San Diego Opera to stay open amid crowdfunding success

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/19/san-diego-opera-stay-open-crowdfunding

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The San Diego Opera has reversed a decision to close after months of boardroom intrigue to rival the drama on any stage.

The board's directors on Monday said they had voted to rescind a 19 March decision to liquidate the company and announced a new season of three operas.

“The public spoke, we listened, and we’re open for business,” board president Carol Lazier said in a statement. “And do we have some great news to share with you.”

Instead of vanishing from the musical calendar, the troubled California company will produce three operas – Puccini’s La Boheme, Mozart’s Don Giovanni and John Adams’ Nixon in China – at the Civic Theatre during the 2015 season, its 50th anniversary.

It will also present two gala concerts with with the San Diego Symphony at the Jacobs Music Center.

It took a de facto boardroom coup, crowdfunding and cutbacks to finally save the city's opera, but questions remain over the viability of an institution which has struggled for funding, audiences and prestige compared to counterparts in San Francisco, Chicago and New York.

The 58-member board voted in March to shut down after its then-director, Ian Campbell, argued it was better “to go out with dignity, on a high note with heads held high than to slip into the night, leaving creditors and community in the lurch”.

Some creditors and unions representing performers and production personnel protested the decision to shut down, as did rebel board members who voted to extend the shutdown deadline to 19 May in hope of obtaining additional funding.

In a chaotic meeting in April about a dozen board members from the faction which wished to close the opera jumped or were pushed out, including Campbell and his ex-wife, Ann Spira Campbell, a deputy director.

Lazier, a philanthropist formerly married a venture capitalist, took over and set a target of raising $1m via crowdfunding by 19 May to show public desire to keep the company open.

The campaign raised more than $2.1m. “You spread the word, donated, tweeted and posted to Facebook and, because of an amazing and dedicated community, San Diego Opera is moving forward,” said a statement on its website.

Lazier contributed $1m, yielding more than $3m by the deadline. The company still needs to raise $6.5m for the estimated $10.5m operating budget, a slimmed-down affair from an original programme that envisaged not three but four operas.