Over at the Atlanta Symphony Robert Spano has been featuring contemporary music by a group of composers that are starting to be known as the Atlanta School.
They're Atlantan not because the composers all hail from there; it's because the orchestra has made a thing of performing composers that belong to an aesthetic that the orchestra believes in. By giving the music context and suggesting clear reasons why these composers belong together, Atlanta has helped define them in a compelling way.
And guess what? After a few years of building audiences, the contemporary music programs now outsell traditional programs.
The most significant aspect of the Atlanta School project may be the trust it is building for new music in general. A semistaged version of the opera "Dr. Atomic" by American composer John Adams sold at 88% of paid capacity during the depths of the economic recession. In a reversal of usual box-office patterns, concerts with music by Atlanta School composers typically sell at about 84% of capacity, says marketing vice president Charles Wade, versus an average of 78% for other classical events.
At Ojai, the performances are assumed to be great. But the programs need to be something more as well. We have to answer questions for every piece, for every performer: why this music? Why now? This isn't a randomly assembled set of pieces or performers. They fit into some sort of tradition and aesthetic; they convey something we think is important. They provoke certain kinds of responses. There's Ojai DNA sewn into the fabric of every concert. The trick is how to make it clear even to people who are visiting for the first time.
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