Michael Spierman, center, is seen with the cast of a 1980s Bronx Opera Company performance in this photographic collage prepared for the organization’s 40th anniversary this year.
Sitting on a comfortable couch in the Bedford Park apartment he has called home nearly all his life, Bronx Opera Company artistic director Michael Spierman mused that since his performing arts venture was launched in 1967, much in the borough has changed and yet much has remained the same.
Spierman, an affable and enthusiastic man in his 60s, who is an adjunct professor of music literature at Hunter College, started the Bronx Opera Company with a group of friends in the fall of 1967. Their intention, he said, was to gather music lovers together and give their neighbors in the borough a bit of culture through performances at community centers. They did that—and more. This Sunday, at a Riverdale fund-raising gala, what has become a cultural institution in the borough will celebrate its 40th anniversary.
“We were all musical devotees and basically had an idea that there was not a huge amount of cultural activity around the borough,” Spierman said, as No. 4 trains came and went outside the window behind him. “The object was to put on an opera or two and to have a good time.”
With an initial investment of $400, Spierman and his friends launched their pioneering 1967-1968 season with a performance of Mozart’s “Cosi fan tutte” on Nov. 24, 1967. Today, as the company prepares for its 40th May season, it relies on an annual budget of $270,000 to provide for a staff of about 120 that includes an orchestra, a chorus, set designers and stage hands.
“It’s peanuts for an opera,” said Spierman, who takes no salary for his work as the company’s artistic director. “I bet the Metropolitan Opera’s Con Edison bill is bigger than our budget.
“There is a certain insanity in doing this. Opera is a phenomenon that involves all of the arts if you think about it.”
Because opera requires so much—an orchestra, performers, sets and more—it’s difficult, Spierman said, when certain funding streams, be they public or private, dry up. Losing 25 percent of the company’s budget is almost insurmountable, he said, because he would have to make the difficult choice of deciding what to cut back. While Spierman said he could chose to make cuts to some of the company’s educational outreach programs, he said he would hate to do so because he’s committed to teaching people about opera.
“It is by nature a more expensive venture and takes a great amount of coordination,” Spierman said, explaining that about 40 percent of the company’s budget comes from corporate donors, foundations and contributions from individuals. Another 40 percent comes from the city and the state, but in these uncertain economic times, he worries that it may become increasingly difficult for the company to survive and thrive.
“What we don’t have is that huge funder who is extremely affluent,” Spierman said. “We have no one we can call and say, ‘We’re $50,000 short. Can you help us out?’”
Still, through the generosity of private donations and the continued support from state and city government, Spierman said, the Bronx Opera is able to mount at least two opera performances each year. The season begins in January with what Spierman calls “more obscure” opera performances and continues in May with more traditional pieces. Read more..
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