Young Artists’ Careers Get an Early Boost From Affiliates

It’s dusk as a group of concert-goers file patiently into an auditorium in Long Beach to attend an “informance”--a quasi-recital plus conversation--by pianist William Koehler.

The curtain parts and Koehler, tall and agreeable, bounds on stage. Sipping from a can of cream soda, he tells his audience--numbering about 75--that he was born in Houston, studied at the Juilliard School in New York and for five years has taught at the University of Northern Illinois. Also, that as a participant in the Affiliate Artists program, he performs in facilities where the fine arts are generally inaccessible.

Turning to a brown upright Wurlitzer that has been tuned in his honor, Koehler launches into a Gershwin medley. Midway through “Rhapsody in Blue,” he is interrupted by a bespectacled listener in the third row.

“Give us more! I just love that ‘Rhapsody,’ ” says a young man in black. “Gershwin makes the hair on my neck stand on end.”

Later, after traversing with much gusto the glissandi of Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 10, Koehler wanders the 380-seat hall taking requests.

“Can you play ‘Fur Elise?’ ” asks a voice in the rear.

“Do Grieg’s Piano Concerto,” demands another.

Koehler obliges, also adding a few bars of Beethoven’s “Moonlight “ sonata. He is accompanied by gentle snores.

“How much do you get for all this?” one attendee suddenly demands.

“Not much,” Koehler responds. He then thanks the Xerox Corp. and the Long Beach Symphony for making the evening possible at the federal prison on Long Beach’s Terminal Island.

New York-based Affiliate Artists, which turns 25 next spring, is one of the primary career development programs for young artists. Its operating budget of around $2.2 million is used for activities that include the Conductors Program; one-to-six week residencies for actors, mimes, dancers, singers and jazz and classical instrumentalists; and the Pianists Program, which since 1982 has been sponsored by Xerox.

Xerox annually contributes about $85,000, funding the stringent auditions from which four to five survivors from a field of about 200 applicants are named to the AA roster for two seasons. The pianists are placed in two-week residencies with “middle and major” orchestras nationwide, netting about $2,000 plus expenses for each stint that includes a recital, orchestral appearance and 12-14 informal performances in prisons, hospitals and schools.

Los Angeles-born Alan Gampel, 25, a recent audition winner who begins his first residency in January with the Grand Rapids Symphony in Michigan, says although the competition is tough--applicants must submit three recital programs and three concertos--the process differs vastly from international contests.

“When you sit down to play, you get the feeling you are a human being,” says Gampel, a prizewinner in the 1986 Queen Elizabeth Piano Competition in Brussels and winner of the 1989 New York Chopin contest.

“(Affiliate Artists) has a dossier on you, a cassette of your playing and everyone knows about you and pays attention to you.” (Also signed for the 1990-92 seasons are pianists R. Clipper Erickson, Kevin Kenner, Marc Ponthus and Jose Ramos-Santana.)

A resident of Paris, Gampel is carving a career in Europe where, he says, concert dates are easier to come by than in the United States. He proudly talks of a recital booking next spring at the Theatre du Champs Elysees. ampel trusts that his tenure with Affiliate Artists will help boost his career back home.

“The hope is that you will have some important concerts that will entice important people and help land you good management in the United States,” he says.

But above all, Gampel relishes being able to perform a number of concerts in a short time span--”I thrive under this kind of pressure,” he says--and also being given the chance to experiment with repertory in different concert settings. He plans to try out Balakirev’s “Islamey,” and introduce works by Soviet composers Edison Denisov and Rodion Shchedrin, whom he met while on a concert tour of Moscow and Leningrad in 1989.

The 36-year-old Koehler, whose recent residency was with the Long Beach Symphony, also embraces the flexibility the program affords. A champion of new music, he programmed “Aftermath,” a tone poem by black American composer Betty Jackson King for his appearance before the National Council of Negro Women, an organization servicing the black community in Long Beach. Playing for the Crippled Children’s Society, he offered excerpts from Saint-Saens’ “Carnival of the Animals.” He remained undecided about the program he was to deliver in the dining room of a local law office.

Before going on the road, Affiliate Artists go into training, spending weeks in seclusion learning about variety in programming, pacing and how to acknowledge their sponsor. But mostly, informs trainer Doreen Dunn, they embark on a “personal exploration of why they are an artist.”

A former actor turned playwright, Dunn--herself a 1977 Affiliate Artist--has coached opera singers, dancers, mimes and instrumentalists in the art of sharing their inner process.

“ ‘Informances’ are not lecture demonstrations or workshops but rather are based on who you are and your ability to talk about it to the people around you,” explains Dunn, now executive director of Ohio Dance, a statewide services organization.

While some artists like Koehler are “inventive” and flourish, others, Dunn reports, are dropped from the roster because they either fail to learn communication skills; or, being on a fast track, opt to further careers abroad.

Jeffrey Kahane, who was a 1981 Van Cliburn Competition finalist and was named an Affiliate Artist in 1983--months prior to his win at the Arthur Rubinstein competition in Israel--concurs that certain artists are unsuited to the format.

“There may be wonderful musicians who don’t feel comfortable or are not interested in talking to all kinds of people,” said Kahane, who played in “difficult situations” in psychiatric wards, hospitals and for people with severe disabilities.

On reflection, Kahane, 33, who teaches at the Eastman School of Music and gives about 70 concerts a year, calls his association with Affiliate Artists “a growth-inducing experience” that allowed him on an intimate level to talk about himself and his music.

“If one is open to it, these can be great opportunities and stepping stones,” he says.

Affiliate Artists isn’t the only group in the career development business. For the emerging young artist or older performer seeking to rekindle a flagging career, New York-based Pro Musicis offers recital opportunities, and stipulates that solo instrumentalists and singers signed to its roster also perform community service.

Founded more than 20 years ago by Franciscan priest Father Eugene Merlet, Pro Musicis has an annual operating budget of about $450,000. Each year, the nonprofit organization selects four to five artists who are paid $1,000 to appear on the Pro Musicis recital series in New York, Rome, Boston, Los Angeles and beginning in 1991 in Tokyo. Each performance is repeated twice, often at concerts for the homeless. Cellist Sharon Robinson on one occasion performed at the Union Rescue Mission in downtown Los Angeles following an earlier recital at the the County Museum of Art.

Nonprofit Young Concert Artists Inc., which since its inception in 1961 has helped spawn the careers of Ida Kavafian, Emmanuel Ax, Murray Perahia and Dawn Upshaw, among others, goes a step further: In addition to presenting young soloists, singers and string quartets at its concert series at the Kennedy Center and at the 92nd Street Y, the New York-based organization with a staff of nine and an annual operating budget of about $750,000 also offers full management services at no cost to its charges.

Affiliate Artists, recognizing the dearth of podium positions for young American conductors, in 1973 also founded the Conductors Program.

Richard Clark, who founded Affiliate Artists largely to get American singers like himself more exposure, says his organization offers corporations “the forum to develop talent, support arts in the community--and look good in the process.”

Indeed. Herb Simmons, recreation supervisor at Terminal Island, says although rock groups frequently visit the medium-security facility for men, classical musicians are much appreciated and sought after. (Three years ago, the Long Beach symphony also provided at no cost the services of keyboardist Alec Chien.)

Additionally, the informality of performances by Affiliate Artists renders the loftiest of arts more accessible, and exposes the artists to a variety of audiences.

Take, for example, the introduction emcee Jaymes Browne gave pianist Koehler:

“Laaaaaadies and gentlemen,” he bellowed. “Tonight we’re going to hear one of the greatest pianists in the world in all of time.”

Or the request by one listener to hear “Autumn Leaves”--”by any composer you want.”

Koehler earned a rousing ovation following his 45-minute performance, prompting the evening’s master of ceremonies to announce:

“Old Bill over here is scheduled to play your favorite ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ with the Long Beach Symphony at the Terrace Theater.”

Then, with a grin at his fellow inmates: “If anybody is interested in ticket information--please contact your warden.”