How much does it cost to put on a concert and where does the
money come from? It is a fact of life that ticket receipts do not cover the
total cost, even for a relatively small event. In 2010 we put on a concert
performance of my opera When a Man Knows; it was done on a shoe string,
but we still needed some substantial sponsorship to fill in the gap between
ticket sales and costs. And of course if you want to put on, say, a Handel
oratorio using fully professional forces properly rehearsed, then you are
looking at a significant funding gap; one generally filled by sponsors, usually
big name firms.
Of course, you've got to find someone willing and
interested, the content of the event needs to appeal to the sponsors. This
scrabbling for money has always happened, in the past composers and performers
needed patrons and sponsors. Impresarios like Diaghilev spent most of their
working lives searching for the next sponsor and Sir Thomas Beecham’s seasons
at Covent Garden only happened because of his father’s money. Since the
formation of the Arts Council, this role has often been taken by government,
but as the arts have dropped in importance to a series of governments who seem
to have done their best to look philistine, companies are having to hustle for
themselves.
The Gabrieli Consort have had a long relationship with Christ
Church Spitalfields; in 2005 their concert season there consisted of 6
concerts, but in 2011 they only performed there once. What tends to happen with
such independent groups is that they perform where it is economic to do so, so
you can end up with the slightly crazy situation of well known British
performing groups appearing mainly outside Britain. If you want to see some of
the more interesting work from groups like the Gabrieli Consort, the English
Concert and others like them you have to travel to see them. In fact, thanks to
the Barbican Centre’s Great Performers season, we tend to see more performances
from visiting groups then UK ones.
Gabrieli's solution to this is to do it themselves.
Following on from their Proms performance of Mendelssohn's Elijah with Simon Keenlyside, Paul McCreesh and his
forces went into the studio to record the work. The project was part funded by collaborators at the City of Wroclaw, Poland, where McCreesh is artistic director of the Wratislava Cantans festival, but having secured that partnership Gabrieli still needed to top up with a
group funding event organised by the Gabrieli Consort themselves. The recording
of Elijah will come out on Paul McCreesh's new label, Winged Lion Records; the
label's first disc is Berlioz's Requiem recorded with the Wroclaw Festival; a disc
which is already winning acclaim.
So they are repeating the group funding/crowd sourcing again
this autumn/winter in order to fill the sponsorship gap for their concerts as
part of the 2012 Christ Church Spitalfields Festival. The extra money gives
them the flexibility to mount a performance of Purcell's Fairy Queen, the Monteverdi and Stravinsky masses and a
new a cappella choral programme, plus various educational extras and
outreach which are now part of the contemporary performance experience.
All this will help to celebrate the amazing fact that the
Gabrieli Consort are 30 next year.
The fund raising takes place as part of the Big Give,
starting 5th December, the advantage of this is that funds raised
through the Big Give will be matched by funds from major supporters and sponsors,
so that if you include gift aid then £100 in donations will become £225.
All this happens from 10.am on Monday 5th
December. Further details at www.gabrieli.com
and http://new.thebiggive.org.uk/projects/view/13226
As next year is Gabrieli’s 30th anniversary and
they are inviting people to share their thoughts and reminiscences via the
groups Facebook page or by sending an email to info@gabrieli.com
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