October 29, 2024 • 18 mins
The world is full of injustice and inequity, and most arts organizations have the best of intentions to be responsive in thoughtful and meaningful ways. But it can be challenging–boards and long-time patrons can push back on programming and messaging that feels unfamiliar to them, and change can feel unbearably slow when your organization lacks the necessary connections or resources within its larger community.
In this episode, we’ll share never-before-aired insights on how to hold your organization accountable to its goals around representation, access, and equity, from a conversation recorded earlier this year between CI’s VP, Managing Director Christopher Williams and Canton Symphony Orchestra’s Rachel Hagemeier. Rachel discusses the Symphony’s podcast, Orchestrating Change, and the learnings and organizational shifts that have come out of those interviews, as well as the Symphony’s evolving model for community connection.
CI to Eye Interview (1:30) - CI’s Christopher Williams sits down with the Canton Symphony Orchestra’s Rachel Hagemeier to help listeners understand how to hold their organizations accountable to their mission and goals around representation, access, and equity.
CI-Lebrity Sightings (16:10) - Dan shares his favorite news stories about CI clients.
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LINKS:
Institute for Composer Diversity | 2023 Orchestra Repertoire Report
Know Your Own Bone | Trust Trends for Cultural Entities at Mid-Year 2024
Know Your Own Bone | The Causes Likely Visitors Care About Most as We Enter the Election Cycle
Gothamist | After 19 years, a docent at the Rubin Museum says goodbye to his ‘home away from home’
BroadwayWorld | Steppenwolf, Goodman Theatre, and More Take Home Equity Jeff Awards
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:08):
Hi everyone, it's Christopher Williams.
The arts world is drivenby passion and purpose,
and many of us are dedicatedto addressing injustice and
inequity in all that we do, whetherthrough programming, marketing,
or behind the scenes. Buteven with our best intentions,
(00:29):
our industry faces real challengesin achieving lasting change.
We strive to be more inclusiveto open doors to new voices,
but the path isn't always easy.
Boards and longtime patrons canresist programming or messaging that
feels unfamiliar,
and progress can be frustratingly slowwhen an organization lacks the community
(00:51):
connections or resources to supportthese efforts. In today's episode,
you'll hear how one symphony is holdingitself accountable to its mission and
values around representation,access, and equity.
We're sharing never-before-aired insightsfrom a conversation recorded earlier
this year between myself and RachelHagemeier from the Canton Symphony
(01:14):
Orchestra. Rachel discusses theSymphony's podcast, Orchestrating Change,
and the shifts it has sparkedwithin the organization.
She also shares how the Canton Symphonyis building a new model for community
connection and accountability inthe arts. Let's take a listen.
(01:40):
Rachel Hagemeier, welcome to CI to Eye.
Thank you. Very excited to be here today.
I'm so eager to talk to you,
and I also come from asimilar part of the world.
I'm from southwest Missouri,kind of in your neighborhood.
Yeah.
I think we also have being ahigh school drum major in common.
Oh yeah. High school drummajoring. It never leaves you.
(02:01):
Very important formativeroles in our leadership.
Yes. Oh, for sure.
So you host your ownorganization's podcast called
Orchestrating Change to addressissues of equity, diversity,
and inclusion in the industry.
Tell me more about what you'retrying to achieve with that,
because it's work that so needs to happen.
(02:22):
The idea for the podcast came from ourdirector of marketing and development,
Nathan Maslyk, back in 2020 when themurder of George Floyd took place,
and we saw tons of orchestras makebeautiful statements and we said,
great. We could do a statement.
Is there something though that wecould do to hold ourselves accountable?
And so publicly talkingabout it and publicly giving
(02:45):
limelight and airtime topeople who represent minority
backgrounds and are doing the worksuccessfully in the field already,
who are already doing wayabove and beyond what most
orchestras in America are doing-ifwe can talk to those people,
they're going to fuel our ideas.
And maybe there's some stuff thatwe can't implement in Canton,
(03:06):
but it's going to keepit top of mind for us.
We wanted to keep this conversationas a throughline so that
our DEI committee on the boardcould have things to think about.
And we talk about race, gender expression,
socioeconomic status,gender, all sorts of stuff,
but also physical disabilityand deafness, blindness,
(03:28):
all these different things. There's somuch in the DEI world that needs our
attention,
and so doing that podcast-we'rein season five now.
It's just a joy to talkto these people. I mean,
we've gotten to have DashonBurton on the podcast.
Grammy Award-winning Dashon Burton.Jeff Scott, also Grammy Award-winning.
(03:49):
And so many other people,like Sara Davis Buechner,
a transgender pianist who playedwith Canton pre-transition and
post-transition. Our formermusic director, Gerhardt,
was one of the few conductors whoprogrammed her after her transition.
Now she gets programmed a lotmore, but in the early days.
Listening to her story and the way thatshe navigated that whole experience.
(04:12):
And it has led to a lot ofdifferent things at the symphony.
Our involvement in the Sphinx Organizationand their SOPA auditions that they
do, and trying to bring musiciansof color onto the stage.
We still have a long way to go withthat. We're not a very diverse orchestra,
but we're better than we used to be.
We talk a lot about equity ofmusic access in the community,
(04:34):
so we started a free strings trainingprogram in Southeast Canton through
Lighthouse Ministries. SoutheastCanton is considered a food desert.
There's no gas stations. Victimof redlining. Very poor area.
The history of SoutheastCanton is devastating to read.
It was all blighted for an industrialpark that was going to go in that
never opened. So how canwe bring access? Well,
(04:59):
we have a ton of violins hanging aroundand we'll just give them free lessons.
It's only 12 students, but now they'rejoining our Youth Symphony program.
It's been so wonderful to havethat podcast and to do it,
and I've learned so much, and Inever want to stop doing it. Now,
whenever I'm having a bad dayand I'm like, "I'm too busy,
we have to record a podcast episode, I'mtoo busy"-afterwards I'm always like,
(05:21):
"That was the greatest. Ifeel so refreshed now.".
I know. Yeah.
It's really, really nice.
Oh, that's great.
I can imagine that there are so manypeople that love the podcast and love what
you're talking about on the podcast,
but did you face any challenges in someof the discussions that you were having?
The board understood it. We kind ofdecided as an organization, okay,
(05:43):
what are the things we need to do tomake sure that we're actually doing this
work?
So we decided every MasterWorks concerthas to have a composer of color or a
female composer. All of 'em. We haveto. And that's not just to check a box,
that's to hold ourselves accountableto make sure we're programming it.
We can program more, and we try to,and we do, but if we don't do that,
we're not doing our jobs.
And so the board was onboard and the staff gets it,
(06:06):
and our guests are amazing,
and we've been challenged inconversations with assumptions that we
have and identified a lot ofgaps in our own knowledge and
biases we didn't think we had.
We did get some pushbackfrom our community.
We got a letter about how we were beingracist to white people, which was...
(06:29):
You just look at it and go,okay. And you just toss it away.
Because you don't need to have thatconversation. But the thing that
is hard for us is there'sso much we want to do
that we can't. We don't have accessto the materials that we would need.
We don't have the money that we need.
(06:49):
We don't have the space or the connectionsin the community because Canton's
pretty small. There's lots ofstuff that we want to do right now,
but it takes a lot of planning and time.
And so the amount of change I would liketo see happen is not happening at the
rate at which I would like it to happen,
and it's just about patienceand working hard and being
(07:11):
uncomfortable and continuing on anddoing that cycle forever and ever.
Because we were having a conversationwith one of our guests in the first season
where he said,
"I remember back in the 1980s whenI was on a panel about diversifying
orchestras. And then I remember in theearly two thousands when I was on a panel
about diversifying orchestras. Andthen here we are again." And he said,
(07:34):
"It's been a fad. It's been a cycle.
It's been something that pops up everyonce in a while." What do we need to do
to make sure that this has stayingpower and that it's not just a phase.
And it's a little concerning.
A study came out about the number ofcomposers of color that were programmed
went from like 0.4% to 9.4%.
That's a big change. It's still only 9.4%,
(07:56):
but when looking at theseasons upcoming, it went down.
And so how do we keep remindingorchestras that there's
room for Beethoven and SamuelColeridge-Taylor? You can do both.
Jessie Montgomery is alive and well,
and she's maybe available to come toyour concert if you play her music.
(08:17):
There's a lot of remindingthat this is not a phase.
This is continuation. And that'sI think maybe the hardest thing.
I think you're doing the Lord's work bytalking about these kinds of issues on
your podcast,
and I think it can be challenging to talkabout some of these things when you're
in any part of the country. For example,
I'm sitting in the very progressiveeastern part of the country,
(08:41):
and I know where you aresitting. And so I'm wondering,
does the geographical environmentthat you find your organization in,
does it make it harderto address some of this?
Or do you feel like it's not a problem?
In certain ways. I think that...
We just did a Gospel joint symphonyconcert, and it was so fun.
And our audience was the mostdiverse audience we've ever
(09:06):
had. I've only been there for fiveyears, but oh my gosh. I was like, well,
this is like I'm in aBaptist church on Sunday.
This is a very different experiencethan we've ever had at the symphony,
and it was super fun.
And doing concerts specifically fordemographics of people that have been left
out of the concert hall is apart of what we want to do.
We did a concert last fall with The LabraBrothers for Dia de los Muertos that
(09:29):
was all Hispanic punkfusion music with orchestra,
and our audience wasmostly Spanish-speaking.
So I introduced the concert and thenone of our board members, Joanna,
introduced it in Spanish because most ofthe audience didn't speak English. Now,
those two concerts sold a lot less ticketsthan almost everything else we did.
(09:51):
Is that because the demographicsof people that those concerts
were for don't see our marketing in thetraditional ways? Is that because we
need to shift the way that we think aboutticketing and getting the word out to
those people? Or... why wasn'tour traditional audience there?
I'm not doing a Gospel joint symphonyjust for the Black community.
(10:16):
It was a little sad that a lot of ourtraditional audience wasn't there.
So what can we do to do content that, yes,
maybe it's focused on theBlack Gospel experience,
but our whole community iscurious and interested about it.
And in the same token,what can we do to make our,
it's not targeted to the black community.It's just a MasterWorks concert.
(10:37):
There happens to be a Black composeron it, but that's not the focus.
The focus is the music. How can we makeour orchestra a space that the Black
community would want tocome to that concert?
And so I think that is a reallyinteresting challenge for us.
Canton is pretty siloed when itcomes to different communities,
and there's still a racial tension.
We had a really hard incident with thepolice and a Black man dying recently in
(11:02):
Canton. Very,
very George Floyd-esque to theexact words that he was saying,
George Floyd-esque.
And so there's a lot of reallydifficult things like that happening.
And so as a symphony, where'sour place in that conversation?
And by having this podcast and talkingabout these issues when it comes to
(11:23):
racial issues and diversityand lack of diversity,
that I think we get a lot lesspushback from. People just say,
it doesn't apply to them. I don'tneed to go to the Gospel concert.
It's not for me. I don't need toengage in that thing. It's not for me.
I see.
I don't have any conversation.
We do get some pushback when we talkabout gender expression and LGBTQ+
(11:46):
issues. Our music director is gay,
and he didn't come out publiclyuntil... Well, he was out publicly,
but to our community, his biodidn't mention his fiance.
He didn't tell the Youth Symphonystudents. Because when he did say it,
we had Youth Symphony students quitbecause their parents were scared of the
(12:08):
fact that he was gay. So,but in the same token,
we went to Pride. We go to Pride. Wehave our Pride, we do a petting zoo,
and we're at Pride and we have a greattime. We have violins out and people can,
like a petting zoo, but an instrument.
And we're there with Youth Symphonymaterials and Matthew's there.
And we had kids join Youth Symphonybecause they saw us at Pride,
(12:29):
and we have a transgender student inYouth Symphony who now is going off to
college for music because he was able tofeel comfortable at Youth Symphony. So
in the same token though, thenwe have those beautiful moments.
So the pushback is minimal.
I think what it is is justthe community that we're in,
where is our place in thisconversation in the community?
We're an arts organization.Do we even have any place?
(12:52):
And I think the answer is yes,
but in a very different way than ourprosecutor is going to talk about things,
than our legal system isgoing to talk about things.
But we do have a place at that table,
and how do we make sure that we're therein a way that is authentic to who we
are and how we can impact iskind of the difficult thing now.
I don't know if you ever saw this pieceof research from Colleen Dilenschneider,
(13:14):
who-essentially it was to saythat our audiences actually
do look to us for a pointof view on these kinds
of issues, which is interesting.I think for a long time,
perhaps your Gen X or Boomer peers,Rachel, would've said, "Well,
we absolutely cannot participate in aconversation of this nature," which...
(13:36):
it's not true anymore. And I thinkpeople like you are absolutely...
It's probably a deal breaker for youto not participate in these kinds of
conversations. Though you might do it inyour own way, you're going to be there.
Yeah, I mean, I do still think-andthis is where I find I get scared,
and it's like, okay, if we say this thing,
how is it going to impact my donations?
(13:56):
Of course.
Which is like, that'sa bad thing to think.
I understand.
But when I'm person looking at thebudget and realizing I have a $274,000
deficit that I need to fix,
if I lose my big old conservativedonor, what do I do then?
But then I remember too, I worked forthe Oklahoma City Ballet for a summer,
(14:17):
and I remember the artistic directorat one time remembering a donor
conversation he hadwhere the donor was like,
I'm going to give my amount a year,however much it was. And then he said,
but I would give more if thetutu's were a little shorter.
There are certain things thatyou have a duty to stand up for.
You have to stand up for your dancersbecause that's inappropriate and you don't
get to boss us around in that way,
(14:38):
and your donors should notdictate the organization.
They should support whatthe organization is doing.
Anytime we do need to get vocal aboutsomething and say what we believe,
because I want the musicians who play onstage to feel comfortable being a part
of this organization.
I want everyone in the audienceto feel comfortable being here.
So what can we do to make moreperspectives feel like they have a
(15:00):
voice?
Yeah.
I think one of the things I try to dofor myself and even for our clients [is],
when you stand up for thedisenfranchised and you perhaps risk
losing a donor,
who else is inspired by that action andis going to come to the table for the
very first time? They see yourbravery and they say that.
Absolutely. And we show up at Pride.
(15:22):
And now suddenly now we have ahuge supporter from Mr. Craig
Covey who is a gay man whosupports. And he was like,
this is amazing. I love what you're doing.
And now is a huge supporter of thesymphony because we started engaging.
So we're not going to necessarily...we might -- maybe we lose someone,
but we'll maybe gain a huge amountof people that we didn't even,
(15:46):
that didn't feel comfortablebefore. And now they do.
Yeah. That's wonderful. That'swonderful. Well, Rachel,
this has been such anenjoyable time spent for me.
Thank you so much forspending time with us today.
Thank you. This was wonderful. I am sohappy to talk about this topic, and yeah,
it's been a really fun littleafternoon here with you guys.
(16:13):
Hello, everyone. Dan here, backwith more CI-lebrity Sightings.
Here's our roundup of CI clients makingthe headlines this month. First up,
the Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art isclosing its physical doors only to open
some new ones.
The museum is kicking off a fresh chapteras a global institution with touring
exhibitions and an expanded onlinepresence. To commemorate the occasion,
(16:35):
Gothamist profiled a longtime docentas he bid a bittersweet farewell to his
home away from home. Next,
the Times of San Diego reportedthat after two years of renovations,
the San Diego Symphony has finallyreopened its Jacob's Music Center.
They celebrated with a full day ofmusical performances and of course,
a brand new look. And finally,
(16:56):
BroadwayWorld published the nomineesand winners of the 2024 Joseph Jefferson
Equity Awards honoring thebest in Chicago theater.
We couldn't be prouder to seeso many CI clients on the list.
Major applause to SteppenwolfTheatre Company, Goodman Theatre,
Mercury Theater Chicago, and theGuthrie for being celebrated.
Congrats to all these organizationsfor keeping the arts fresh, exciting,
(17:19):
and tuned into whatcommunities need right now.
Got a story that deserves a shout out?Well, tag us on social and let us know.
Thank you for listening to CI to Eye.
(17:40):
This episode was edited and produced byKaren McConarty and co-written by Karen
McConarty and myself, Dan Titmuss.
Stephanie Medina and Jess Berube are CIto Eye's designers and video editors,
and all work together tocreate CI's digital content.
Our music is by whoisuzo. Ifyou enjoyed today's episode,
please take a moment torate us or leave a review.
(18:01):
A nice comment goes a long way in helpingother people discover CI to Eye and
hear from experts in the arts and beyond.If you didn't enjoy today's episode,
pass it on to all of your enemies.Don't forget to follow us on Facebook,
Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube,
and TikTok for regular contentto help you market smarter.
You can also sign up for our newsletterat capacityinteractive.com so you never
(18:23):
miss an update. And ifyou haven't already,
please click the subscribe buttonwherever you get your podcasts.
Until next time, stay nerdy.
Hi everyone, it's Christopher Williams.
The arts world is drivenby passion and purpose,
and many of us are dedicatedto addressing injustice and
inequity in all that we do, whetherthrough programming, marketing,
or behind the scenes. Buteven with our best intentions,
(00:29):
our industry faces real challengesin achieving lasting change.
We strive to be more inclusiveto open doors to new voices,
but the path isn't always easy.
Boards and longtime patrons canresist programming or messaging that
feels unfamiliar,
and progress can be frustratingly slowwhen an organization lacks the community
(00:51):
connections or resources to supportthese efforts. In today's episode,
you'll hear how one symphony is holdingitself accountable to its mission and
values around representation,access, and equity.
We're sharing never-before-aired insightsfrom a conversation recorded earlier
this year between myself and RachelHagemeier from the Canton Symphony
(01:14):
Orchestra. Rachel discusses theSymphony's podcast, Orchestrating Change,
and the shifts it has sparkedwithin the organization.
She also shares how the Canton Symphonyis building a new model for community
connection and accountability inthe arts. Let's take a listen.
(01:40):
Rachel Hagemeier, welcome to CI to Eye.
Thank you. Very excited to be here today.
I'm so eager to talk to you,
and I also come from asimilar part of the world.
I'm from southwest Missouri,kind of in your neighborhood.
Yeah.
I think we also have being ahigh school drum major in common.
Oh yeah. High school drummajoring. It never leaves you.
(02:01):
Very important formativeroles in our leadership.
Yes. Oh, for sure.
So you host your ownorganization's podcast called
Orchestrating Change to addressissues of equity, diversity,
and inclusion in the industry.
Tell me more about what you'retrying to achieve with that,
because it's work that so needs to happen.
(02:22):
The idea for the podcast came from ourdirector of marketing and development,
Nathan Maslyk, back in 2020 when themurder of George Floyd took place,
and we saw tons of orchestras makebeautiful statements and we said,
great. We could do a statement.
Is there something though that wecould do to hold ourselves accountable?
And so publicly talkingabout it and publicly giving
(02:45):
limelight and airtime topeople who represent minority
backgrounds and are doing the worksuccessfully in the field already,
who are already doing wayabove and beyond what most
orchestras in America are doing-ifwe can talk to those people,
they're going to fuel our ideas.
And maybe there's some stuff thatwe can't implement in Canton,
(03:06):
but it's going to keepit top of mind for us.
We wanted to keep this conversationas a throughline so that
our DEI committee on the boardcould have things to think about.
And we talk about race, gender expression,
socioeconomic status,gender, all sorts of stuff,
but also physical disabilityand deafness, blindness,
(03:28):
all these different things. There's somuch in the DEI world that needs our
attention,
and so doing that podcast-we'rein season five now.
It's just a joy to talkto these people. I mean,
we've gotten to have DashonBurton on the podcast.
Grammy Award-winning Dashon Burton.Jeff Scott, also Grammy Award-winning.
(03:49):
And so many other people,like Sara Davis Buechner,
a transgender pianist who playedwith Canton pre-transition and
post-transition. Our formermusic director, Gerhardt,
was one of the few conductors whoprogrammed her after her transition.
Now she gets programmed a lotmore, but in the early days.
Listening to her story and the way thatshe navigated that whole experience.
(04:12):
And it has led to a lot ofdifferent things at the symphony.
Our involvement in the Sphinx Organizationand their SOPA auditions that they
do, and trying to bring musiciansof color onto the stage.
We still have a long way to go withthat. We're not a very diverse orchestra,
but we're better than we used to be.
We talk a lot about equity ofmusic access in the community,
(04:34):
so we started a free strings trainingprogram in Southeast Canton through
Lighthouse Ministries. SoutheastCanton is considered a food desert.
There's no gas stations. Victimof redlining. Very poor area.
The history of SoutheastCanton is devastating to read.
It was all blighted for an industrialpark that was going to go in that
never opened. So how canwe bring access? Well,
(04:59):
we have a ton of violins hanging aroundand we'll just give them free lessons.
It's only 12 students, but now they'rejoining our Youth Symphony program.
It's been so wonderful to havethat podcast and to do it,
and I've learned so much, and Inever want to stop doing it. Now,
whenever I'm having a bad dayand I'm like, "I'm too busy,
we have to record a podcast episode, I'mtoo busy"-afterwards I'm always like,
(05:21):
"That was the greatest. Ifeel so refreshed now.".
I know. Yeah.
It's really, really nice.
Oh, that's great.
I can imagine that there are so manypeople that love the podcast and love what
you're talking about on the podcast,
but did you face any challenges in someof the discussions that you were having?
The board understood it. We kind ofdecided as an organization, okay,
(05:43):
what are the things we need to do tomake sure that we're actually doing this
work?
So we decided every MasterWorks concerthas to have a composer of color or a
female composer. All of 'em. We haveto. And that's not just to check a box,
that's to hold ourselves accountableto make sure we're programming it.
We can program more, and we try to,and we do, but if we don't do that,
we're not doing our jobs.
And so the board was onboard and the staff gets it,
(06:06):
and our guests are amazing,
and we've been challenged inconversations with assumptions that we
have and identified a lot ofgaps in our own knowledge and
biases we didn't think we had.
We did get some pushbackfrom our community.
We got a letter about how we were beingracist to white people, which was...
(06:29):
You just look at it and go,okay. And you just toss it away.
Because you don't need to have thatconversation. But the thing that
is hard for us is there'sso much we want to do
that we can't. We don't have accessto the materials that we would need.
We don't have the money that we need.
(06:49):
We don't have the space or the connectionsin the community because Canton's
pretty small. There's lots ofstuff that we want to do right now,
but it takes a lot of planning and time.
And so the amount of change I would liketo see happen is not happening at the
rate at which I would like it to happen,
and it's just about patienceand working hard and being
(07:11):
uncomfortable and continuing on anddoing that cycle forever and ever.
Because we were having a conversationwith one of our guests in the first season
where he said,
"I remember back in the 1980s whenI was on a panel about diversifying
orchestras. And then I remember in theearly two thousands when I was on a panel
about diversifying orchestras. Andthen here we are again." And he said,
(07:34):
"It's been a fad. It's been a cycle.
It's been something that pops up everyonce in a while." What do we need to do
to make sure that this has stayingpower and that it's not just a phase.
And it's a little concerning.
A study came out about the number ofcomposers of color that were programmed
went from like 0.4% to 9.4%.
That's a big change. It's still only 9.4%,
(07:56):
but when looking at theseasons upcoming, it went down.
And so how do we keep remindingorchestras that there's
room for Beethoven and SamuelColeridge-Taylor? You can do both.
Jessie Montgomery is alive and well,
and she's maybe available to come toyour concert if you play her music.
(08:17):
There's a lot of remindingthat this is not a phase.
This is continuation. And that'sI think maybe the hardest thing.
I think you're doing the Lord's work bytalking about these kinds of issues on
your podcast,
and I think it can be challenging to talkabout some of these things when you're
in any part of the country. For example,
I'm sitting in the very progressiveeastern part of the country,
(08:41):
and I know where you aresitting. And so I'm wondering,
does the geographical environmentthat you find your organization in,
does it make it harderto address some of this?
Or do you feel like it's not a problem?
In certain ways. I think that...
We just did a Gospel joint symphonyconcert, and it was so fun.
And our audience was the mostdiverse audience we've ever
(09:06):
had. I've only been there for fiveyears, but oh my gosh. I was like, well,
this is like I'm in aBaptist church on Sunday.
This is a very different experiencethan we've ever had at the symphony,
and it was super fun.
And doing concerts specifically fordemographics of people that have been left
out of the concert hall is apart of what we want to do.
We did a concert last fall with The LabraBrothers for Dia de los Muertos that
(09:29):
was all Hispanic punkfusion music with orchestra,
and our audience wasmostly Spanish-speaking.
So I introduced the concert and thenone of our board members, Joanna,
introduced it in Spanish because most ofthe audience didn't speak English. Now,
those two concerts sold a lot less ticketsthan almost everything else we did.
(09:51):
Is that because the demographicsof people that those concerts
were for don't see our marketing in thetraditional ways? Is that because we
need to shift the way that we think aboutticketing and getting the word out to
those people? Or... why wasn'tour traditional audience there?
I'm not doing a Gospel joint symphonyjust for the Black community.
(10:16):
It was a little sad that a lot of ourtraditional audience wasn't there.
So what can we do to do content that, yes,
maybe it's focused on theBlack Gospel experience,
but our whole community iscurious and interested about it.
And in the same token,what can we do to make our,
it's not targeted to the black community.It's just a MasterWorks concert.
(10:37):
There happens to be a Black composeron it, but that's not the focus.
The focus is the music. How can we makeour orchestra a space that the Black
community would want tocome to that concert?
And so I think that is a reallyinteresting challenge for us.
Canton is pretty siloed when itcomes to different communities,
and there's still a racial tension.
We had a really hard incident with thepolice and a Black man dying recently in
(11:02):
Canton. Very,
very George Floyd-esque to theexact words that he was saying,
George Floyd-esque.
And so there's a lot of reallydifficult things like that happening.
And so as a symphony, where'sour place in that conversation?
And by having this podcast and talkingabout these issues when it comes to
(11:23):
racial issues and diversityand lack of diversity,
that I think we get a lot lesspushback from. People just say,
it doesn't apply to them. I don'tneed to go to the Gospel concert.
It's not for me. I don't need toengage in that thing. It's not for me.
I see.
I don't have any conversation.
We do get some pushback when we talkabout gender expression and LGBTQ+
(11:46):
issues. Our music director is gay,
and he didn't come out publiclyuntil... Well, he was out publicly,
but to our community, his biodidn't mention his fiance.
He didn't tell the Youth Symphonystudents. Because when he did say it,
we had Youth Symphony students quitbecause their parents were scared of the
(12:08):
fact that he was gay. So,but in the same token,
we went to Pride. We go to Pride. Wehave our Pride, we do a petting zoo,
and we're at Pride and we have a greattime. We have violins out and people can,
like a petting zoo, but an instrument.
And we're there with Youth Symphonymaterials and Matthew's there.
And we had kids join Youth Symphonybecause they saw us at Pride,
(12:29):
and we have a transgender student inYouth Symphony who now is going off to
college for music because he was able tofeel comfortable at Youth Symphony. So
in the same token though, thenwe have those beautiful moments.
So the pushback is minimal.
I think what it is is justthe community that we're in,
where is our place in thisconversation in the community?
We're an arts organization.Do we even have any place?
(12:52):
And I think the answer is yes,
but in a very different way than ourprosecutor is going to talk about things,
than our legal system isgoing to talk about things.
But we do have a place at that table,
and how do we make sure that we're therein a way that is authentic to who we
are and how we can impact iskind of the difficult thing now.
I don't know if you ever saw this pieceof research from Colleen Dilenschneider,
(13:14):
who-essentially it was to saythat our audiences actually
do look to us for a pointof view on these kinds
of issues, which is interesting.I think for a long time,
perhaps your Gen X or Boomer peers,Rachel, would've said, "Well,
we absolutely cannot participate in aconversation of this nature," which...
(13:36):
it's not true anymore. And I thinkpeople like you are absolutely...
It's probably a deal breaker for youto not participate in these kinds of
conversations. Though you might do it inyour own way, you're going to be there.
Yeah, I mean, I do still think-andthis is where I find I get scared,
and it's like, okay, if we say this thing,
how is it going to impact my donations?
(13:56):
Of course.
Which is like, that'sa bad thing to think.
I understand.
But when I'm person looking at thebudget and realizing I have a $274,000
deficit that I need to fix,
if I lose my big old conservativedonor, what do I do then?
But then I remember too, I worked forthe Oklahoma City Ballet for a summer,
(14:17):
and I remember the artistic directorat one time remembering a donor
conversation he hadwhere the donor was like,
I'm going to give my amount a year,however much it was. And then he said,
but I would give more if thetutu's were a little shorter.
There are certain things thatyou have a duty to stand up for.
You have to stand up for your dancersbecause that's inappropriate and you don't
get to boss us around in that way,
(14:38):
and your donors should notdictate the organization.
They should support whatthe organization is doing.
Anytime we do need to get vocal aboutsomething and say what we believe,
because I want the musicians who play onstage to feel comfortable being a part
of this organization.
I want everyone in the audienceto feel comfortable being here.
So what can we do to make moreperspectives feel like they have a
(15:00):
voice?
Yeah.
I think one of the things I try to dofor myself and even for our clients [is],
when you stand up for thedisenfranchised and you perhaps risk
losing a donor,
who else is inspired by that action andis going to come to the table for the
very first time? They see yourbravery and they say that.
Absolutely. And we show up at Pride.
(15:22):
And now suddenly now we have ahuge supporter from Mr. Craig
Covey who is a gay man whosupports. And he was like,
this is amazing. I love what you're doing.
And now is a huge supporter of thesymphony because we started engaging.
So we're not going to necessarily...we might -- maybe we lose someone,
but we'll maybe gain a huge amountof people that we didn't even,
(15:46):
that didn't feel comfortablebefore. And now they do.
Yeah. That's wonderful. That'swonderful. Well, Rachel,
this has been such anenjoyable time spent for me.
Thank you so much forspending time with us today.
Thank you. This was wonderful. I am sohappy to talk about this topic, and yeah,
it's been a really fun littleafternoon here with you guys.
(16:13):
Hello, everyone. Dan here, backwith more CI-lebrity Sightings.
Here's our roundup of CI clients makingthe headlines this month. First up,
the Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art isclosing its physical doors only to open
some new ones.
The museum is kicking off a fresh chapteras a global institution with touring
exhibitions and an expanded onlinepresence. To commemorate the occasion,
(16:35):
Gothamist profiled a longtime docentas he bid a bittersweet farewell to his
home away from home. Next,
the Times of San Diego reportedthat after two years of renovations,
the San Diego Symphony has finallyreopened its Jacob's Music Center.
They celebrated with a full day ofmusical performances and of course,
a brand new look. And finally,
(16:56):
BroadwayWorld published the nomineesand winners of the 2024 Joseph Jefferson
Equity Awards honoring thebest in Chicago theater.
We couldn't be prouder to seeso many CI clients on the list.
Major applause to SteppenwolfTheatre Company, Goodman Theatre,
Mercury Theater Chicago, and theGuthrie for being celebrated.
Congrats to all these organizationsfor keeping the arts fresh, exciting,
(17:19):
and tuned into whatcommunities need right now.
Got a story that deserves a shout out?Well, tag us on social and let us know.
Thank you for listening to CI to Eye.
(17:40):
This episode was edited and produced byKaren McConarty and co-written by Karen
McConarty and myself, Dan Titmuss.
Stephanie Medina and Jess Berube are CIto Eye's designers and video editors,
and all work together tocreate CI's digital content.
Our music is by whoisuzo. Ifyou enjoyed today's episode,
please take a moment torate us or leave a review.
(18:01):
A nice comment goes a long way in helpingother people discover CI to Eye and
hear from experts in the arts and beyond.If you didn't enjoy today's episode,
pass it on to all of your enemies.Don't forget to follow us on Facebook,
Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube,
and TikTok for regular contentto help you market smarter.
You can also sign up for our newsletterat capacityinteractive.com so you never
(18:23):
miss an update. And ifyou haven't already,
please click the subscribe buttonwherever you get your podcasts.
Until next time, stay nerdy.
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