Dark year for NYCO?
UPDATE: La Cieca has just heard that the "dark season" is not a done deal just yet. The NYCO board meets next week to make that decision. (Given how late in the game this is, most likely the "decision" will be no more than a formality. But La Cieca will keep her ear to the ground, not to mention her shoulder to the wheel and her nose to the grindstone. She also intends to free her mind with the intention that her ass should follow.)
La Cieca has been hearing whispers and grumblings from here and there for a couple of months now, so maybe it's time to go out on a limb and predict that the New York City Opera will take a season-long hiatus in 2008-09. Yes, that's right, no season at all, not until the opening of Gérard Mortier's first year of direction in the fall of 2009.
The primary reason driving La Cieca's gloomy prediction is the lack of any sense of what the repertoire or casting would be for 2008-09, even as 2007 draws to a close. NYCO, like other opera companies, has a fairly long lead time in planning upcoming seasons. Their practice in recent years has been to lock in repertoire and casting more than a year before the beginning of a given season.
For example, it was fairly common knowledge by the summer of 2006 that the current NYCO season would include Vanessa, Cendrillion, King Arthur and so forth; major casting was already set by then as well. Repertoire choices for Mortier's first season leaked several months ago: 2009-10 will feature The Rake's Progress, Einstein on the Beach, Nixon in China, Věc Makropulos, Pelléas et Mélisande, Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny, Saint François d'Assise and Death in Venice.
No such details have surfaced about plans for 2008-09; in fact, an informant tells La Cieca that ever since early last summer "managers have been attempting to nail down the schedule and engagements for their artists, but have been met with stone cold silence from the [NYCO] administration."
This same source continues with a little speculation that your doyenne must say she finds reasonable enough:
La Cieca has been hearing whispers and grumblings from here and there for a couple of months now, so maybe it's time to go out on a limb and predict that the New York City Opera will take a season-long hiatus in 2008-09. Yes, that's right, no season at all, not until the opening of Gérard Mortier's first year of direction in the fall of 2009.
The primary reason driving La Cieca's gloomy prediction is the lack of any sense of what the repertoire or casting would be for 2008-09, even as 2007 draws to a close. NYCO, like other opera companies, has a fairly long lead time in planning upcoming seasons. Their practice in recent years has been to lock in repertoire and casting more than a year before the beginning of a given season.
For example, it was fairly common knowledge by the summer of 2006 that the current NYCO season would include Vanessa, Cendrillion, King Arthur and so forth; major casting was already set by then as well. Repertoire choices for Mortier's first season leaked several months ago: 2009-10 will feature The Rake's Progress, Einstein on the Beach, Nixon in China, Věc Makropulos, Pelléas et Mélisande, Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny, Saint François d'Assise and Death in Venice.
No such details have surfaced about plans for 2008-09; in fact, an informant tells La Cieca that ever since early last summer "managers have been attempting to nail down the schedule and engagements for their artists, but have been met with stone cold silence from the [NYCO] administration."
This same source continues with a little speculation that your doyenne must say she finds reasonable enough:
The official reason given [for the cancellation of the 2008-09 season] will be that Mortier wants to freshen up and fix the hall in conjunction with NYCB (and they certainly will take the time given to do some work on the State Theater, remove the sound system, etc.) but the real reason was he was so patently appalled by every performance he saw this year and last that he wants a literal fresh start for the entire company, and wants no attachment whatsoever to the past artistic administration.
POSTED at
3:30 PM
55 Comments:
And can you blame him...?
La Cieca: Didn't Mortier, in one of those manifold interviews at the time of his appointment, all but say that's what he intended to do?
I seem to remember something of the sort.
ACD
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Wow. I'm not sure how I feel about this.
However, Mortier's first season sounds like it could be *great*.
????????!????
Operas that triumphed at NYCO and were never brought back include Esther, Ermione, Die Soldaten, Moses und Aron, In the House of the Dead and Rinaldo. I'd also like to see them continue the Handel and Rossini revivals with Imeneo and Zelmira. But I guess I'll have to hold my breath and wait for Saint-Francois d'Assise.
There are also those of us who were expecting contracts for the next season. I'd say we bear the brunt of it.
it's an injustice to all of the musicians and other artisans of the company. They should be ashamed.
Wow - that's funny. A dark year next season, then two or three Mortier seasons, followed by dark seasons for years and years afterwards.
What he thinks is going to work will not. Without a major infusion of cash, NYCO will sink under its own weight. I want some of what Mortier is drinking/smoking/injecting if he thinks that his 08-09 season is going to sell period - much less sell well enough to keep the company off the respirator it's currently attached to.
It'll be acres and acres of empty seats. Queens and bookworms will come out for those shows. Mr and Mrs. New York Opera Goer will not.
You can wish and hope and pray otherwise, but he's about to get a rude welcome to American market fundamentals.
Switching to a stagione season is one thing - yeah, it's different from what the NYCO has done. Dumping the singers is fine from a business sense, rude from an artistic sense, but most new GMs know pretty well who they're going to be keeping or brooming, as well as who they're bringing along with them.
But New York audiences, particularly Lincoln Center audiences, are like 4-year-olds at dinner. They might try a nibble of something new if they know they won't have to eat a whole meal of it. Otherwise they'll throw it on the floor, demand macaroni and cheese, and ruin the meal for everyone else.
With all due respect to Hans Lick above, yes, those were successes. But in the same season? That's the issue. You can be adventurous at times, but not all the time.
It comes down to this. Who is his market? Who is his market? Who is his market?
sorry - that should say 09-10 above, instead of 08-09.
Wow, that could be suicide, unless they have secured milions of dollars to cover the lost season.
First, there's the question of the musicians and staff who be will asked to take an upaid leave of absence. But equally important is the question of ticket sales and donations. Good luck getting all the subscribers back after a year off. Same goes for donors.
Artistically speaking, it may seem nice and clean to have a year off and start "fresh" but the administrative and financial implications are huge!
I know that Mortier also plans on doing Clemenza di Tito within the next couple of years. Don't know if it's 09-10 but definitely within the near future.
Have to admit, I'm not going to be on line to buy tickets. It may be macaroni and cheese, but I like bel canto and before. Why not at least a little variety? NYCO's done some nice Monteverdi, great Rossini, etc. I'm sorry if I'm ruining everyone else's meal, but I'm not spending my scarce recreational dollars and my even scarcer recreational time when the only choice on the menu seems to be Brussels' sprouts.
Actually, I like Brussels sprouts...
Mrs. NYC: It should probably be pointed out that the NYCO is not going to a permanent policy of 20th century works. Rather, Mortier's announced first season is a sort of year-long festival of these operas, none of which have been heard recently in New York. Following seasons will include works from the whole range of operatic epochs, so one is led to believe.
First, they imported all the plays from the West End to NY. Now they even copy their opera renovation projects. What's next? Gays running for Mayor? Oh, wait...
I have to second what the working singer said - what about all the people who work there? I mean, they are either a) going to have be paid to not work, or b) they are all going to take other jobs, and then they are going to have to start the 09-10 season with all new people - and I'm not talking about the principal artists and weekly people - it is, undoubtedly, going to throw them all for a loop too, but what about the chorus? What about the ORCHESTRA?? What about the entire artistic and administrative staff? Wardrobe people? Makeup people? I mean, they employ a huge number of people, some of whom have been there for years, and some of whom SHOULD stay there for years, because they are great at their jobs. What about the music staff????? I mean, seriously people, while getting a fresh start in regards to some, and perhaps even a LOT of these people might be good for the company, there are many gifted, wonderful people there who are going to be out on the streets. What then? It's a nightmare actually, and I feel really sad for anyone who might lose a job.
Sugarmezzo, it's not all that much different than what has happened across the plaza - certainly to a lesser degree there in terms of firings (or not re-hirings, I guess), but similar nonetheless.
It's just the way things go in this business when regimes change. Out with yours, in with mine.
Except that Gelb will be fine as long as he continues to sell tickets, and even if he doesn't, he has a longer leash because the Met can withstand the stress of some less than stellar box offices. (If he has an Achilles' Heel that could trip him up, it's his obsession with "stars", but whether that will eventually bite him in the ass bad enough is probably unlikely.)
City Opera, on the other hand, can't take the stress of poor sales PLUS high turnover. It always, always costs considerably more money to replace people than management ever realizes in any business, and this will be no different.
What makes no sense in all of Mortier's plans is the apparent lack of understanding of what he truly has inherited. He's either been grossly misled (doubtful), blithely ignorant of reality (perhaps) or just willfully provocative, who-cares-what-happens-I-can-always-go-home-to-Europe (most likely).
But that's okay. If/when it all blows up and the USS-NYCO starts to sink, it'll be our faults as stupid Americans, unable to appreciate his vision.
Will one of the NYCO changes be to double the size of the orchestra pit? When I saw "St Francois d'Assise" in San Francisco, some of the musicians had to spill up on the stage and off to the sides. That was one massive orchestra. Or is there a chamber orchestra version they will perform instead?
justanotheranon: You got it exactly right about how Mortier doesn't give a damn if he destoys NYCO and will have plenty of excuses when it happens.
Rysanekfreak: In the Times of 7 March Mortier is quoted as saying one of his goals is to enlarge the pit by making the front row of seats removable.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/07/arts/music/07mort.html
justanotheranon: I agree, it will indeed be our fault, for allowing the current NYCO administration to dig itself into so deep a financial and artistic pit. Why should Mortier be charged with trying to clean up a decade of neglect and (in many cases) downright lousy judgment. Had the current NYCO heads not squandered five years begging for a new theater, maybe they might have had time to present interesting, artistically valid opera that would attract an audience.
Maybe what I'm saying here is this: if Mortier's plans can't save the NYCO, maybe the company doesn't deserve to be saved.
But I thought they were doing Saint Francois at the Armory?
All good points, anotheranon...
I don't understand why the company can't seem to come up with a clear vision of what they are about - seriously - I really don't.
I mean, I don't have any answers, it would be great if I did, but it seems like there should be a company "mission", and if they can come up with a good one, and STICK to it, they will be golden.
I am sad for the singers who were counting on this place to sing, and now aren't going to have jobs. This is indeed sad and worrisome news.
I don't know much about the NYCO situation but enough of their standards not to bother going there whenever I'm in NY. The situation sounds not dissimilar to what happened to ENO during the refurbishment of their home the Coliseum. Their standards had been on the decline since their Power House years, and with the closure of the theatre the strength of the company- orchestra, chorus, support staff and the house ensemble was decimated. They are still fighting to rebuild a viable repertory with hit-and-miss borrowed productions ( the recent Houston Aida definitely a miss)and using inexperienced Film and drama producers sometimes coming off like the Minghella Butterfly and more often not. The question is whether a company, with less than stellar names employing young and upcoming performers,is going to compete with an international house ( ROH or MET). What is the distinctive vision- performing in English, innovative productions, more unusual repertoire? The critical successes at the ENO in London have been the Britten Cycle, Janacek and Russian works.
After attending a few performances with the then new sound system, I stopped going to NYCO. I don't care if they close forever.
La Cieca,
As someone working in the business (for a long time), I can tell you that this statement:
NYCO, like other opera companies, has a fairly long lead time in planning upcoming seasons. Their practice in recent years has been to lock in repertoire and casting more than a year before the beginning of a given season.
is completely FALSE. NYCO has an idea often of what they will do, but even tiny regional companies are better about casting singers years in advance. At this time last year, the current season was NOT completely set...and hardly fully cast.
However, yes, they will most likely take a hiatus. They are no longer hearing auditions via Robin Thompson (who is out and on to consult for Canadian Opera Company) and any auditions (very few) that Mortier is hearing is for the following season.
However, to insinuate that NYCO has always cast far in advance is beyond laughable.
IndustryPro
The posters here who have said that they couldn't care less if NYCO finally folds for good are, in my humble opinion, selfish pigs(sorry about that, but I'm quite upset over the prospect of a company that has given me far more pleasure then their next -door neighbor on the Lincoln Center Plaza.)
If nothing else...what is going to happen to all the behind the scenes staff, if the House goes dark , for a season...or forever?
I find it incredibly difficult to fathom how the various Unions will allow this season closure to happen.
If it is just a question of physical "house-keeping", why couldn't NYCO re-locate for the time that takes, as San Francisco Opera did , when the War Memorial Opera House was being retro-fitted
Hoping for the best, for City Opera, here.....
La Cieca - first of all, thank you for giving us a forum that is relevant, timely, and fun in ways that nothing else online has been for opera in years - or really, ever.
But I have to disagree with your assessment that the public somehow deserves, or is to blame, for the current NYCO problems. That's like blaming the patient for dying when the doctor botches the surgery.
Furthermore, Mortier IS responsible for turning NYCO around, regardless of what hand he was dealt. It's his job. That's what's expected of new leaders of struggling organizations - to fix what's wrong, get the place back to running on even keel, and then start moving onward and upward. I can't track the path of logic you use to arrive at your conclusion that the future of the company shouldn't be his responsibility.
It's also disheartening when critics paint the last decade plus of NYCO with such a broad brush - some things sucked, so then all things sucked? Yes, the dreaded enhancement system situation was handled poorly, but similar systems are used in other houses around the world. There have been forgettable singers, but also really fine singers that any company would be more than happy to have (and do). For me, the problem is that the level of quality has been wildly inconsistent - world-class one night, totally anonymous for the next three.
To give Mortier a little more credit than I did in above postings, maybe the move to a stagione system is exactly what the place needs. In the old system, they'd have three shows in rotation on stage, three others in rehearsal, and the whole place had the feeling of being exhausted by the end of the week. By going stagione, they can now focus on what's in front of them - more intense prep for one show at a time, which will not stretch the music staff, backstage staff, and most importantly, the orchestra and chorus, to the breaking point.
That aside, I just don't get why Mortier is making more problems for himself than he needs to. Program a fair mixture of standard rep and non-standard rep, cast it exceedingly well (yes, it can be done), run it as a stagione season as mentioned above, and then find a unique and interesting positioning to promote the hell out of it so you can compete with Peter the Wolf next door.
It's hard, but not THAT hard.
industrypro: I think you understood me to say something other than what I actually did say. I know that NYCO at least in recent seasons has in fact made decisions about repertoire and major casting beginning the summer before the previous season, e.g., summer of 2006 for the 2007-2008 season. Of course there were some changes after that point, but the season would be at least roughed in (which I should have said instead of "locked in") at least a year prior -- otherwise they'd have no chance whatever of casting anyone but rank beginners.
As of now (that is, six months after the summer of 2007) there are still no plans out there for 2008-09, so my conclusion is, there will be no season, with NYCO starting up again for 09-10.
I also fail to see how it would totally fall upon Mortier to try to salvage 08-09 when his contract doesn't begin until the following season. Doesn't the NYCO have a board of directors who might be bothered to search for an interim general manager? In the meantime, has Paul Kellogg simply fallen off the face of the earth?
justanotheranon: It was my impression that by programming an entire season of 20th century masterpieces, then performing them in a variety of venues citywide, Mortier was indeed finding "a unique and interesting positioning" for a first NYCO season, and perhaps for that matter setting a pattern for following season, i.e., building each season around a theme instead of just a hodgepodge cobbled together from what ran overbudget at Glimmerglass plus the annual Lauren Flanigan vehicle.
I would further add that while, yes, the future of NYCO is Mortier's responsibility, he should not be charged with immediately fixing problems that built up over the course of more than a decade. In other words, success in a first season should not be defined as "complete financial turnaround, brilliant reviews, sold-out houses every night of the year, plus everyone in the music biz in NYC wants Mortier to be his BFF." That's simply not going to happen, and could never happen in any real-life situation for an incoming intendant.
La Cieca says, let's see what Mortier does over the span of several seasons. At the earliest, we should be able to form some first impressions by the end of the first season. But a year before he even officially arrives in town is too early to start the evaluation process.
La Cieca - thanks for clarifying your position. Agree with much of what you say when you put it that way.
I just don't know if he'll have the good fortune to not have major heat turned up on him by the end of that first season - by the press, the public, and the board. The company is in deep shit, needs to step out of it quickly, and your guess, my guess, and his guess is as good as anyone else's right now, one supposes.
Cieca -
if ONLY Paul Kellogg would fall off the face of the earth....
balabanov11: I think the bowtie has some artificial gravity power.
I am in complete agreement with La Cieca. I am a diehard NYCO supporter I donate to NYCO and not the Met (because I feel that my money is more needed at NYCO), but I tend to see more productions the Met. When I first moved to NYC I was so happy to have an alternative to the conservative productions I had seen in Washington DC, Chicago, Baltimore and at the Met. We must remember that a DECADE ago Iphigenie was presented at NYCO Chritine Goerke. The production was crap - I remember piles of laundry and shmattes/wimples on the chorus heads. BUT it was a work that had not been heard in New York for over 80 years and the artistic staff were discovering some amazing singers Goerke, Dunleavy, Delavan,Futral,Daniel, Mehta et al. The Strauss cycle, the Handel cycle, the Rossini-Bellini-Donizetti revivals. Every GM runs out of juice at some point and Kellogg was no differant than the rest. His major problem was the coterie of directors and dubious artists that he surrounded himself with. He worked inside an ego driven vacuum for for the last decade and was not amenable to any director or producer that wasn't willing to genuflect to his greatness. So you got stuck with a dramturg who basically was there because she knew how to work it and directors like Lamos & Rader-Schreiber who could do the same. B y working it I mean playing into Kellogg's massive ego.
And let's not forget the board of directors. What the hell was going on with that? I feel that the renovation has a lot to do with it. Mortier and everyone involved has mentioned that NYC Ballet had to be catered to - and why not - the house works for them and any changes are for NYCO. I am sure that if there are extensive renovations going on it had better be on NYCO's time and dime; and not theirs.
Either way I have been just soooo disappointed with the past few seasons. I only go to NYCO when there is a rarity being produced or a singer that I know or want to hear. I have pretty much given going to actually enjoy a production. Unfortunately for the past few seasons coming way from NYCO raving about a production (and not just a performer) was few and far between and always took me by suprise. It is sad to go to a house expecting hate what you are about to see. AND WE ALL KNOW HOW HORRIBLE THE SOUND IS IN THAT HOUSE!
NYCO has been doing relevant work by bringing little known or produced operas to the public. No one is denying that, but the disappointment time and time again. It's gets harder for fundraisers (I donate on principle) to attract the ever dwindling pools of money out there, that every arts organization in the city is fighting for AND it is definitely hard for the public to get behind a new opera house when no one wanted to see what you were putting on in the old house. That was the issue that nobody at NYCO was willing to face during there ill-fated new house nid.
Operas that triumphed at NYCO and were never brought back include Esther, Ermione, Die Soldaten, Moses und Aron, In the House of the Dead and Rinaldo.
The Moses und Aron was incredible, well sung/played, nice production despite the stupid scrim and proof that Schoenberg's opera was theatrically viable. I went back twice. It was hilarious to read the reviews of Die Soldaten, which basically amounted to "Wow, it's really depressing". BTW, Lincoln Center just announced that they're importing David Pountney's Ruhr Triennal production in July, 2008.
Who is his market? Who is his market? Who is his market?
People who think that opera didn't die with Verdi and Puccini, that in fact it got waaaaaay more interesting.
It'll be acres and acres of empty seats. Queens and bookworms will come out for those shows. Mr and Mrs. New York Opera Goer will not.
So, you've taken a survey, have you? Out of the list of pieces being done in Mr. Mortier's first year, I'm certain that the Einstein on the Beach and Nixon in China will sell extremely well, as will the St. Francois based on novelty factor--it packed 'em in in San Francisco, but then the audiences there are far more adventurous than the stodgy, conservative NYC crowd. The others will be contingent on how well they're done, I'd say.
Have to admit, I'm not going to be on line to buy tickets. It may be macaroni and cheese, but I like bel canto and before. Why not at least a little variety?
Welcome to *my* world. Bel canto/Italian/Baroque stuff that you'd have to pay me to attend constitute about 95% of the opera schedules everywhere except Germany, so when the stuff I want to hear comes around, I have to travel to attend. One season --one single season-- not studded with *shudder* Handel *shudder*, Mozart and 19th century Italian stuff and people are having kittens. Unreal.
Good call on the parallels with ENO, Yniold. I went there in June for the Death in Venice and the theatre looks great and the production was stunning. They're not out of the wilderness by any means, but I think they're on the right track with a mix of standard rep, rarities and long-forgotten pieces. The management problems they've had there since the Powerhouse years make the NYCO situation seem like an oasis of stability and forward thinking.
building each season around a theme instead of just a hodgepodge cobbled together from what ran overbudget at Glimmerglass plus the annual Lauren Flanigan vehicle
I *heart* La Cieca.
I don't live in New York and I've never attended a performance at the NYCO, although, on occasion, I fly in to attend the Met. The announced 2009-10 shedule of NYCO is adventurous and intellecually stimulating. The question remains for any opera lover of NYCO: can any opera house sustain itsself on an entire season where Puccini and Verdi are absent?
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The answer is no to Constantine's question. Even the old regime at NYCO understood that and programmed all the old war horses on Friday and Saturday nights. Their reasoning was that the people who want to see challenging works will find a way to see them on weeknights. It was quite frustrating a couple of seasons back wanting to see one of the more adventurous pieces and only having Tuesday or Thursday or a Sunday matinee available to see it.
NYCO has bever really gotten the chestnuts wrong. The Boheme, Carmen, Butterfly, Turandot, Figaro & Giovanni are exceedingly conservative. The problem was programming "difficult" or little known works and not having the Gelb type of media hype to create interest or a cohesive artistic vision or directors/producers that offered a palatable production(and by palatable I DO NOT MEAN SAFE!). Plus Kellogg really did not have the best relationship with the Times. There were those times where they would take a not so rare piece and muck it up just to be different from the Met. But when things worked tickets were hard to come by or for the days of the Wadsworth's Xerxes.
AP Article about this.
Prediction: If NYCO (or any established company), goes dark for a year, they do so at very great risk. Susan Baker rubs me the wrong way, big time. It is just like her and G.M. (that purile jackass), to do that and kill the company. Momentum is lost, infrastructure/personnel are lost, morale goes under -- and you try to start the company up, and you find out one fine day that you don't have one.
NYCO has been a mess for a long long time, every since White died and Beverly-the-Evil got Rudel fired; it has not been the same since. NYCO does not just take money, it takes LEADERSHIP and planning, and a sense of mission, and everything that cunt Baker and the fraudulent Mortier cannot bring to it. Mark my words, if it goes dark it may stay dark!
MrMyster
Henry - no, I haven't taken a survey. I assume the results of yours are forthcoming.
Honestly, regardless of who's right and who's wrong, bully for you.
If it sells as well as you seem to think it will, then you can take comfort that the kitten-havers like me are proven wrong.
If I'm right, you can sit wherever you want.
Enjoy.
I take a non-conspicuous but instructive example:
Amy Burton.
She has, in my experience, never sung an unsuccessful performance at NYCO. (Though she can be paid more for not singing -- i.e., covering Met roles -- than she made doing leads at NYCO.)
But where has she been for the last few seasons? Wasn't the last thing she did the bang-up job of La Voix humaine at Glimmerglass, which didn't make it to the Plaza? And instead of her (or other fine Handel singers from the triumphant Xerxes era) we get the superannunated Rumanienne as Agrippina?
What is going on with casting -- which is surely basic to the health of a house? There are many other examples, but A.B. seems to be a good one.
The public won't give a rat's ass. NYCO has been irrelevant for 30 years. When a company chooses 60% of its repertory for shock value instead of musical value, they deserve to fail. I never saw or heard so much CRAP being performed in the last ten years that didn't even deserve the cheap cardboard sets they were afforded. Most of the time the ushers could've written a more compelling score. And what kind of shitty company allows microphones on stage? That's the whole idea behind opera singing, idiots, no microphones.
They aimed to be an alternative to the MET but have become a slave to them. When the MET announces a new production for a few years down the road NYCO comes up with a half-assed version of the same opera for the very next season. I just heard on WQXR they will perform in churches or other places until renovations at Lincoln Center are completed. My suggestions is the Big Apple Circus tent that we often see in Damrosch Park, a much more appropriate venue.
I have to say I think the evaluations of NYCO have been overly harsh here. I have seen good productions w/ some very good singing here (Vanessa), flawed productions w/ some very good singers, but not all (Agrippina - the Romanian WAS the weakest link), some very interesting operas that you'd never hear anywhere else w/ solid singing (Mines of Sulphur) and over the years some FABulous productions (Platee, anyone?). I also think most of the Glimmerglass productions have transferred very well to a very unforgiving, difficult space (the Met may be bigger but the acoustics are MUCH better). Obviously, the house needs better management of some kind, but c'mon guys, have some sense of proportion (or is that too much to ask of a bunch of opera fans?).
All I can say is , I THANK my lucky stars that I don't work at Lincoln Center, where TKLogan1809(is that the year of his birth?)claims he does ...or I'd be spending time on Rikers Island, for second -degree(justifid) homicide...
Wadda sanctimonious PRICK!
Did anyone notice that the AP posting mentioned that parterre.com made the scoop?
...When a company chooses 60% of its repertory for shock value instead of musical value, they deserve to fail. I never saw or heard so much CRAP being performed in the last ten years that didn't even deserve the cheap cardboard sets they were afforded...
All right, some of the American works were not that good, but when somebody condemns 60% (!) of Kellogg's NYCO repertory to the outer darkness of "shock value"...all I can conclude that someone for whom Handel, Rossini, Monteverdi, Rameau, Gluck, smaller-scale R. Strauss et al lack "musical value" must be a very deprived soul.
The problems with the Kellogg regime, to my mind as a NYCO subscriber, lay elsewhere--dirkva has laid them out very well. Unfortunately, Mortier's reforms don't seem to be addressing them. I'm looking forward to his first season nonetheless--but if people like TKLogan take umbrage at too much Handel & Rossini in a season, no wonder people are decrying an all-modern season, even though most of the works announced have been performed in New York, and none of them are atonal.
nycoq,
Of course I did. Parterre box, under the leadership of La Cieca, has become a "big time" opera site, with information and critiques that many a time beat main stream media!
In a rather lengthy report on the Bloomberg news-wire, reporting the story of the possibility of a drk House at the State Theater, the most interesting rvelation , I thought , was that Mortier HAS NOT SIGNED A CONTRACT WITH NYCO AS OF THIS POINT IN TIME..........
The claim is that there are "visa' hold-ups...
mmmmmm.......
Someone wrote that Mortier has not got a signed contract with NYCO as of right now?
That IS news! Maybe all is not lost after all. I have so little faith in Mortier based on what he did at Salzburg and Paris. There is no reason to think he will treat New York any better, is there? NYCO has a slot in NewYork, and it's the same it always was -- to pick up where the Met leaves off, and to do so at a fair cost. I agree with all who have said that NYCO lack management strength. Chairman Susan Baker does not supply that -- she explained she was "charmed" by Mortier at dinner and his hiring resulted from that encounter. Now we see he is not legally hired. How very very interesting. Maybe it's time for a complete a clean sweap of NYCO management, Board Chairman and all. Good luck NYCO!
MrMyster
Since I don't live in NYC, when I do make a trip there, I tend to go see Met productions. I did see, however, a production of Sweeney Todd (with Delevan/Page) at NYCO that I enjoyed very much. And I've read a lot of positive things about certain productions. It does seem like the company has experienced more misses than hits over the last 10 years and that it needs a re-established vision. Well, Mortier's planned first season seems to be doing just that.
The Met presents all of the mainstream repertoire about as well as it can (every company experiences failures) so that leaves the NYCO with plenty of room to explore the non-mainstream repertoire. To survive as a company on a steady diet of non-mainstream works, it will have to reduce the number of performances. And while that will mean less work for the musicians/artists involved, it can be a very good thing. Better to do fewer things very well than a lot of things poorly.
As I see it, Mortier and NYCO have a huge opportunity artistically. But this is not Europe. Without financial security, the best artistic plans can fail. Unless they've secured a lot of major donors (including their board) to cover off the costs of skipping an entire season, then they are headed for trouble.
kashania,
Like you, I don't live in New York but in El Paso, Texas, and when in NYC I attend the Met. NYCO does not profess to be an experimental or avant-garde opera house, but a standard one. If you see Mortier's 2009-2010 schedule, disaster is in the making that neither the board nor donors can prevent, if ticket sales count. No standard opera house can survive, if Puccini and Verdi are absent for an entire season. This is my opinion and one expert and familiar with the NYCO agreed with me on this blog. If Mortier is going to use NYCO to serve his ego and idiosyncrasies laced with arrogance, the future of this organization may be at risk.
How exactly does he intend to even run 2009/2010, if he doesn't have a staple opera in the bunch? The closest he has is Pelleas and that's pushing it. No Verdi, Puccini, Rossini, etc? Maybe he could get Cedolins to sing Luisa Miller (heaven forfend!).
Constantine Pappas' posting is exactly right. Mortier has always used his positions to serve his ego and his arrogance. He is the worst possible choice for NYCO, and the fool Mrs Baker was taken in by him. It may never happen if they wise up in time; if not the damned thing will die, and later others will have to start it up or not. Una vergogna!
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I actually think that Mortier's first season will be a financial success. Whether the productions are good or regie-crap waits to be seen. Not to sound like a snobby New Yorker, but there is certainly a rabid group of New Yorkers starving for that line up - coupled with the curious - I predict that on novelty factor alone NYCO will have a great season subscription wise. I have been living in New York for 11 years and I have only seen 3 of the planned productions in New York City and 2 in other cities. Funny enough I saw the Makropoulos Case, Pelleas and the Rake at the MET. Those operas could revive the people's opinion of NYCO and Mr. Mortier.
To me it seems like a brilliant piece of P.R. on Mortier's part to go in that direction for the first season. Hype, hype and more hype. Lord knows it works for Gelb. He has hyped that gawd awful Tan dun production back for a second season run. If Mr. Mortier can get a well oiled P.R. concept together he has it made for the first couple of seasons. I hope that a themed season is what he is heading for. The Glimmerglass season was a resounding success using the Orpheus theme. Granted Glimmerglass' season is only 2 months though. Honestly on hype-factor alone Mortier is a good decision for NYCO. Someone mentioned earlier about New Yorkers claiming they want truffles when they really want mac n'cheese. I actually find that to be true - look at the Met. Where 80% of the productions are big overblown conservative affairs (which is the reason why most of us choose to see opera there) and not avant garde. The Lohengrin was not a success until it was revived several seasons later and the public had a chance to get over their shock. The Met was even sued over the Tristan by the foundation that underwrote it because it was too "contemporary". Met audiences skew conservative, but I think that well conceived artistically daring and dramatically sound productions (no bad regie PLEASE!) will set NYCO apart and finally get them from under the shadow of the Met. There is a large group of us who loved mac n'cheese with truffles on top. I cannot wait to see what the next few years bring to New York's opera scene.
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