Memo to accompany enclosed letter:
September 19,2009
Dear NHMF Board Members
This letter was sent to the Board in July when I returned from working overseas and discovered that there were a great many troubling things going on. In looking into them I felt impelled to write to you all and hope that as the summer progressed things would right themselves.
I am re-sending the letter for two reasons. First, I think it's probable that most of you did not see it. Second, I see that that rather than getting better, things have gotten worse. There is a very large group made up of patrons and audience members who are deeply disturbed about a wide range of things. You have undoubtedly read and heard of many of them, and I am certainly not going to belabor them here.
The original letter is about a rather different aspect of the current state of the Festival and for this reason I wanted to make sure, as Board members, you had it. Susan read it in July and responded that you were all mindful of the concerns and “actively working” on them. As there will be a fall meeting, I wanted once again to express my grave concerns so that this can actually happen.
I very much appreciate both your reading my letter and your willingness to serve the best interests of the Festival.
Deborah Stuart
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Deborah Stuart
64 Buffalo Road
Wentworth, NH 03282
July 29, 2009
Board of Directors
New Hampshire Music Festival
Center Harbor, NH
Dear Friends,
As have many others, I am writing to you about the current distress of many Festival constituents. I however want to comment on a somewhat different aspect of what is going on.
As a longtime (35+) year associate of the Festival – former Board member, active in the Music in the Schools Program, worked with David Graham on New Hampshire Charitable Foundation grant initiative to include people with disabilities in programming, a donor and member of the Encore Society, it pains me to see the current situation.
I have long experience in non-profit arts administration. I was for eight years on the Board of a John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts affiliate, VSA arts – an international federally funded organization. I was also their interim President and CEO for 18 months, during a period of change and transition for the organization. This is just to say that – I know what times like these are like.
Change is inevitable, however much we want things that are familiar and that we feel work well to stay the same. Believe me, I do understand that. Progress is important to the health and longevity of any organization.
However, I am writing because I am truly appalled at the way this change which is outlined for the Festival is being handled administratively. I have been in this field a long time, have experience not just with VSA arts but with other organizations as well. I have never seen such egregious misjudgment of how to facilitate change so that it is transparent, inclusive of the interests and input of it's constituencies, and understandable to all concerned.
As you as Board members are, I am sure, aware, there is widespread dismay and disbelief that certain actions are being taken without many people understanding what and why these things are happening. The administration is sorely misinformed if it thinks that the support of audience members, small and medium contribution donors and musicians don't count. Major donors notwithstanding – these various constituencies are the Music Festival. To ride roughshod over them will, in my experience, destroy any chances the Festival has for making a transition to a larger, more significant, more “exciting” - whatever the goals are – organization. Quite the contrary. This kind of behavior could take the Festival down. And I think that would be very sad and a huge loss to this region and to all those who have loved and supported it.
Except for a couple of communications which are vague and somewhat insulting to those of us who think the quality of the music is truly excellent, I do not hear of any actions which are considered best practice when an organization undergoes a major shift in focus and/or activity. Were there focus groups? Was there really a recommendation from the Artistic Council (I sat on a Board which included one of these people and I very much doubt that they met and made such a decision)? Were there real efforts made to consider ways to bring all the constituencies along so that there would be support and continued involvement? Are the finances really in line for this move? (Those of us who see the orchestra size cut, the rehearsal schedule cut, the chorus cut, while a new level of costly administration is added, wonder.) Does the administration really want to insinuate that the orchestra members need to reapply to demonstrate that they will work harder, when we have the superb Chamber concerts which they have offered the community for so many years and without pay? Why has marketing for our concerts been so lacking? Why do figures - both financial and statistical - not add up?
While not going into specifics in this letter, I and many others wonder if an administration which is so ignorant of best practices on this basic level of communication and planning actually has the ability to make good choices on the larger ones. Change in venue, change in artistic direction, change in personnel, change in scope of funding requirements. These are huge events for an organization. How can we trust that sound thinking is going on when such unsound actions are being manifest in so many ways.
From the age of eight, when I started attending BSO concerts, I have been privileged to hear the best of the best. I'm not holding myself up as unusual. There are lots of Festival concert goers who are more musically sophisticated than I. But I think we'd all agree that to have music as wonderful as we hear every summer, in a rural area of NH, is a marvelous gift. To lose this would be such a shame.
I understand that to keep this kind of involvement in music alive for today's audiences takes creative thinking and new approaches. But that's not going to be achieved by methods that are alienating virtually everybody who has been an enthusiastic supporter and champion and contributor of either funds or talent.
Please take this letter in the spirit in which it is being sent – I want only for the Festival to be valued and preserved in a positive way, even with changes. We all deserve better than we are getting in terms of inclusiveness and transparency.
With appreciation for your service
Deborah Stuart
Wentworth, NH