Sir, – In response to the letter asking "where has all the opera gone?" (Letters, October 24th) I would like to add another response: where has the paying audience gone?
I religiously attend live opera performed here and am deeply saddened by the paltry audience attendance, despite broadly reasonable ticket prices. Poor attendance often leads to nice ticket upgrades on the night, but it isn’t feasible to increase the amount of live opera when audiences simply are not there. We cannot expect the Arts Council to generously subsidise half-empty auditoriums. I am embarrassed by the fact that every time I go to see an Irish artist abroad there are people standing outside looking for tickets when the same artists play to 70-80 per cent audiences here.
The artificial inflation of audiences through concession and complimentary tickets is a further embarrassment. RTÉ now hosts a huge stand in the National Concert Hall. This is a state broadcaster already heavily subsidised through the licence fee and cross-subsidised by other RTÉ activities.
We cannot simply expect a minority to be generously entertained by the taxpayer.
It is time those “thousands” of opera fans your letter writers spoke of actually started turning up to support the performers who signed the letter, and started paying their way to live performances.
The simplistic, vague calls for “more” of something that clearly isn’t in demand is missing the point entirely.
The problem isn’t simply funding and opportunity, it is sheer lack of concrete support for what is there.
– Is mise,
LAURA F FARRELL
Swords,
Co Dublin.