Loss of Spontaneity

A couple of years ago I started volunteering for a local theater group. Through that activity I met people who invited me to become an usher at our local Symphony Hall and at the historic Orpheum Theatre. As a Symphony Hall usher, I work for performances of the local Symphony, Ballet, and Opera companies. The Orpheum hosts small touring companies, concerts of various genres, and events sponsored by local arts, educational, and charitable organizations. I also am one of the docents who give tours of the theater. In the second half of 2015, I was offered the role of Usher Captain (oooooh!). I said ‘yes’, believing as I do, in most areas of life, there is no reason not to take money for something I was already doing for free. Besides, I get to wear a nifty, retro-looking, maroon blazer made of 100% virgin polyester. Everyone loves a man in uniform. The hours vary from week to week but tend to concentrate on evening and weekends.

In another spin-off of my skills as usher extraordinaire, last spring the City’s volunteer coordinator let me know the City was trying to hire “Venue Hosts” at the Convention Center. The hiring process to work for the City is more bureaucratic than I imagined possible but after a few months of processing and interviewing I was hired. The Venue Host gig is fun. Occasionally I will encounter a ‘friend of Dave’; a cranky senior citizen who just wants to complain and vent their sense of disappointed entitlement but most of the time conventions or expos are hectic but enjoyable. I help people find their events in the Center, and their cars afterward. I direct them to local restaurants, theaters, or other points of interest and act as resource for local information. I also get to work closely with the local Convention & Visitors Bureau. Many of the events are corporate but there are others as well. Both Ben Carson and ‘The Donald’ held rallies in the Center. The Salvation Army hosted its Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners there as well. The job is part-time. The schedule varies from week to week, depending on schedule of events in the Convention Center.

In addition to these two, I also volunteer with one of the local museums and three local theater companies.

These factors, plus the usual ebb & flow of life with its auto repairs, dentist/doctor appointments, cultural evenings, and social obligations, mean I seem to be forever updating my calendar and juggling things. I’m not complaining. Most of it is discretionary and I can thin out the calendar whenever I start to feel over-committed. But there is a loss of spontaneity and I am occasionally confronted by the density of it.

Harper’s Other Dad sent me a note last week about an invitation to meet another couple for coffee. The first gap in the calendar that would accommodate such a casual meeting was 21 days hence. Yesterday, H.O.D. learned a friend from the Midwest would be in town on Friday evening and hoped to connect. They had not seen each other in a long time. Arranging it was not a problem, really. I just moved his Symphony ticket from Friday night to Saturday night and adjusted the dog’s day care schedule. Sadly, I won’t be able to join them, however. My next uncommitted Friday evening is February 26th.

 

Double Dose of Divas

Harper’s Other Dad and I spent much of Sunday finishing the process of getting Christmas packed away so, by the end of the day, we were both a bit tired. He retired into the blogosphere, as is his wont,  while I began scanning the television guide for some type of entertainment. And I hit the jackpot finding two gems of the 1970’s playing concurrently; 1972’s Lady Sings the Blues and 1975’s Funny Lady. Oh my, didn’t that little “Last” button on my remote, the one that allows me to bounce between two channels, get a workout over the succeeding couple of hours!

I’ll save for another time, maybe never, my thoughts on the relative merits of the two films as artistic expressions. One fact about which there can be no doubt, however, is both films were ‘star turns’ for major A-list divas of the era. I speak, of course, of Diana Ross in the former and Barbra Streisand in the latter.

Here are my favorite clips from each. Diana as Billie Holiday in the grips of addiction (apologies for the poor sound quality of the clip)…

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjODPpMVrjY%5D

 

And Barbra as Fanny Brice in the grips of a tantrum of self-pity…

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7NLx2iUXuU%5D

What a fun way to close out the holiday weekend!

Black-Eyed Peas 2016

I’ve written before about the custom of serving black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day. One does this to ensure health, happiness, and prosperity in the year ahead. Some people may call this ‘superstition’. I prefer ‘tradition’. You say tomato. I say tomahto….. When New Year’s Day arrives black-eyed peas have to be on the table lest my grandmother climb from her grave to haunt me.

This year my friends at Epicurious (love that app!) sent a suggested recipe. This was nice of them. I don’t know many ways to prepare black-eyed peas and have long since exhausted the known variations. Epicurious proposed combining them with pork tenderloin. The dish included combinations of ingredients I would never have imagined using. Coffee? Pickle purée? What is life without adventure!

Ingredients

1. Redeye glaze:
   • 2 ounces country ham scraps or prosciutto
   • 1-2 teaspoons vegetable oil (optional)
   • 3 tablespoons shallots, coarsely chopped
   • 1/2 cup strong coffee or espresso
   • 2 cups pork stock or low-salt chicken broth
   • 3 tablespoons sorghum syrup or honey
   • 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2. Black-eyed peas with spiced butter:
   • 7 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided
   • 1 cup minced yellow onion
   • 1/4 cup minced garlic
   • 8 cups low-salt chicken broth
   • 2 cups dried black-eyed peas, soaked overnight, drained
   • 5 bay leaves, divided
   • Kosher salt
   • 1 tablespoon each crushed toasted coriander and fennel seeds
   • 1 1×3″ strip lemon peel, all white pith removed
   • 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
3. Tenderloin and assembly:
   • 1 tablespoon kosher salt
   • 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
   • 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
   • 1/4 teaspoon (packed) light brown sugar
   • 2 1 1/4-pound trimmed pork tenderloins
   • 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
   • 1 cup bread-and-butter pickles, blended to a coarse purée

 Preparation

1. For redeye glaze:
   1. Heat a medium heavy saucepan over medium heat. Add ham and sauté until golden brown, adding vegetable oil as needed if the ham scraps are lean. Add shallots and cook, stirring often, until they begin to soften, about 3 minutes. Stir in coffee, scraping up any browned bits.
   2. Add stock, sorghum syrup, and vinegar; bring to a simmer and cook until sauce coats the back of a spoon, about 20 minutes. Strain into a small bowl. DO AHEAD: Can be made 2 days ahead. Let cool completely; cover and chill. Rewarm before using.
2. For black-eyed peas with spiced butter:
   1. Melt 3 tablespoons butter in a large heavy pot over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring often, until softened, about 8 minutes. Add garlic and cook until fragrant, about 2 minutes. Add broth, peas, and 3 bay leaves. Bring to a boil; reduce heat to medium-low and cook, skimming the surface occasionally, until peas are tender, about 1 1/4 hours. Discard bay leaves.
   2. Strain peas, reserving broth. Transfer 2 cups strained peas to a medium bowl; mash into a paste. Return whole and mashed peas to pot, along with some of the broth to thin mixture. Season with salt. DO AHEAD: Can be made 2 days ahead.
   3. Melt remaining 4 tablespoons butter in small pan over medium heat. Simmer until browned bits form on bottom of pan, 5-6 minutes. Stir in coriander, fennel, lemon peel, cayenne, and remaining 2 bay leaves; cook, stirring, for 1 minute. Remove pan from heat. DO AHEAD: Can be made 2 hours ahead. Let stand at room temperature. Rewarm and discard bay leaves and lemon peel from spice butter before serving.
3. For tenderloin and assembly:
   1. Combine first 4 ingredients in a small bowl. Season pork with spice mixture; let stand for 1 hour.
   2. Preheat oven to 350°F. Heat oil in a large cast-iron skillet over high heat. Sear pork on all sides until deep golden brown, about 8 minutes total. Transfer skillet to oven. Roast pork, occasionally brushing with glaze, until an instant-read thermometer inserted into meat registers 140°F, about 15 minutes. Transfer meat to a carving board. Let rest, uncovered, for 10 minutes.
   3. Reheat peas and spice butter. Cut pork into 1/4″-1/2″-thick slices. Transfer to plates and spoon pickle purée over. Serve with peas drizzled with spoonfuls of spice butter.

I was pleased with the fruits of my labors. Should I make this dish again next year, however, I will pay more attention to the admonitions “DO AHEAD”. I’m not the stereotypical “a man, a can, and a pan” cook but doing this all at the same time took more time than I like to spend on a meal, even for good luck.

And Then This Happened

Last spring I started volunteering at one of our local museums. There are a number of volunteer opportunities available but the one I enjoy most, at least thus far, is staffing the Information Desk. There is a nice variety of questions and it affords me the opportunity to interact with most of the guests. Working conditions are pleasant and most of the museum staff and volunteers are friendly.

Another group of volunteers usually on hand are the Gallery Assistants. We call them ‘Rovers’ because their assignment is to circulate throughout the galleries. They give directions, answer questions, highlight changes or updates in the displays and keep an eye open for potential problems. It’s like working at the Info Desk but with more walking and fewer brochures. Rovers are discouraged from congregating at the Info Desk and chatting with the Desk Staff (ie. me) or other rovers. Human nature being what it is, however, it happens. This is especially true right after the museum opens in the morning when guests are few.

Recently, during one such chat, I met a volunteer I had not encountered before. This is not unusual. There are more than 500 volunteers so I see unfamiliar faces all the time. Our conversation followed the usual volunteer chat outline; name? (Sally), how long have you been a volunteer? (2 years), what assignments are you trained for?, etc. When all else fails there is the weather (hot!) and the traffic (congested!). As this conversation progressed I mentioned I also volunteered as an usher at Symphony Hall. Sally said she had always wanted to do that so I explained how it worked and offered to give her the contact information for the volunteer coordinator. She eagerly said; “Yes, please.” That’s when this got a little strange.

While I looked through my phone for the information I’d offered her, Sally raised both of her arms above her head, palms out, and said; “My Lord Jesus Christ loves me. Jesus Christ is my protector. The Lord is my savior.” Then she looked at me, giggled, and inquired; “What comes next?”

Having been raised a Southern Baptist, I am not rattled by the occasional Pentecostal ejaculation but they don’t usually arise in idle chatter with complete strangers in secular settings. I looked up from my phone, smiled and said; “I beg your pardon?”

“What comes next? I don’t know the next line.” Sally replied.

“I’m not familiar with the prayer”; I replied. “It sounds a little like the beginning of Psalm 23 but that is ‘The Lord is my shepherd… not savior”.

“I don’t know that one” Sally said.

Just my luck, 9:15 on a Wednesday morning and the Spirit decides to descend upon one of the faithful and picks one who doesn’t even know the 23rd Psalm? Am I on one of those hidden camera shows? If this goes viral on YouTube I’ll be annoyed.

About that time some guests arrived so I gave her the email address I’d written down and turned my attention to the visitors. After what seemed like an uncomfortably long silence, Sally wandered off to resume her roving.

In hindsight, I wish I’d come up with a better response than, “I beg your pardon?” Perhaps if I’d said, ‘Amen’ it might have brought the experience to a more rapid conclusion. Not being my first visit to the evangelical rodeo, I knew not to say, ‘Hallelujah’. In fundamentalist-speak that is the equivalent of the chorus in Grease singing; “Tell Me More, Tell Me More”. It just queues up the next verse.

Harper’s Other Dad advised, in situations like this the appropriate response to; “What comes next?” is ‘Lithium or some other mood stabilizer’. I did not want to go there, however. I don’t recall whether it was Carrie’s mom or Sybil’s mom that said; “Beware of practitioners of the mind”. I take no chances. I am pretty sure both are friends of Sally.

Note to self: Email the volunteer coordinator to let her know I gave her contact info to a potential volunteer…. one with whom I’d rather not be assigned.

A Time Capsule

In 1995, my best guess tells me it was November, I visited Toronto for a long weekend. It was not my first trip to Toronto, and I have been back many times since, but the trip is memorable because I went alone. I’d found myself single again (“…. and pushing 40!”) and I was still a couple of years away from meeting the man who would become Harper’s Other Dad.

I’d purchased a ticket to see Sunset Boulevard at the Ford Centre starring Diahann Carroll as Norma and Rex Smith as Joe. I’d even sprung for seat in the Loge. Having recently moved into a new apartment, I thought a tchotchke or two might be in order if something crossed my path. Passing a shop on my way to Art Gallery of Ontario, a wooden box called my name so I brought it home. It has occupied the same spot on my dresser ever since, albeit it in 4 different homes.

For reasons far too prosaic to detail I made the madcap decision yesterday to open that Canadian box. I felt just like Louis Leakey. I didn’t find anything particularly surprising but the currents of time that brought this particular collection of items to settle in the same location intrigue me.

Here’s the inventory:

• A random collection of  things one might call “jewelry” were one feeling particularly generous. Most falls into the category usually referred to in Casa de Harper as “cheap Christmas trash” but a couple of pieces have both sentimental and, potentially, monetary value; an antique badge, my grandmother’s watch, and a cameo that was my mother’s.
• Bills and coins totaling 1671 Costa Rican colones. That is $3.13 (US) at current exchange rates.
• Coins totaling $2 Canadian, currently $1.63 (US). I’ll try to remember to take them to Canada next month.
• 1 Dutch guilder. I think that’s about $.51 (US).  The Netherlands converted to the Euro in 2002 and exchange rates for legacy currencies are a little confusing.
• $6 in Kennedy half-dollar coins.
• $17 in one-dollar coins, including 5 Susan B Anthony dollars.

Among the decidedly less valuable:

• A faded movie ticket stub for the King of Scotland, 2/18/07 – 5:00 show.
• A broken button
• A picture hanger
• One (only one?) rubber ear piece from headphones

And on the bizarre side:

• A screw that I found among my mother’s cremains. (I choose to believe it was from the coffin.)
• 3 matchbooks. Two are from businesses in New Hampshire. This is odd because I have never been in New Hampshire. The third matchbook is from a leather bar in Toronto called The Black Eagle. That is still somewhat odd, given that I’ve never smoked, but at least it’s a place I’ve actually been.
• 2 Trojan “Twisted Pleasure” condoms, unopened, with an expiration date of March 2009. (I guess I wasn’t the belle of the ball at the Black Eagle.)

I took the opportunity to dispose of the ticket stub, the button, and the antique prophylactics. The matches are stashed in the kitchen in a drawer where I might seek matches at some future time. The ear piece has joined its fellows in a box in the office. The picture hanger has moved to a tin in the garage with more of its kind. At some point I should put the jewelry in one of the other places I have stashed such “treasures” around the house. The American coins should go to the bank, though I want to check whether there might be a premium for the Susan B’s. For now they are all back in the Canadian box.

The guilder and the colones may have found their permanent home. I’ll leave it to posterity to determine the best future for them. Maybe I should just put them in an envelope and mail them to the Treasury Departments of their respective countries as a donation toward their national debts. I should open a few more unexamined boxes and see if I find any stamps.

Buyer & Cellar

As the theater season draws to a close, a local company is offering a pair of productions in which gay icons play significant roles, albeit in very different ways. The company’s smaller performance space features the musical drama End of the Rainbow, a dramatization of the last weeks of Judy Garland’s life (see my blog post). At the same time, across the lobby on their main stage, is Jonathan Tolins’ Buyer & Cellar, a one-man comedy about the fictional experiences of a struggling actor working, all too briefly, on the Malibu estate of Barbra Streisand.

Buyer & Cellar opened in New York in February 2013 at a small theater before beginning its well-received Off-Broadway run in June of that year. Brooklyn-born Tolins is an experienced writer/actor/producer. As a playwright, he’s probably best known for his 1993 play Twilight of the Golds. I’d heard good things about Buyer & Cellar from a friend who’d seen the national tour so I had a vague idea that show was a comedy with a gay sensibility. When I saw a local production on the schedule I decided to buy a ticket.

On its face, the plot is simple. It is the unlikely story of Alex More, an unemployed actor who takes a job as a curator, of sorts, for the collections in the basement of a barn on Barbra Streisand’s estate. They take great pains to point out that the story is entirely fictional and inspired by Streisand’s 2010 book My Passion for Design. In the course of a 100-minute monologue, performed without intermission, Alex describes his encounters with Streisand and the effect they have on his life. At the beginning Alex admits to having only a casual interest in Barbra. His epiphany comes once is he accepts the job and encounters the dress she wore while singing “People” in the original stage production of Funny Girl. “I was a little girl in Fatima, blinded by a vision of the eternal”. The gay sensibility was on full display.

The play is witty. Alex describes La Streisand’s attire as looking “like something Donna Karan might design for Dorothy Zbornak” (Bea Arthur’s character in Golden Girls). He also describes Streisand’s famous fingernails as “long enough to make a statement: ‘No I don’t play piano or type my own blog, so fuck you’ “. As funny as the cattiness is, it is not what makes Buyer & Cellar worth seeing. Were that the scope, it would be simply a gay man gushing about a gay icon. That’s not theater. That’s brunch.

What makes the play interesting is the poignancy of Alex’s emotional journey from star-struck to enthralled to disillusioned. He describes it all in very human terms and we get a reflected glimpse of Streisand as a human being, at least as she exists in the mind of the playwright, and not just as an icon. At the same time, the story of his adventures in the rarefied world of Streisand’s Malibu are interspersed with glimpses into his relationship with his boyfriend, Barry. It is the relationship with Barry that roots the narrative in the real world and, more importantly, shows the audience the consequences of Alex’s emotional investment in Streisand’s world.

 I attended the show on a Wednesday evening. The performance was well attended but most of the audience were subscribers, straight couples of ‘a certain age’. In the first few minutes I was slightly uncomfortable at the audience’s reaction to the character of Alex. I had a strong sense they were laughing AT Alex rather than at his story. I thought this would be a long 90 minutes if we were there for a gay minstrel show. Happily, that turned out not the be the case. I don’t know what the rest of the crowd experienced the play. I found it laugh-out-loud funny while still being touching and very, very human. I’ll always show up for theater like that.

Spring Comes to Casa de Harper

Harper’s Other Dad and I attempted to go out about 7:00 AM Sunday morning in search of breakfast. Much to our surprise and consternation, the garage door would not open. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know; “hashtag firstworldproblems” and all that. But a car really is a necessity in Harper’s Valley and having a car one cannot get out of the garage is very much like not having a car at all, except you’re still paying to insure it.

I’ll be the first to admit I am no ‘Joe Fix-it’ but it was instantly obvious even to me what was amiss. The large spring above the garage door that assists in lifting its considerable weight was broken. I knew this because it was in two pieces when it used to be only one. Anyone who’s ever looked inside a wind-up toy knows that springs don’t function when only one end is anchored. When one end is free I believe it is more accurately called ‘turning’ rather than ‘winding’. In any case, this spring was offering no assistance at all in opening my garage door. And, of course, this is happening at 7:00 AM when we’d both been somewhat over-served at a neighbor’s party the night before.

Child of the popular culture that I am, my mind immediately turned (not wound) to Tigger.

A wonderful thing is a Tigger
A Tigger’s a wonderful thing.
Their tops are made out of rubber,
their bottoms are made out of spring
They’re bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy,
fun, fun, fun, fun, fun.

“Bouncy, bouncy, bouncy” my Aunt Fanny! If my garage door were a Tigger it’s bottom was stuck to the cold, hard reality of Arizona concrete in the harsh light of a hangover Sunday morning. “Fun, fun, fun” are not words the come first to mind. Tigger can kiss my spring-less butt.

Resourceful individuals that we are, Harper’s Other Dad and I lifted to garage door manually (horrors!) and backed the car out. He had the inspired idea that we should probably back both cars out since the spring was unlikely to heal before Monday morning. I’d already laid my healing hands upon it without success. And I am way too cheap to pay someone to come out on Sunday to fix it. He is so cleaver…. and remarkably clear-headed in the circumstances.

Like so many things in our society, problems can be solved with the application of effort and money. I briefly considered adopting a Tea Party strategy of donning a “Put the white back in the White House” t-shirt and blaming President Obama and illegal immigrants for my broken spring but I thought that was probably not going to make the garage door open. A couple of phone calls and the promise of money brought a nice young man with a truck, tools, and a new spring. By mid-day Monday the door had been repaired and all was right with the world.

Tree Trimming

Tree maintenance is ‘a thing’ in the desert. Because rain is both scare and seasonal, trees and cacti have relatively small root balls and their roots are close to the surface. They don’t grow down looking for moister in the soil, they grow up and out hoping to catch rain.  As a result, anything that grows tall, like mesquite trees, becomes top-heavy and then tend to fall over or break in the wind. With the onset of the monsoon season only a few weeks away, it is time to do some trimming at Casa de Harper.

This one is blocking the sun from the cactus and threatening to lose limbs in the monsoon winds.

BEFORE

AFTER

* * * * *

This one is getting too top-heavy for it’s place in the yard

BEFORE

AFTER

* * * * *

One of the trunks on this one is leaning precariously toward the house exposing its roots and threatening our roof.
I’m also hoping trimming it up will prevent it from dropping so much debris into the pool.

BEFORE

AFTER

* * * * *

Much of this tree broke off in an autumn storm and landed on the wall between our home and the neighbor’s.
We’re removing it completely.

BEFORE

AFTER

* * * * *

We’re hoping this guy will grow taller and fuller when it is out of the shadow of its soon-to-be-removed neighbor.

BEFORE

AFTER

End of the Rainbow

Being both one of nature’s bachelors and ‘of a certain age’, Judy Garland has been a fixture in my consciousness for as long as I can remember. The Wizard of Oz was an annual television event when I was a youngster. There were also A Start is Born, Judgment at Nuremberg, Easter Parade, and all those films with Mickey Rooney. As I got older, in addition to her work, I became aware of her public persona; the divorces, the drugs and alcohol, and the suicide attempts. She died in 1969 at the age of 47, I was 13. Garland has been dead nearly as long as she was alive and yet, on some level, the legend endures. 

Englishman Peter Quilter’s 2005 musical play, End of the Rainbow, is set in London during what would turn out to be the last weeks of her life. Broke, ill, unsuccessfully battling addiction, and desperately in love with the younger man who would become her 5th and final husband, Garland was booked for a 5-week run at the Talk of the Town nightclub. Interestingly, the play includes relatively little exposition. Aside from a few humorous nods to ‘Oz‘ and a couple of references to two of her ex-husbands, there is not much back-story offered. The playwright assumes the audience will know who she was and what came before she arrived in London in 1969. He’s not wrong.

The play has an interesting provenance. It premiered at the Sydney Opera House in Australia and had successful, often award-winning, runs in Scotland, The Netherlands, the Czech Republic, Finland, Poland and New Zealand before coming to England. After a regional run it opened in the West End in November of 2010 where it was critically acclaimed and ran for six month. After productions in Spain, Germany, and Brazil, End of the Rainbow had its American premier at the Guthrie in Minneapolis before opening on Broadway in March 2012. It ran for 176 performances and garnered 3 Tony nominations.

I have only seen one other play by Quilter, also a musical drama. Glorious!, a biographical piece about Florence Foster Jenkins also premiered in 2005.

The title of End of the Rainbow, of course, refers to “Somewhere Over the Rainbow“, from The Wizard of Oz. In many ways the song served as the leitmotif for Garland’s career and life. Everyone who remembers her knows the song but Garland fans know there are actually two of them. There is the version Dorothy sings near to beginning of “…Oz” which is yearning and optimistic. Then there is the version from Garland’s later-in-life concert performances where the song is darker and fraught with irony. Yearning was replaced by regret and optimism had morphed into desperation. The young Dorothy’s dreamy hopefulness becomes heartbreaking when viewed from the other end. 

The local production is tight and well executed. The set is representational and very effective. The costumes successfully conjure the 1960’s as well as Garland’s on-stage style.

The actor (female) portraying Garland gives a well-crafted performance in, what must be, an exhausting role. Not only is the characterization an emotional rollercoaster fueled by equal parts of desperation, drugs and alcohol but, in a couple of scenes she transitions from emotional peaks directly into singing. I thought the dialog performance were (just) slightly uneven but the vocal performances were spot-on. The onstage mannerisms, the phrasing, and the open-throated vibrato are the Garland I remember.

I joked about it before seeing the performance but it was surprisingly difficult for me to suspend my disbelief seeing Garland portrayed by a female. I’d seen her portrayed on television, notably by Judy Davis in the 2001 made-for-television biopic;  Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows, but all the times I’d seen performers ‘do Judy’ onstage it was by female impersonators and drag performers.

So what is it with homos and Judy Garland? The play acknowledges the link, going so far, at one point, as to suggest the idolatry of the gay community may have contributed to the dysfunction in her personal life, but it offers no theory as to the root of the undeniable connection. I wonder how this play speaks to younger generations of gays? Is the story familiar to those whose icons were Barbra and Bette, …or Madonna and Gaga? I’m not sure. For that matter, does the story resonate for younger straight people? Does it speak to people who, if they remember Garland at all, remember the perceived bookends of here career, “Oz” and “Witness” but know little of what came before, between, or after? Again, I’m not sure. In the end they likely find relevance in the ultimately tragic story of a gifted artist whose life was larger than life. She had great successes and great failures. She struggled and survived, until she didn’t. End of the Rainbow evokes all of that. It was a nice evening in the theater. 

The Future of the Orchestra

In September 2013 I shared an article on Facebook from the New Republic called “America’s Orchestras are in Crisis“. Published in the August 25, 2013 edition, Philip Kennicott’s article explores not only the financial crisis affecting orchestras around the country but the struggles of these institutions to define their mission for the 21st century. I’ve attended many performances in our local Symphony Hall recently and have been struck how, 18 months later, the strategies discussed in Kennicott’s article have been so aggressively pursued. Whether that is a good or a bad thing is a matter of opinion but the direction taken, at least for our local symphony, could not be more clear.

To paraphrase the article, orchestras are confronting the new reality that audiences buy tickets for individual performances rather than in the traditional ‘season subscription’ model. Aside from increasing promotional cost, this means, to a degree, each event has to stand on its own to attract an audience. This leads the organization to confront the issue of how to balance their responsibility as leaders in their artistic communities bringing audiences to concert hall for traditional classic fare vs. putting programs in the hall that will fill the seats. Kennicott quotes The New York Times’ Edward Rothstein; “Cynically led by its managerial class, the orchestra is explicitly urged to lean toward pop and make courting audiences its primary activity.”

The opposing view is represented by a quote from Richard Dare, then the CEO and managing director of the Brooklyn Philharmonic, who compares the tradition philosophy of classical music venues to “A musical North Korea.” ” Quickly now: Rise to your feet and applaud. The Dear Leader is coming on stage to conduct. He will guide us, ever so worshipfully through the necrocracy of composers we are obliged to forever adore.”

Our local symphony seems more closely aligned with the latter point of view. They stage not only the traditional “classics” and “pops” series but a buffet of concerts and special events designed to fill the seats. It may be anecdotal but when I compare attendance to the classical concerts to which I subscribe and the Pops and special events for which I often usher, the strategy must have a positive impact on the ‘bottom line’. There are usually large numbers of empty seats for the classics concerts while the special events are frequently sold at or near capacity. And for many of the attendees, this event is their first visit to the symphony. Say what you will about ‘cultural decline’ or ‘dumbing down the arts’ but there is much to be said for selling enough tickets to meet payroll, not to mention, giving audiences what they seem to want.
Box Office Blockbusters
All Night Long – The Music of the 1980’s
replay: A Video Game Symphony of Heroes
Broadway Romance
Gershwin
Sound of Speed (an evening of music inspired by auto racing).

There were popular guest vocalists:

The Texas Tenors
Diana Krall
Cheyenne Jackson
Colm Wilkinson

And the group I like to call “Symphony as Tribute Band”;

Evenings of the music of:

Louis Armstrong
Queen
Led Zeppelin
Neil Diamond

The 2015-2016 season seems to continue the trend. The classics series is an extremely conservative offering of what Harper’s Other Dad refers to as “Old War Horses”. These are pieces that classical music aficionados love and have seen a dozen times before. I imagine the hope is a list of recognizable favorites will retain, if not attract, subscribers.

For the ‘butts in the seats’ concerts there are some repeats and some new events targeted toward audiences that might otherwise not be drawn to Symphony Hall.

The Music of John Williams
Super Heroes
Pixar in Concert
Schoolhouse Rock!
Cirque de la Symphonie
A Night at the Oscars
“Pitch Perfect: a Celebration of Sports and Music”
The Gershwin Experience
Star Wars: The Music

The guest vocalists will include:

Jason Alexander
Kristin Chenoweth
Human Nature (“Bigger than the Beatles in Australia”)

The ‘Symphony as Tribute Band’ offering includes the music of;
Abba
Billy Joel
Whitney Houston
Michael  Jackson
Beatlemania
Sinatra Sings Sinatra

Returning to the Kennicott article, there is a quote that strikes me each time I read it. “Americans tend to draw the line between connoisseurship and fatuousness at a level just slightly higher than their own degree of appreciation.” In context that might be viewed as a negative but I actually find it a little optimistic. It means the sophistication of our tastes is aspirational. We want to be lead to a level of cultural appreciation slightly above where we are. Whether the audience will actually follow the lead of any arts organization that seeks to take them there, however, is to be determined.