Why concert halls are going out of business

[rachmaninoff_forever]

Or opera houses or whatever.

It's so damn uncomfortable sitting in a freaking concert hall!

I can't sit in a tight space for too long or else my knees start hurting a lot.

And I'm not the only one.

I feel like to enjoy classical music you MUST be comfortable.

Put more space in between the aisles and rows and I guarantee everyone stops going out of business.

[liszt1022]

https://mellowyellowcello.com/2014/01/27/audience-shaming-needs-to-end/

[Bob]

Shame away.  If someone is dumb enough to bring a young kid to a concert and then not leave after the kid won't be quiet... Shame away.  They brought it on themselves.  If the conductor doesn't do something, the orchestra will get the feedback from all the other audience members later.


Ditto on the chairs.  Some are puffy, but that makes it worse.  It's kind of dumb too when the hall isn't filled up and everyone is crammed into tiny seats.  I'm in favor of shorter concerts, in part for the seats.

[rachmaninoff_forever]

https://mellowyellowcello.com/2014/01/27/audience-shaming-needs-to-end/

If I was that kid my mom would take me out, give me the ass whooping of my life, and then take me back as if nothing happened lol.

I agree with bob when he said that the mom was the idiot for not taking the kids out earlier.  I don't care how much money you spent on the tickets, if you're ruining other peoples experiences, GET OUT. 

But AT&T the same time, think about it from the moms perspective.  I would've felt soooooooo salty!!!!!!!!  That one guy who screamed get the baby out was hella bogus.

I think you should be able to eat, move around, cough but not too much, and text during concerts as long as you're not loud.

Coughing in excessive amounts freaking PISS ME OFF!!!  I saw Stephen Hough play once, and there was this one lady who WOULDN'T STOP!!!  Dude she was coughing like she just barely made it out of drowning!  That's that sh*t I will call you out on.  It's just obnoxious.

[iansinclair]

Certainly bad seating and unhelpful audiences are significant reasons.

But there is another reason, sadly: pure and simple, it's called "money".  Besides my profession (minister of music), I was also, for many years, deeply involved with ballet.  I don't think that either companies I was working with (major top level professional groups) nor the houses we danced in ever broke even, never mind made a profit, on a performance or series of performances.  There is a very definite upper limit on what one can charge for a ticket -- even in New York! -- and that sets your income for a sold out house.  But the expense of running that house is more than that, for a professional house.  And donors, folks, are getting fewer and fewer and fewer.

Amateur performances in local or regional houses have a better shot at it; very often if the group running the house has been smart enough, it itself is a non-profit (which helps tremendously!) and is staffed and run by volunteers, with only a very small group of paid people.  Then you stand a chance and there are a number of such operations going along rather successfully.  It still costs a bundle just to open the place up (lights, heat, cleaning, security, fire, etc.) but a clever mix of popular and occasional classical stuff can break even.