Songs from a Parisian Salon
Live events programming is one of Graham Henderson’s key areas of experience. From 2003-20 he was developing, marketing and delivering up to 50 live events per year, events which reached tens of thousands of people. These included regular sold-out events in Hall 1 at Kings Place in London (capacity 450) and large-scale events at other prestigious venues. For instance, a John Donne event at St Paul’s Cathedral in 2012 attracted an audience of 1,200 people, and was the largest arts event forming part of the Cultural Olympiad accompanying the London Olympic Games in that year. However, this case study relates to one of Graham’s most innovative live events, Songs from a Parisian Salon, which took place at the Senate House in Bloomsbury in February 2020, attracting an audience of around 150 people. The Echéa Quartet performed at a live Patočka related event in London.
Combining period costume drama with live classical song, the show was designed to attract new audiences to the fabulous but little-known French classical song repertoire. The drama was centred on the life and personality of Winaretta Singer, Princesse de Polignac, heiress to the American Singer sowing machine fortune and one of the leading salon hostesses in Paris in the 1890s, who was played by an actor. It provided an opportunity to luxuriate in Belle Epoch clothes, artefacts and interiors. It was also designed as an experiential show, with audiences encouraged to join in the recreation of a late C19th Century Parisian salon by dressing up and cos-playing the part of French aristocrats and haut bourgeoisie in the era of Proust. Involving dressing up and live music the event was radically different in its approach to the typical music recital, the show proved very popular with its audience.
The format of fashion, drama and musical theatre offered vibrant content to arts audiences entirely unfamiliar with French classical song. It is a show which demonstrates how imaginative cross-arts programming can refresh forgotten repertoire and win new audiences for high-quality arts content. Because of the COVID pandemic in March 2020 plans to scale up the show for commercial presentation at the 950 seat Cadogan Hall in London had to be cancelled. The event nevertheless shows how live events programming can potentially expand audiences whilst generating a profit or surplus, and form part of a sustainable business development model for the arts.
For more information email The Company of Adventurers at [email protected]