Niagara Rising?

It's a strange time to be thinking about summer - here in Minneapolis, the temps are in the 30s, and the snow should fly pretty soon. But a story out of Ontario this morning should have orchestras around North America taking notice. According to sources, two of Canada's largest orchestras, the Toronto Symphony and Ottawa's National Arts Centre Orchestra (the latter of which is led by former St. Paul Chamber Orchestra music director Pinchas Zukerman,) are planning to create a major new summer music festival in Niagara, which some are calling Tanglewood North. (My personal geography obsession compels me to point out that, while a Niagara-based fest would in fact be 350 miles west of the Boston Symphony's famous summer home, it would be less than one degree of latitude further north. Yes, I'm a nerd.)

Geography aside, the idea of a major summer music destination at Niagara should have both arts supporters and local merchants in southern Ontario and upstate New York salivating. Tanglewood is a major economic force for the Berkshire resort region of Western Massachusetts, drawing audience from all over New England, New York City, and the entirety of upstate New York to tiny Lenox, MA for eight weeks every year. Collectively, that means that a large chunk of the considerable wealth of the Northeast US gravitates to a single musical center each and every summer, and the Boston Symphony's public profile (already screaming high by orchestra standards) is significantly enhanced by its longtime association with the bucolic setting and informal quality of such a unique venue.

Orchestras across North America have been jealous of Tanglewood for decades, and many have tried to recreate the magic elsewhere, with varying degrees of success. The Philadelphia Orchestra heads north to Saratoga Springs, New York for several weeks each summer, and has enjoyed some economic success there, although nothing like what the BSO enjoys at Tanglewood. Chicago and Cleveland each decamp for relatively nearby festivals in Highland Park, Illinois and Kent, Ohio, respectively. In 2003, an ambitious new festival center was constructed in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania for the Pittsburgh Symphony (among others,) and failed spectacularly, although it has since reopened with a considerably less ambitious mission. And back in the early part of this decade, our very own Minnesota Orchestra abandoned plans to construct an outdoor summer venue in Brooklyn Park, just north of Minneapolis. (At present, we are the only major American orchestra to stay 100% at home in the summer, which isn't likely to change, since our 4-week Sommmerfest, based at Orchestra Hall, has been a consistent moneymaker and audience favorite in recent years.)

The simple reality for most orchestras is that creating a sustainable summer festival in a remote location, while always an attractive prospect, is a nearly impossible task to complete. You need not only a beautiful location, but a spot within easy driving distance of millions of potential concertgoers. You need the vast majority of those potential concertgoers to be well-off enough to afford your ticket prices. Assuming that your dream location is not located within 25 miles or so of your home city, you need housing for your musicians and staff - a major issue considering the size of a symphony orchestra. Finally, you need an existing infrastructure willing to embrace your plans and integrate you into whatever local scene already exists.

These requirements are the reason that my personal summer dream for the Minnesota Orchestra - a monthlong festival in Bemidji or Grand Marais - will likely never be a realistic possibility. We in the Upper Midwest simply don't have the population density of the Northeast (I consider this to be a very good thing, in general,) nor do we have their almost unbelievable concentration of wealth. (Also, our orchestra, while certainly a well-funded organization by any reasonable standard, does not have the resources of the Boston Symphony, which leads the world in endowment size and fundraising capability.) So while I assume we will continue to make regular tours of outstate Minnesota (something we've been doing nearly every year since 2003,) I doubt you can expect to see us plunk ourselves down in a single remote outpost for an extended stay.

Still, I think the new Canadian festival has the potential to be a smashing success, if it comes to fruition. Niagara is a unique location, less than half an hour from Buffalo, less than two hours from Toronto, within an easy one day drive of Detroit, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh, and practically right next to the millions of people who live throughout Southern Ontario in cities like Hamilton and Kitchener. More importantly, the area is already home to multiple summer arts festivals (notably Niagara's Shaw Festival, which is one of the continent's preeminent theater fests,) so the infrastructure for a musical center is already largely in place. Oh, and that waterfall seems to draw a few people to the area, as well...