ATLarts

By Brad

January 2, 2008 10:16 PM | Link to this

Mr. Ruhe gives the nod to the Atlanta Opera as “…Atlanta’s classical story of the decade,” because it rents space at a new traveling show hall in Cobb County. Why? Doesn’t every performing arts company logically look for the best and least expensive space for performance? I think most of the performing arts groups also rent halls in Atlanta. Several of them also rent from the same hall such as the Atlanta Boy Choir and the AGMC.

As most of us know, the Atlanta Opera moved to Cobb County as an act of desperation. They were going bankrupt. They were in severe debt and their ticket sales were declining. Let’s clarify the facts. That hall was conceived without the Atlanta Opera in mind. They didn’t have very much influence on its design or anything else. The majority of the design was complete before AO had their first meeting with the hall officials. They are a tenant and they had no choice but to move there. Let’s make sure that is very clear: THEY HAD NO CHOICE! They were even forced to sell their offices. This isn’t “Atlanta’s classical story of the decade.” It is an act of desperation for a sinking ship. That is a small patch on a limping 3 legged, one eyed dog of an opera company and far from exciting. If “Opera hits highest note of 2007,” as the title suggests, then it must have been a very embarrassing season for everyone else.

Also, Atlanta doesn’t need a $300 million performance hall for the symphony. Has anyone given any thought to the wonderful things that a $300 million boost can do if divided among all of metro Atlanta’s arts groups? I think more than make a pretty hall. Contrary to the ASO’s own inflated view of themselves, most of metro Atlanta made their opinion clear that they don’t find the ASO is worth an additional $300 million.

Speaking of opinions, Mr. Ruhe’s initial review of the ASO’s Bernstein show is very different than his retrospective of it now. It was a glowing review at the onset and now it is one of the embarrassments of the year. I think what is more was embarrassing is the ASO’s choice of pixilated and off centered Lenny pictures projected above the stage, the use of the AGMC as dancers instead of singers, and the symphony’s sloppy performance. Candide Overture was junk. The soprano got lost in Glitter, didn’t take the high notes and in the Balcony Scene had too many botched entrances. If Mr. Ruhe were a better musician, I think he would have heard that.

Shame on you Pierre!

By Wowed!

January 7, 2008 1:07 AM | Link to this

I think the AJC should replace Pierre Ruhe with commenter Brad! He seems to have a clearer view of Atlanta’s classical music reality.

By Mrs. B.A.

January 8, 2008 4:21 PM | Link to this

I think the fact remains clear that Atlanta can benefit further from $300 million divided amongst all of the existing arts groups in Atlanta than it can by investing in one singular group – regardless of quality and stature.

The ASO currently has a larger donor base than it does yearly paying show patrons – excluding its collaborative Pops Series. On the other hand, most of the other arts organizations, both professional and community based have far more show patrons than donors. In addition, the ASO services a very small portion of the metro Atlanta arts going public.

As a whole, there are less than 200 active non-profit arts groups in all of metro Atlanta. Approximately 90% of those groups have a yearly budget of less than $1 million. In fact, 90% of them have a budget less than half a million dollars. If the $300 million dollars that is/was being raised by Woodruff was distributed equally amongst 200 arts groups, it would equate to $1.5 million per group. Multiple studies show communities who invest in that fashion for their arts organizations benefit much greater than investing in a single organization. I could find no studies that are contrary to those findings. Equally distributing these funds could be the catalyst for the first real and massive change within metro Atlanta’s arts scene. I would speculate that Atlanta could be a cultural haven if that sort of money were invested correctly.

Instead of us wondering along with Mr. Ruhe about how Woodruff Foundation and Woodruff Arts Center is going to resolve their terrible woes in the coming years and decades, shouldn’t we be lobbying for fundamental change in how this massive non-profit organization uses its funding and why good people are giving money to them? Sure, they bring some good things to Atlanta, but more good things can be done with the smaller organizations who offer a more steady diet of bold and interesting works. How many times must an arts organization perform Beethoven’s 9th symphony for a community to give $300 million for a new building?

By Dangel

January 9, 2008 1:39 AM | Link to this

For those of us who have been a part of the arts scene for decades, we have grown to work around the ASO and the AO. As the previous commenters suggest, there are better things going on than just at the ASO and AO. Mr. Ruhe has a way of picking favorite projects to promote or destroy. This is just another in the long line of AJC reviewers who try to mold the arts scene with articles.

By Peter Stelling

January 11, 2008 1:09 AM | Link to this

I am nearly struck dumb by the comments I have just read while searching for a review of tonight’s regular ASO subscription concert (January 10, 2008) which, mysteriously, at 12:40pm on January 11, has still not been posted.

Why is there seemingly so much animosity out there against the two major performing arts companies in our city (the Atlanta Symphony and the Atlanta Opera)? And I only exclude a third, the Atlanta Ballet, the oldest of the triad, because they misguidedly fired their orchestra and perform to recorded music, which, to my mind, eliminates them entirely for consideration at all until they come to their senses, figure out how to pay live musicians and rejoin the real world.

The Atlanta Opera has made great strides thanks to the windfall of a new performing venue. Who cares how and when the negotiations began, or whether they had input into the design of the new hall? The important fact is: IT WORKS! We can hear the singers and we can hear the orchestra in the same room with us, not, as in Civic Center in DT ATL, as if they were out in the parking lot.

The ASO may have chosen a bad plot of land and an overly ambitious design for their new hall. I call designs like that a “Dallas complex”. Haven’t we, in Atlanta, grown out of that kind of thinking? I have said from the time of their initial announcement, the design is flawed because so much money would go to provide machinery to make the flapping wings flap instead of concentrating on creating a room with great acoustics where our fine orchestra can finally play to be heard in every seat and where they can actually hear each other on the stage. Why not just recreate the Musikverein in Vienna…recreate a hall that works and has guaranteed acoustics? God knows, it would be cheaper and a whole lot more tasteful to look at, as well.

All that being said, I come back to my main point: WHY is there no review of tonight’s exceptional concert on the AJC website? Principal Guest Conductor Donald Runnicles provided a reading of the Berlioz SYMPHONIE FANTASTIQUE that was nothing short of revelatory. I have listened to this piece (a favorite of mine) from the time I was in high school (1950’s, sorry), and I have never heard a reading that stretched it quite to its limits in the way that Maestro Runnicles presented it tonight. The orchestra responded with brilliant playing, and the tempi varied between the slow Germanic-style reading of Bruno Walter to the accelerated excitement of the legendary Toscanini. The passages in the central pastoral movement reminded one of Beethoven’s Pastorale…I never would have thought to link the two pieces, but the similarities in this reading were blindingly ear-opening. Maestro Runnicles is obviously more than ready to assume his new appointment as the Music Director of Deutsche Oper Berlin…his years of service to the craft of operatic conducting spill over magnificently onto the podium of the concert hall and provide excitement to the ear that makes the visual element unnecessary.

By Dangel

January 12, 2008 12:48 AM | Link to this

Peter = Naive amateur.