Atlanta joins opera’s top 10
OperaOpera America ranks US companies by budget, with a baseline of $15 million annual budget to make the top ten (among 180 ensembles).
Atlanta Opera has just broken through.
The list now reads: The Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Santa Fe, Seattle and Atlanta.
Atlanta chair Rhys Wilson said: ‘General & Artistic Director Tomer Zvulun was selected to lead the Atlanta Opera in 2013 and he immediately went to work innovating and celebrating the art of opera in our city. We’ve created new ways of thinking about opera and supporting the next generation of creatives, artists and audiences through our programs. Strong fundraising efforts and tight spending controls have stabilized the financial structure of the company while the caliber of the productions and the artists, both singers and musicians, has increased. We found a way to continue producing opera safely through the pandemic, which allowed us to keep our staff, donors and patrons; to provide needed jobs to more than 150 artists; and to raise our profile internationally. As a result, for the last eight seasons, we have operated in the black.’
I was really impressed by what they did during the pandemic.
So San Francisco is way farther down the list than they used to be.
It’s not quite right that they rank them. They take results from 8 of the top 10, excluding NY and Washington, and use their data to discuss the state-of-the-business, so to speak, of the companies with budgets over $15 million. Apparently Atlanta was included this year, possibly replacing Detroit (MOT), but the report is not yet published, afaik. SFO is by budget within the top four.
That’s sort of what I would have thought – since I think the SFO budget used to be bigger than Lyric opera. But the list is confusing then.
That would be shocking if their budget matched the Lyric, their shows certainly don’t come close.
Only three of these US cities are in the top 100 cities worldwide for Opera performances per year. They are big fish in a giant’s embarrassingly little puddle.
Looking at budgets they would be number 11.
Buff singers who are miked and shirtless can help any opera company move into the Top Ten earners!