Why did the Count Basie Theater decide take booking in-house?
Well, it was three things really. First, the organization had received a clear message from the few funders it had at the time, and this is about four years ago before I was in the picture, that they made grants to us to serve the public through programming, not to pay the oil bills. Two, all of our financial eggs were in the same basket, theatre rentals, and any good financial analyst will tell you that’s a dangerous thing. So we wanted to diversify and expand our income streams. And three, and this is going to sound corny, but it’s true, this organization felt a moral obligation to be doing the kind of work that we are supposed to be doing as a nonprofit corporation, namely, being the catalyst for bringing the kind of cultural and performing arts programs that are not otherwise available in this market together with audiences. I can’t actually take credit for that. I was here when that effort began, and one of the reasons I got hired was I had a clear track record of being able to ju
