Louisville Magazine is Louisville's city magazine, covering Louisville people, lifestyles, politics, sports, restaurants, entertainment and homes. Includes a monthly calendar of events.
Issue link: https://loumag.epubxp.com/i/197412
CULTURE Nights at the Opera By Bill Doolittle Photos by Mickie Winters Budgeting itself wisely and casting young talent on the rise has profted Kentucky Opera as other companies suffer declines. 30 LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 11.13 I n an era when many arts groups have trouble holding on to audiences and struggle fnancially, Kentucky Opera has found a way to fll the Brown Teatre and stay afoat fnancially. More than stay afoat, the opera seems to be going places. Te question is: How? How does Kentucky Opera fll its hall? How does the opera company pay its bills, when other big classical-music entities fail? Te Baltimore Opera is gone. Te New York City Opera blew $9.5 million of its endowment in the 2008 stock-market crash, then went bust for good this year — bowing out, believe it or not, with a staging of the new opera Anna Nicole. Te Louisville Orchestra declared bankruptcy two years ago and lost an entire season. Big problems haunt symphonies in Detroit and Minneapolis, and even the venerable Philadelphia Orchestra ran out of money. Yet here's Kentucky Opera singing merrily along, with general director David Roth happily noting at the end of each season that his company has once again balanced its books. Four straight years in the black, he recently noted. And counting. "I don't claim to be a fnancial wizard," Roth says with a laugh. "If I had $300 million, I'd know how to spend it. But we're not a $300 million operation, like the Metropolitan Opera. We're a $2 million operation, and that's the budget we'll spend this year." Opera, as one would imagine, is the costliest of all musical art forms. And a runaway opera, supervised by runaway egos, can toss away big money on a grand production. Extravagant sets, world-famous stars, designer-created costumes. Or, the opera company can concentrate on the music. "Some of the most creative performances have been on the smallest budgets," Roth says. "I don't mean to say that creativity only comes out of need and want, but you do have to start with: What is our budget — what are our resources — to do the work we want to do?" Ten get from that point to opening night. Te 59-year-old Roth, who doublemajored in business administration and vocal performance at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, took over Kentucky Opera in 2006 after stints with several opera