Columbus Symphony believes new technology to be future of Orchestras

The new executive director of the Columbus Symphony, Roland Valliere, announced that the Columbus Symphony will offer high quality video recordings of their performances this season.  Roland’s last position was as executive director of the Kansas City Symphony, but he left there in 2002 to develop a handheld digital device for concert goers.  He admits that the need for such a product has lessened due to the emergence of Apple Iphones and Blackberrys, so he is pairing with a company to create applications for the Apple Iphone and Itouch.  He believes that the symphony needs to extend beyond the concert hall to reach a broader audience. 

 

Without question technology is changing our entire culture, and I respect Mr. Valliere for his continued efforts to marry 21^st century technology with classical music, but I am not sure that this technology will actually reach more people.  A person does not wake up one day and decide they want to see a symphony or a play, they are taken to it.  With the rise of Twitter and Facebook there is more opportunity to be “taken” to an on-line symphony than before, but I think that scenario will happen less than anticipated.  While this technology is quite awesome, I believe it is important to keep the live performance at the forefront of the Symphony’s efforts. 

 

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/life/stories/2009/10/04/1_VALLIERE_ART_10-04-09_E1_9MF7MQA.html?sid=101

 

--Brian