Performing Arts Scheduling Conflicts

[YouOverThere]

It often seems that performing arts groups in Denver can't help tripping over each other. Tonight was a classic example. It was day 2 of the Colorado Ballet's run of Beauty and the Beast. At the other end of the block, the Colorado Symphony was presenting one of their more intriguing progams of the year, featuring the gold-medalist from the Van Cliburn piano competition. Denver's top amateur a cappella chorus, Kantorei, also had a concert, while the Boulder-based Colorado Music Festival was sponsoring a chamber concert. Down in Colorado Springs, the Colorado Springs Philharmonic was having a subscription concert. A few weeks ago, a couple of different sets of groups decided that it would be great to hold benefit concerts for Haiti. Guess which evening both of them selected to stage their concerts?

Is it like this in other cities?

[volcanohunter]

Is it like this in other cities?

Yes, and it's frustrating. Money permitting, Colorado Ballet could resolve some scheduling conflicts by hiring the Colorado Symphony to play for their performances. Where I live the symphony orchestra, the ballet and the opera company don't conflict because the same orchestra is playing at all the shows. Likewise, the local baroque orchestra is made up of members of the local symphony orchestra, so the former is scheduled around the latter. However, the ballet and the city's main modern dance presenter don't use the same venue and do program on top of each other, as happened tonight, and when touring artists are involved, all bets are off.

[bart]

YouOverThere, you made me aware that there may be advantages of having just one major performance venue in a smaller city. Our Kravis Center (2300-2400 seats) is the only major opera-house type facility in this metro area. This means that the Kravis, in addition to the shows they bring in on their own, has contracts with Miami City Ballet, the Palm Beach Opera, and the local organization that presents touring symphonic orchestras. (They also had a contract with Ballet Florida before tahta company folded last spring.)

There is plenty of artistic competition, but not among major companies, who cannot perform at the same time.

Isn't there a cultural council or something like that in the Denver area which could coordinate annual schedules to avoid this kind of problem?

[dirac]

It often seems that performing arts groups in Denver can't help tripping over each other......Is it like this in other cities?

Once the new performing arts season gets underway, I'm sure it probably is. Too bad we can't stagger the season like sports - football in winter, basketball in spring, baseball in summer, etc.

[sandik]

Oh, you don't want to get me started on this topic. The dance community in Seattle seems to revel in scheduling on top of each other.

YouOverThere, you made me aware that there may be advantages of having just one major performance venue...

The symphony, the opera and the ballet all used to share the same theater, and it was so very hard -- any growth for one group came at the complicated accomodation of the others. Despite the overlapping programming on some days, it's been much easier since the symphony got its own home, leaving the opera and the ballet to split dates.

[bart]

The symphony, the opera and the ballet all used to share the same theater, and it was so very hard -- any growth for one group came at the complicated accomodation of the others. Despite the overlapping programming on some days, it's been much easier since the symphony got its own home, leaving the opera and the ballet to split dates.

This does make great sense for cities like Seattle (and Denver?) where there is a prestigious resident symphony with an extensive season (and wealthy donor group) of its own. In our city, the local opera company developed plans to build its own theater, and actually acquired down-town real estate but had to drop the project due to lack of funds.

Our situation, visiting orchestras coming in for one or two performances, makes the one-theater arrangement easier. However, our one-big-theater-only situation does require a Board that is committed to providing the classical arts with first dibs. Our Board could fill the theater with old comedians, Broadway tours, nostalgia rock bands, and a few touring dance companies and musical acts, etc., but choose, wisely and at a financial cost, not to do this.

[Jack Reed]

Sharing the orchestra, as in volcanohunter's situation seems like a reasonable (Canadian) approach; several groups may be paying into the musicians' pool of income, so it's good for them, too, and maintains their welcome presence. But touring groups would likely have a hard time coordinating with local presenters everywhere, even if they tried to do it with a computer, I'd guess.

But last October, we had a mini-dance festival in the Chicago area, where local ballet is a little thin in quality IMO, although the Joffrey does offer the common four-repertory-programs-plus-Nutcracker schedule, sometimes running two consecutive weekends, which compares to the Miami company's touring up and down their area of support in southeast Florida: The Paul Taylor Dance Company kicked it off in a distant suburb on Thursday evening without conflict but then on the weekend Miami City Ballet and the Merce Cunningham Dance Company settled in exactly opposite each other to force some of us into triage mode. (The rest of the year we look for the occasional touring company, ABT, Bolshoi, or check the Spring Repertory program of former Balanchine dancer Daniel Duell's school's better students, the Ballet Chicago Studio Company. Rarely a conflict there, and it seemed the fates were unfair last October, when we had to ration our exposure to such top-flight offerings.

Decades ago (I am reminded by this topic) and in a different place, I capitalized on schedule conflict when I saw about three and a half dance programs on one Sunday: IIRC, most of both NYCB programs, the Dance Theatre of Harlem, and a film in a downtown cinema. That was New York in the 70's. Things happened all over, and the transportation system could get you around town to it. (Sometimes we just ran across the plaza at Lincoln Center.) But New York is New York. Or was.

Conflict or near-conflict isn't always so bad for the fan, especially for a visitor packing it in in a short time for weeks of contemplation afterward, but times change, and some coordination for "efficiency's" sake - to make better use of resources and to avoid excluding ticket-buyers who can't be in multiple places at once - sure seems like a good idea.

[dirac]

Absolutely.

[sandik]

Sharing the orchestra, as in volcanohunter's situation seems like a reasonable (Canadian) approach; several groups may be paying into the musicians' pool of income, so it's good for them, too, and maintains their welcome presence. But touring groups would likely have a hard time coordinating with local presenters everywhere, even if they tried to do it with a computer, I'd guess.

Actually, this is slightly less complex than you imagine, since most touring companies are presented by a local or regional organization that should have access to information about local performances and the enlightened self interest not to book their own events on top of a competing program. It's very unusual now for a dance company or other touring group to book and present (and promote) their own events.

Using Seattle as an example, there are several presenters in town that create whole seasons comprised of artists touring from outside the area. In some cases, they run a theater, which makes that element of the equation simpler, but in other cases they don't even control a venue.