Sydney choirs sing for change

The federal arts funding rations have never been particularly generous and the Sydney Philharmonic Choirs are the latest to lose out n grants.

Without their tri-annual grant from the Australia Council for the Arts, the Choirs will have to slice their program.

General Manager of the Choirs, Lisa Nolan, said: “We are not in a weak position, but we may have to adjust our 2012 program and change some venues.”

The Choirs are considering using less high-profile venues such as local community centres to cut costs. Ms Nolan said: “If we do more community based singing, then we can also reduce the ticket prices and attract more people to keep revenues up.”

The Choirs will now have to develop new marketing plans to sell more of their programs. It is hard getting visibility like some of the commercial performers do.

We cannot afford to do a long run of ads in the SMH, for example,” she said. The Australia Council for the Arts is the government’s arts funding and advisory body.

Its key role is to support the nation’s arts sector through funding and developing various art groups. Director of Music at the Council, Paul Mason, said: “It’s a very competitive environment or funding.” “We’ve had good discussions with the choir about other funding opportunities.”

The Council meets regularly to assess   and peer-review applications n seven major categories and would not disclose why they rejected the Choirs’ application.

The success of applicants depends on how they measure up against set criteria. Previous applicants have found the application process and criteria onerous.

President of Choral Association Australia, Viviane Knight, said: “We need to have singing footy teams. Then we will get funding for sure.”

One of the criteria for choir applicants is to provide a full CD of the works for which they require funding. Ms Night said: “But how can we provide a CD if we have no money to perform?

Getting funding is like extracting teeth. “There is easy funding for sports but funding for the arts is difficult in this country.”

The Choirs are now looking to the corporate and private sector or financial support.  Ms Nolan said: “The Council is trying to get the choir to be more competitive and business-like.

We are encouraged to seek out corporate ‘partners’ to help us.”A report by the Australia Council last month indicated corporate sponsorship as increased in the last three years. Global economic conditions have not hampered Australia’s philanthropic giving.

The creative director at Elton Ward Creative, Simon Moore, said: “The Sydney Philharmonic Choirs are an integral part of the arts scene in Sydney, and fill a space which is not occupied by any other performing arts body. I am very happy to give them every support that I can.”

The leading choral group in Melbourne, The Royal Melbourne Philharmonic, is in a different situation. The Victorian choir has ever received federal funding from the Australia Council. It survives on Victorian state grants and private donations.

Ex Vice president of the Royal Melbourne Philharmonic, Val Reilly, said: “We managed to survive by the skin of our teeth … it is very possible to sing without a federal grant but it is definitely a fact that there is too little support for singing.”

By Su-Lin Tan