The Orchestra’s Subscribers: Fiercely Loyal, Financially Essential and Sometimes Fickle : PACIFIC SYMPHONY : Optimism in the Face of Ups-and-Downs

They are the backbone of arts organizations, providing up to 90% of the audiences and of the revenues. Most are fiercely loyal and willing to volunteer their support, such as subscriber Betty Rockwell has done for years at the Pasadena Symphony. But some are fickle, as the Master Chorale of Orange County is discovering as the novelty of its new home at the Performing Arts Center wears off. Even the mighty Los Angeles Philharmonic has a 25% annual subscriber turnover rate. At the Pacific Symphony in Orange County, the goal is to retain 75% to 80% of all subscribers, and at 65% renewals this year it will be a struggle. Why are subscribers so imporant? Single-ticket sales are “scary,” says Deborah Rutter of the L.A. Chamber Orchestra, “because you never know how you’re doing until the last minute.” As the 1989-90 music season begins, here are five portraits of these key people, the subscribers themselves.

Joni Marie Barr of Santa Ana, a six-year subscriber to the Pacific Symphony, momentarily balked when asked why she keeps coming back to hear Orange County’s largest symphonic organization.

“How do you really explain something like your love of classical music?” said Barr, 50, a real estate investor who has attended concerts by major symphony orchestras in Los Angeles, New York and Chicago as well as in Orange County about once a month for the past 25 years. “It’s difficult for me because I am not educated in music, I just have an appreciative ear.”

“I love to watch the expressions on the musicians’ faces while they are playing,” Barr said. “It’s really a form of entertainment in itself. Some of them just get into it with their bodies and their souls.”

In addition to the Pacific Symphony, Barr also subscribes to Opera Pacific, is a member of support groups for the orchestra and the Center, and said even crucial changes in the orchestra haven’t caused her to stop spending about $1,000 annually on season tickets.

She first bought a Pacific Symphony subscription in 1983. Since then, she says, she has rarely missed a concert, even when “parking and acoustical problems and uncomfortable seats” plagued concert-goers at Santa Ana High School Auditorium. The Pacific Symphony, then emerging as a major regional orchestra, performed at the 1,500-seat school auditorium before moving into the $73-million, 3,000-seat Orange County Performing Arts Center when the center opened in 1986.

About to launch its 11th season, the 80-member orchestra offers pops and family series as well as classical fare, along with special events such as Handel’s “Messiah” at Christmastime. Barr, however, has continually subscribed “strictly” to the classical series.

That particular type of devotion is critical to the future of the Pacific Symphony, according to its executive director, Louis G. Spisto.

Like other Orange County musical organizations, the orchestra experienced a decline in subscription sales--which generate the vast majority of its ticket revenues--after its first year at the center, Spisto said.

Subscriptions fell somewhat from 13,000 in the 1986-87 season (which filled about 95% of available subscription seats) to 11,786 in 1987-88, Spisto said, which constituted 68% of a possible 17,418 subscriptions.

Why the downturn?

During the center’s inaugural year, patrons came in droves “to see the inside of the center and weren’t as concerned with what was being presented.” Spisto said. “People bought many subscriptions and they are finding it’s very difficult to keep up with that much theater attendance. It is our belief that the community is just now developing its preferences.”

Subscriptions to Pacific Symphony concerts at the center fell again in 1988-89, to 11,205, Spisto said. However, an additional 2,075 subscriptions were sold for the orchestra’s summer series that began that year at Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre. Those figures combined constitute 61% of a possible 21,718 subscriptions.

The current, 1989-1990 year looks good too, Spisto said. Though the organization, which has a budget of about $4.5 million, currently has a cumulative deficit of $250,000, he expects that to turn into a $50,000 surplus by next summer. And, with another month or so to go, already more than 13,085 subscriptions have been sold. A total of 15,000 is projected, which would mean 69% of about 21,820 possible subscriptions sold.

Subscription renewals for classical series--which had been dropping--shot up this year. For the last three years, the orchestra retained about 55% of its classical series subscribers from year to year. This year, 65% of last year’s subscribers renewed their season tickets.

The increase can be attributed in part to the lighter fare of the orchestra’s summer series, Spisto said. “We want to offer something more accessible and provide a number of Orange County people an entree to classical music. A lot of our audience is new to classical music.”

In addition, “There’s a lot of interest in the growth of the orchestra,” Spisto claimed, and in the appointment, expected by the end of the season, of a musical director to replace Keith Clark. Clark resigned in May, under a cloud of controversy after the orchestra’s board voted not to renew his contract.

Still, subscriptions renewal rates to classical music concerts--the core of the orchestra’s programming--aren’t what they should be, Spisto said, which is why patrons like Barr are crucial to the orches tra’s future.

While this year’s 65% renewal rate augers well, “to build this orchestra, we are going to have to do even better than that. We’re going to have to retain 75-80% of classical subscribers in order to add concerts as the years go by. We have found ourselves working hard to replenish some of the subscriptions we lose each year.”