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In his initiative to attract the growing number of Hispanics in Philadelphia to the opera, Center City Opera Theater General and Artistic Director Andrew Kurtz developed the Hispanic Opera Project, now a finalist in the Knight Arts Challenge.
“The challenge to me was how do I open the doors to the community to potentially become larger consumers of opera?” Kurtz, of 11th and South streets, said.
Only 6.2 percent of opera-goers were Hispanic in 2002, according to a National Endowment for the Arts report. But, as the 2010 Cultural Engagement Index reports, Hispanic participation levels in arts and cultural activities are increasing, just as the Hispanic population continues to grow throughout Philadelphia.
With these facts in mind, Kurtz, 44, hopes his company can develop deeper and more meaningful relationships with the Hispanic community to broaden its support of opera as an art form “that is valuable to them.”
Kurtz, wanting to share his love of opera with everyone in the community, expects that with the implementation of new composers and more outreach initiatives, that an emotional, personal opera theme can be exposed through real life Hispanic experiences.
“Once we find the composer, which is an ongoing process,” Kurtz said, “[the composer will] literally have to go and talk to different people in the community [to develop the story].”
If awarded the Knight’s grant prize, Kurtz said he plans to put it toward this new multi-year project’s production, marketing and commissioning costs, for which he’s already begun laying the groundwork.
In May, the opera company will present the East Coast premiere of Daniel Catan’s “Il Postino” at Center City’s Prince Music Theater. Catan, who had a sudden and untimely death in April 2011, was a Mexican-American opera composer and an important voice for developing new Spanish-language opera.
“If we get the grant, it will enable us to work more quickly,” Kurtz said. “If we don’t get the grant, we’re going to continue what we are doing because it is something we believe in.”
“We think it’s vitally important to the Philadelphia community.”
Other finalists:
Contact the South Philly Review at editor@southphillyreview.com.
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