May, 2012

  1. Speaker Spotlight: Sunil Iyengar on Audience 2.0 – How Technology Influences Arts Participation

    Sunil IyengarSunil Iyengar directs the Office of Research & Analysis at the National Endowment for the Arts. Since his arrival at the NEA in June 2006, the office has produced over 20 research publications and revised the major federal survey about arts participation. What does this mean for administrators, audiences, and musicians? Hard data on some of the thorny issues we think about everyday.

    As we gear up for Sunday’s Talking About Audiences event, one recent NEA study certainly helps quantify a trend we’ve been exploring in the last few months—how technology is changing the orchestra’s relationship with its audience. (more…)

    Topic: Audience | Tags: , ,
    May 9, 2012 by Beth Hondl | Comments (1)

  2. Speaker Spotlight: Ben Cameron on Audiences Beyond the Concert Hall

    Where do we find audiences? In this post, Ben Cameron—Program Director for the Arts at the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation—argues that the concert hall is only one place we should be looking. Ben Cameron joins us in San Francisco on Sunday, May 13 for our free Talking About Audiences event. Register today!

    Ben CameronHow questions are framed inevitably guides and often limits our thinking. I am especially struck by the observation in this blog that “…the core orchestral presentation—a live, on-stage concert—is essentially unchanged over the past 100 years. Will that, can that, remain the case for the next 100 years?”—a “can” that seems to imply an aspiration to retain that format and an overall frame that provokes several questions of my own.

    Are there reasons that the experience of the last 100 years should be definitive? (more…)

    Topic: Audience | Tags: ,
    May 7, 2012 by Beth Hondl | Comments (2)

  3. Alan Gilbert of the New York Philharmonic on Programming for Audiences

    Alan Gilbert, Music Director of the New York Phiharmonic, joins us in San Francisco on Sunday, May 13 for our free event “Talking About Audiences.” Recently we had the chance to sit down with him to ask how he approaches programming and what role the audience plays in choosing what music to play. “What we do is very simple actually,” he said. “We play pieces that we really believe in, that we think are great pieces—important for the orchestra to play and important for the audience to hear.” Watch more here:

    We’re looking forward to hearing more.

    Register today to hear Alan Gilbert on May 13!

    Topic: Audience | Tags: ,
    May 4, 2012 by Beth Hondl | Comments (0)

  4. Brent Assink: What’s Working and What Must Work

    From audience engagement, music education, and a changing relationship with the community, to technology and the best use of social media… there are a lot of questions in today’s orchestral world and not always a lot of concrete answers.

    Indeed, if you had to narrow it down and list just the top five things orchestras should work to change, what would they be?

    In a recent talk at the University of Michigan’s American Orchestra Summit, Brent Assink, Executive Director of the San Francisco Symphony, took up that challenge in a keynote speech on the theme “What’s Working and What Must Work.” The American Orchestra Summit brought together arts administrators, educators, and musicians with the goal of inspiring “new ideas and new conversations” around such issues as productive collaboration, changing audiences and communities, and the training of the professional musician in the 21st-century.

    Watch the full speech below or read the transcript at SymphonyNOW.

    Topic: Audience, Community | Tags: ,
    May 3, 2012 by Beth Hondl | Comments (0)

  5. “The expectation is that we sit.” Is concert behavior at odds with human experience?

    You know the drill. Take your seat, don’t move, sit quietly, then applaud enthusiastically only at the appropriate times. Is this prescribed concert behavior the best way to engage audiences? Susan Key—special projects director for the San Francisco Symphony—examines this question.

    Empty SeatsThere has been a lot of discussion lately in arts circles about the importance of listening to our audiences. For me, the point was underscored by an audience question during our March 17 Forum in San Francisco:

    Sitting in the audience can be a very passive experience. I mean, my head is spinning. I have lots of thoughts going through it. But I’m not supposed to move… the expectation is that we sit. We’re well behaved. …but we’re not supposed to do anything. And I wonder whether on occasion there could be a little bit more—like in rock concerts [when] people get up and dance.

    Her question brings up an issue that I think orchestras ignore at their peril: the distance between the multi-textured human experience embedded in the works on our concerts and the human behavior we prescribe for their consumption. (more…)

    Topic: Audience | Tags: ,
    May 2, 2012 by Beth Hondl | Comments (3)

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