Curtain rises
Annual Livestock Show and Rodeo now reflects the Greater Houston community.
In 1966, Ben Love, former chairman of Texas Commerce Bancshares and civic leader, found out that “the cultural thing” (Houston’s lack of world class fine arts organizations) threatened the relocation of Shell from New York to Houston. To help remedy this gap, Love joined the board of the Houston Grand Opera, even though it took him awhile to learn to love opera.
The Houston Grand Opera has come a long way since its first production — “Salome” — in 1955. The organization is not just a vehicle for attracting opera-lovers to Houston. To its credit, the Houston opera has also done its part in helping to meet the city’s greatest challenge — weaving so many people from diverse backgrounds into a community tapestry. “The Refuge” was the debut performance of the “Song of Houston,” the opera’s community engagement series. “The Refuge” recounted the ordeals that have brought people here from Africa, Vietnam, Mexico, Pakistan, India, the former Soviet Union and Central America. Houstonians who came here from different continents are heard speaking their own words as tape-recorded in hundreds of interviews. Since then, the Houston Grand Opera has been producing an award-winning series of intercultural exchanges.
What strikes us about these performances is the way the opera’s outreach to diverse groups, mostly without an operatic tradition of their own, enriches this century’s old art form while strengthening community ties.
This comes to mind as the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo prepares to open Tuesday. The rodeo has become so successful that it draws more visitors than all the people in the entire city of Houston. And it’s not just an event; under the guidance of Chief Operating Officer Leroy Shafer, who is retiring from the rodeo this year after 40 years in the saddle, the rodeo long ago acquired the stature of a city institution.
With roots that took hold when Port City Stockyards owner James W. Sartwelle convened a group over lunch to discuss the lack of a cattle market in Southeast Texas, the first show was held in 1932 in the Democratic Convention Hall. It’s now a $127.9 million enterprise that each year provides $12.3 million in scholarships and a total of $2,267,500 to local charities.
As successful institutions must, it also has embraced the obligation to try to reflect the community. This year, Black Heritage Day will be on Friday and Go Tejano Day is set for March 16, each of which annually marks the end of a yearlong effort to engage communities through encouraging volunteerism and scholarship applications.
At first blush, the Houston opera and the rodeo seem to have little in common. The crowds that are drawn to each dress quite differently, and almost certainly there are patrons who strongly prefer the music of one over the other.
But the respective nonprofit sponsors of the opera and the rodeo — Houston Grand Opera and Houston Rodeo Association — have both recognized their responsibility to the larger community and have sought to broaden their bases.
The rodeo is in process of becoming a home away from home to more people of all ethnicities and genders. As the rodeo and the opera, two of our city’s great institutions, try to pass on a legacy, we are thankful that they are mindful of our future.