WE MADE IT--HALLELUJAH!
Wow, what a year it has been. It seems like yesterday that I was promising that in the aftermath of the flood we would not cancel a concert nor cut back on musician salaries AND create a balanced budget. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. It looks like we will post the first surplus in years so that we can now start paying down the significant debt we had accumulated over the past decade. Our audience support has grown this year, and we have documented steady growth in Iowa City. We have negotiated a new contract with the musicians that increases base pay and diminishes some operating expenses that have been weighing us down. Our Symphony offices are being re-built and we should be returning downtown by the beginning of June. We took a leadership role in investigating the future of the Paramount and were instrumental in seeing that it will be restored. Not bad for being down and out this time last year.
Next season we will continue our nomadic existence as we perform in Cedar Rapids, Iowa City, Elkader, and travel from theater to theater including the Englert, Sinclair Auditorium, West High School and others. It goes to show you that we're not just about a building or a location, but rather music is about bringing people together and inspiring our better angels. No better was this evident than in our last Masterworks concert of the season. Dvorak's 9th Symphony is always an audience favorite--more so here because of its Iowa origins. Because it's such a standard, the challenge for me and the orchestra is to not take anything for granted. When a piece is very familiar, there is the danger of complacency. Making sure that no shortcuts are made and that extreme care in the music's preparation is carried out is a task more demanding than usual. Context for new music is extremely important. Often people fear new music but if presented correctly, it can be the most memorable part of a concert.
Emil Viklicky's "Moravian Triptych" is a case in point. Without Dvorak's symphony as backdrop, it might have baffled some. But when you juxtapose music, both of which were founded upon authentic Czech culture, and both of which were influenced by culture from the New World (jazz in Viklicky's case), then the two musical worlds don't seem that far apart after all. And when you can create an even larger context beyond the concert hall--in this case partnering with and drawing attention to the National Czech and Slovak Museum--then you create a musical experience bigger than the sum of it parts.
Classical music pundits are always preaching that relevance for our art is getting harder to achieve. I say NONSENSE! This past concert is a perfect template of how one keeps the arts near and dear to our hearts.
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