It was time to let the symphony go
She was one the nicest ladies we ever knew. Born in 1939, the San Antonio Symphony was a child of the city’s prosperous German community. When she walked in, she lit up the room. Her smile was infectious and could win over most anyone, especially her dearest friends: sophisticated, older Anglo lovers of classical music. But that was then. This is now.
At one time, symphonies were a primary source of entertainment, along with the ballet, the opera, the theater.
Today we have a plethora of choices for entertainment. Americans receive thousands of messages a day on TV, newspapers, billboards, online, and, occasionally, in person, each poking us for attention. Each trying to tell us something, get us to buy something, go somewhere, stay someplace, date someone or download some new app. It’s a different world.
If you want to hear a symphony performance, all you have do is close your eyes, dim the lights, pour yourself a drink, put on your earphones and click on any symphony performance in the world. All at your fingertips. You don’t even have to dress up.
Which raises the questions: Does San Antonio really need a symphony? Do we even want one? While symphony musicians have demonstrated in the streets, where are the patrons?
In marketing, there is a term: “consumer demand.” If there’s a demand for something, it will sell. If there isn’t, it won’t. The symphony doesn’t sell enough tickets to pay the staff, the operating expenses and 72 musicians.
The musicians know this, and they’ve been pretty straightforward. All they want is enough money to ensure a fair salary and benefits so all 72 musicians can play a full season.
The staff wants the same, and so does the board. Here’s the big rub. They can’t raise the money to make it happen. The symphony has been in financial straits since the 1980s.
That means it’s not a healthy business. A business that spends more than it takes in year after year is not entitled to survive. Businesses come and go. Some survive, some die. Sears, once the nation’s largest retailer, died when people began buying online. As Frank
Sinatra famously sang, “That’s life.”
The symphony has limped along, operating in the red for decades, believing that every great town must have a great symphony. So, they’ve done some perilous things to survive. In a great act of desperation years ago, they robbed their endowment fund to support their operations. When that endowment money ran
out, they kept going by using next season’s ticket sales money to fund current year’s operations.
Some 30 years ago, I chaired the symphony’s board. Every year during my term, no matter how hard we tried, expenses exceeded income. It was one of the most frustrating jobs I’ve ever had. Even then, it was becoming clear that this lady’s charms were fading. Older, longtime patrons were dying off as younger people were going elsewhere for entertainment. Annual corporate and philanthropic gifts in the six and seven figures needed to sustain a symphony never materialized. Yet we were sure that some “angel” would come forward with a gift that would solve all our problems.
That was not to be; the writing was already on the wall. The great lady’s vital signs were deteriorating. Her heart slowly weakening and destined to flatline. All you had to do is look at her chart. A new and more diverse population sought entertainment elsewhere. Yet as a board, we kept drinking the Kool-aid: “You can’t be a great city without a great symphony.” It’s a good line. But not necessarily true.
I congratulate this board for doing something that I and the board I led didn’t do — put this great lady out of her misery. Cut her life support. Let her go in peace and remember her for how long she lived and for the joy she brought us.