| The Lyric Opera of Kansas City opened its doors for the first time on September 29th, 1958, with a performance of La Bohème at the Rockhill Theater. “There was no opera company in Kansas City before that,” says Evan Luskin, general director of the Lyric Opera. Once in a while, a traveling opera came through town, but that was it. Then, Luskin says, in the mid-Fifties, a few local opera lovers began exploring the notion of forming a Kansas City opera company. Russell Patterson, a Kansas City conductor and French horn player had lived in Germany for a time, while studying music on a scholarship. He liked the German tradition of every town having its own opera. These local companies used young singers, just starting their careers. When Patterson came back he began asking friends and colleagues why Kansas City couldn’t adopt the same model. As his vision of a Kansas City opera took shape, Patterson sought the advice of J. Morton Walker, who had worked with opera companies in Minnesota and Texas. Then, Luskin says, he turned to Lyle Kennedy, who served as secretary and treasurer for Kansas City’s Conservatory of Music and Henry Haskell, a music reviewer for The Kansas City Star. The three men discussed the possibility of raising the money to launch an opera company. “They raised $34,000,” Luskin says. “So they put together a company. It was young singers who lived in Kansas City. They had simple sets and costumes, and performed in Rockhill Theater.” The Lyric Opera staged its performances at Rockhill Theater until November, 1967, when the theater caught fire and burned. In that time, the Lyric Opera had presented more than 30 different productions, and more than 200 performances. The Lyric Opera was offered use of the Uptown Theatre on Broadway in 1968, and performed there until 1970 when the Capri Theatre opened at 11th and Central streets. Previously a motion picture house, the Capri Theatre had more than 1,200 seats. By 1974, the Lyric Opera signed a long-term lease for use of the Capri Theatre, and changed the name of the building to the Lyric Theatre. In 1991, the opera company purchased the building from the Hearst Corporation. In 1998, Evan Luskin became general director of the Lyric after serving as the opera’s managing director for 12 years. It was that year that the Lyric Opera’s founder, Patterson retired with the world premiere of “Coyote Tales”. Since its founding, the Lyric Opera of Kansas City has presented more than 95 productions, including 29 American operas. The opera has also produced recordings of “The Taming of the Shrew”, “The Sweet Bye and Bye”, “Captain Jinks of the Horse Marines”, “The Devil and Daniel Webster” and “Coyote Tales”. As the Lyric Opera of Kansas City takes a bow, in celebration of its 50th anniversary, the first to stand to applaud is Kansas City’s business community. “If you are going to be a world class city, you have to have major events,” says Don Dagenais an attorney with the law firm of Lathrop & Gage, who has served on the Lyric Opera’s board of directors since 1985. “Sports are important, but you have to have a high quality cultural community. Opera, ballet, symphony—all those things make a city a destination. That impact of being a destination city is important to attracting businesses. Look at cities like Atlanta, Denver, Phoenix. Those cities have first class opera companies. Our firm is the second largest law firm in Kansas City, we try to recruit talent throughout the country. One of the things we do to sell Kansas City is present the cultural community. We talk about the opera, the symphony, ballet, the Nelson Art Gallery. And that, oftentimes, is a factor that is important in attracting people to town.” Tom Flowers, the current president of the Lyric’s board of directors, says the number and quality of professionals and executives who volunteer time and talent to the organization, year after year, reflects the synergistic relationship between the opera and the business community. “It is a reflection of how important the Kansas City business community is to the arts,” says Flowers, Senior Vice-President of U.S. Bank. “But it’s also part of our recruiting effort. Having high quality arts helps attract people here.” Of course, the Lyric Opera, along with the city’s other cultural crown jewels also attract tourists. And that tran-slates into a significant positive econ- omic impact on the region. Although the measure of such an economic impact is difficult to gauge, a 1989 Mid- America Regional Council study hints at the importance of the arts to a thriving community. Citing the study, Dagenais points out that “the arts have a greater impact than the sports teams. This was some years ago, but I would think, if anything, the impact has grown. Now, this was also before NASCAR. So, we’ve had a greater impact on both sports and arts. The point is; the arts are very important, probably even more important than they used to be.” As further evidence of the Lyric’s impact on Kansas City tourism, Dagenais describes a marketing experiment from the 2006–2007 season. “Last year, we tried, for the first time, [promoting] a specific weekend for people out of town to see the opera, and other events,” Dagenais said. “We were amazed at how many people signed up. Des Moines, Tulsa. We had bus loads of people from St. Louis, St. Joseph, La-rence, Topeka. So if you look at the overall impact—hotels, eating at restaurants, shopping—I think the cultural community attractions of the city have a big impact on the economics of the community.” The Lyric Opera has committed to extending its positive economic impact on the city by purchasing a full city block at 18th and Charlotte, where it will locate its administrative offices, carp-entry shop, wardrobe shop, and other operations departments, after rehabilitating several old buildings on the property. “Certainly, the opera’s future is tied very much to downtown revitalization,” Flowers says. “Our future is the Performing Arts Center. And, our new headquarters at 18th and Charlotte will help with the facelift of downtown. We will be right in the middle of the arts scene.” Evan Luskin, the Lyric’s general director fills in the details. “It’s about one mile east of the new Performing Arts Center. We own the square block so we can control our destiny, take a for-ward looking view with room to expand. We have to renovate three buildings, and we have three years to do it. By July 2010, we will move all operations to this site.” And, by September of 2010, the Lyric Opera will showcase its productions at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts, near 16th and Broadway streets. In a written statement, Julia Kauffman of the Muriel McBrien Kauffman Foundation—the Center’s primary benefactor—praised the Lyric. “We are looking forward to enjoying the Lyric in the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts for another 50 years.” The Muriel McBrien Kauffman Foundation is also a major contributor to the Lyric Opera’s anniversary season, which will feature two major productions. “We don’t usually do two large operas in a season, but we crunched numbers for our dream season,” says Luskin. “We went to our biggest supporters and pro-posed a season above what we normally do. It is a big budget, and we asked them if they would increase giving for the anniversary season. Three major supporters said, ‘We’ll back you’; The Muriel McBrien Kauffman Foundation, the Richard J. Stern Foundation, and the Hall Family Foundation. They didn’t pay for everything, but others increased their gifts. We’ve asked everyone to give us an extra gift this year; we don’t want to triple ticket prices because no one could come.” The anniversary season features four productions, one of which was performed in September. The current production is a performance of “The Pearl Fishers”. “It’s about people who dive for pearls,” Luskin says. “The composer is Bizet, who wrote Carmen, which among opera lovers is a super popular.” In March of 2008, the Lyric will per-form Mozart’s ‘Magic Flute’ in German. “It’s a nicely balanced season, with performances in Italian, French, German and English,” Luskin explains. Then, in late April 2008, the opera will launch its fourth production—the world premiere of an opera composed by Kirke Mechem, a native of Topeka, Kansas. “I thought it would be interesting to do an opera tied to Kansas City,” Luskin says. “An opera composed by a Kansan, based on the life of John Brown, the abolitionist. Brown was an important character in Kansas history. He came here in the 1850s to vote to determine if Kansas would enter the Union as a slave state, or a free state. Missouri was a slave state. During the run up to the election, there was a lot of civil strife, even murders. John Brown was very much involved in the dispute. It’s relevant to Kansas City and its history. Many scenes in the opera take place in the area. And, by the way, we really like the music.”
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