ORANGE COUNTY PERSPECTIVE : A Sour Note

There was something predatory about the way Mozart Camerata swooped in to offer half-price tickets to subscribers of the Orange County Chamber Orchestra, which announced recently that financial problems would force it to slash this season’s offerings. It wasn’t so much what was done as the way it was done that left a bad taste.

After learning of the Chamber Orchestra’s reduction in programs, the Camerata--the only other chamber group in Orange County--quickly announced that it was offering a special deal to Chamber Orchestra subscribers: a 50% reduction on Camerata season tickets to anyone mailing in a copy of a full set of Chamber Orchestra tickets.

The Chamber Orchestra was notified of the impending offer. But the Camerata didn’t feel that it was necessary to wait for a response because, as Camerata board member Harvey Liss explained: “We were not doing anything to injure them.”

However, Chamber Orchestra director Micah Levy, while philosophical about Camerata’s move on his group’s subscribers, had a different interpretation. He said it was a clear attempt to “steal our subscribers.”

Contrast this behavior with, for example, the way theaters in Los Angeles have rallied around the Los Angeles Theatre Center during its financial troubles. It would have been unseemly for any of them, at the same time, to have announced a special deal to lure away LATC subscribers.

“We’re supportive of one another. That’s what the arts are supposed to be,” said one Los Angeles arts executive.

Camerata officials expressed indignation at being accused of doing anything unseemly. They said they were only thinking of concert-goers, who might welcome the opportunity to make up for lost performances of the Chamber Orchestra.

But that kind of thinking misses the point. The Camerata, by trying to take advantage of a fellow chamber group’s troubles, ignored an opportunity to be magnanimous.

In doing so, it invited a cold wind to blow through the art world in Orange County.