in the past for him making so much more than Kevin McKenzie have been that McKenzie has Rachel Moore as his Executive Director, the implication being Martins has more responsibilities since he was on his own and therefore is doing enough to cover the additional salary.

[jsmu]

Amen to Simon G's and papeetepatrick's posts. "attract younger audiences" is pure emesis,

especially when linked with the worst programming of any NYCB season in living memory.

Valse Triste was made passable by its brilliant and charismatic original cast

and by the lovely Sibelius score. You definitely don't want to see it sans McBride.

[abatt]

I hope this isn't inappropriate but I wonder if this comes with a huge pay cut for Martins...the speculated reasons in the past for him making so much more than Kevin McKenzie have been that McKenzie has Rachel Moore as his Executive Director, the implication being Martins has more responsibilities since he was on his own and therefore is doing enough to cover the additional salary.

Excellent question. I doubt he will be taking a pay cut. In fact, now that he has time to be a "choreographer" again, he may increase his salary in connection with fees he is paid for such activities. Though I dislike most of Martins' choreography, I think he does well with the music of John Adams.

[LiLing]

I was surprised at all the responsibilities listed for P.M. in the article. It's a wonder to me he had any time in the studio at all. Maybe he just wants to slow down. After all he is sixty three. Even former dancers get creaky!

[Helene]

I hope this isn't inappropriate but I wonder if this comes with a huge pay cut for Martins...the speculated reasons in the past for him making so much more than Kevin McKenzie have been that McKenzie has Rachel Moore as his Executive Director, the implication being Martins has more responsibilities since he was on his own and therefore is doing enough to cover the additional salary.

But the article concludes:

Ms. Brown’s arrival will coincide with the departure of Ken Tabachnick, who for the past five years has been general manager, a job that involved administrative duties as well as oversight of the renovation of the David H. Koch Theater for the company. He will continue in his role until Ms. Brown assumes her post and will then become a consultant for the company.

Tabachnick didn't do a lot of things that Martins is turning over to Brown, but he was responsible for administration and at least during the renovation times, I assume the reno took up a good chunk of his time. I assume that Brown will take Tabachnick's salary slot after the transition.

[dirac]

I was surprised at all the responsibilities listed for P.M. in the article. It's a wonder to me he had any time in the studio at all. Maybe he just wants to slow down. After all he is sixty three. Even former dancers get creaky!

I agree, it's remarkable he did all that in the first place. I like some of his ballets better than most people on this board, but then I'm not exposed to a surfeit of them (as I am to Helgi Tomasson's sometimes less-than-inspired offerings here in San Francisco).