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In Reply to: RE: "little known Pavel Kogan"... posted by Ivan303 on July 21, 2014 at 21:54:39
I did not know that - interesting - and thanks for the historical background! Somehow, I'm thinking that Anne Ewers MUST have a connection to Isaac Stern!
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when I lived/worked in Utah.
Don't feel sorry for Anne, she left Utah for a job running the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in Philadelphia (at about $350K per year) in about 2007, and the 'Stupid White Guys' who run things in Utah were sad to see her go!
Utah now has BOTH a third rate opera company and a third rate symphony. OK, been a while but last I saw them in 2006 they were AWFUL.
That's too bad, but combining administrative staff didn't have to mean combining fundraising efforts or one organization cannibalizing another's donors. It did probably mean half as many people were trying to do the same work, and that may have been part of the problem.
Of course, if a manager is tasked with reducing operating costs but maintaining or increasing donations is someone else's problem, ...
She convinced the respective boards to combine the two organizations, cut staff including Symphony administration and fundraisers, put here in charge and allow her to raise funds for both organizations.
Didn't work out as planned as folks just wrote one check instead of two, and in most all cases, the numbers on that one check weren't twice as large.
Yes, I get your point. Not the first time a board goes for wholesale reductions in staff without thinking carefully about the consequences. I know nothing about that situation in Utah, but I do know that even if donors had no idea the two organizations were administratively combined, less staff = less work = less results can apply in the arts as in any other business. Sounds like Anne sold them on a bad idea to make herself more powerful and eliminate the competition of second similar organization (as you say, donors may have seen it differently and decided they could give half as much) and then left the mess for something else when she got a better job offer.
But I'd blame the boards for letting all that happen.
Yep, it was her plan from the git-go. The Utah Opera was a third rate organization at best, and she was the General Manager looking to move up to a better, more rewarding position.
The Utah Symphony while admittedly a second tier orchestra, has a GREAT hall (Abravanel Hall) and a music director who, while uninspiring at best, at least was a known guy (Keith Lockhart, Boston Pops, etc.).
Plus just about EVERYONE in Utah is trained to some degree in music, due to the influence of the Mormon Church. OK, they don't necessarily understand the concept of PAYING for it 'cause they get so much of it free. ;-)
"I'd blame the boards for letting all that happen."
Yep, yet again. Why they didn't see that having Anne Ewers knocking on the door to raise money for both institutions on the same call, 'cause she's only gonna get into the carpeted suits once a year, was going to create LESS total donations is beyond me. But the guys in Utah that sit on the boards of the non-profit institutions may have connections but they are not the sharpest in the world.
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