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Dr. Victor Frankenstein knew a thing or two about resurrections: It takes absolute devotion to an ideal, coupled with dogged determination, if you’re going to attempt to bring something to life.
The two people who have taken on the job of directing the resurrection from bankruptcy of the San Diego Symphony are nothing if not devoted and determined. Perhaps the most important thing that can be said about new symphony board Chair Sandra Pay and Vice Chair Ted Roth is that, while there's certainly a healthy dollop of idealism involved, they're going into the game with their eyes wide open.
If the quality of the leadership reflects the chances of success, the symphony has a better than average possibility of making it back into this world.
Pay has devoted much of her adult life to the arts in San Diego. She has chaired the San Diego Opera and the San Diego Arts Advisory boards and has just stepped down as board chairman of the San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture. She also has been the president of the Playwrights Project and was a founding board member of the Institute for Arts Education. Add membership on the boards of Sharp Hospital, the Greater San Diego Chamber and San Diego’s Parker Foundation, and you will see the sterling qualifications Pay brings to her new task and why she is respected throughout San Diego’s arts, government and philanthropic communities.
Knowing this, as well as the severe problems that have beset the San Diego Symphony for the past two years, begs the question: Why is Pay risking her long-standing reputation on what could still be a cultural bust?
"First is the challenge of seeing if this community will build a symphony designed to meet the needs of San Diego and position itself for a strong future," says Pay. And second, "education. This organization should be the powerhouse (in musical education) in this community, a leader in getting the word out. Changes obviously needed to be made. Change has never bothered me."
Roth, president and chief operating officer of Alliance Pharmaceuticals, without whose assistance Pay would have declined to take the job, "got into the picture in late '96 when I was asked by Mayor Susan Golding to be a member of the team put together to review the (symphony) situation."
Pay was in the same group and Roth says it was assumed by all involved that Pay would be the new board president if that position again came back into existence. "Last May, after a symphony organization had been reconstituted, Sandra and I were voted in," Roth says.
Pay describes herself as front person and Roth as behind-the-scenes man. Roth says his job is "to help identify sources of revenue and pursue those sources."
Pay and Roth's definitions of the primary problems are complementary and cut a wide swath. Pay says one of the most important, salaries, was overcome by "the willingness of the musicians to accept the need for a different kind of contract." The new contract will be based on services rather than weeks of work or number of concerts, and includes services to be utilized not only for concerts and rehearsals but also for in-school education, performance in smaller ensembles and the like.
Thomas Gerdom, interim symphony president, reports that the new contract calls for annual salaries that give the symphony about 205 services per player. Further, 79 musicians are covered by the new contract, and musicians who left to find work elsewhere after the symphony folded have two years to resume their chairs.
Resuming the flow of funding to the symphony is the second challenge that Pay and Roth face. Pay points out that "getting start-up money" is critical. "The organization now has $2.6 million in pledges and cash," she says. "The donors most likely to give us money were those who had given but had been disappointed in the past. Those who hadn't given before didn’t want to. Nobody wanted to be the first to make a commitment. They wanted to see if the previous donors would give."
As sources, she names the $500,000 set aside by the city for a restart when the symphony first went into bankruptcy; generous gifts by Irwin and Joan Jacobs and new donors John and Becky Moores; and, of course, the $2 million from Larry Robinson to defray the indebtedness of the bankruptcy, as well as another $1 million he has made available for start-up expenses.
Pay and Roth agree that overcoming "the frustration of the community" and establishing credibility will be a big problem. "We have to earn the acceptance of the community," says Roth. "Just because there's a new board doesn’t mean the community should automatically support us."
Roth and Pay agree that developing and putting into place a plan to attract new customers and new audiences is a huge task facing the new symphony. "We must relate not only to 20- and 30-year-olds, but also get into the primary and secondary schools, developing our own audiences," Roth says. "In order to make this a sustaining organization, we have to overcome the problems of start-up and credibility, but we must also make sure we respond quickly to establishing audiences for the future."
How long does Roth feel it will take for the institution to achieve stability? "At least a year," he says. "I would hope we can demonstrate stability in a two- to three-year period."
Says Pay: "I hope the community will help us to come back. It’s not going to be perfect, but the responses of the community can help. Tell us what you like, what you don’t like. Let us hear from you." Roth adds, "All we ask is that they give us a chance, that they wait to see what we can do."
An author, lecturer and consultant, John Willett has critiqued music, dance and the arts for more than 17 years.
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