Country Roads Magazine "Performing Arts Issue" September 2021

S TAT E O F T H E A R T S

Our Renaissance is Pending LOUISIANA PERFORMERS AND AUDIENCES GOT A TASTE OF OUR OWN POST-PLAGUE ARTS REVIVAL, BUT WE AREN’T THERE YET Story by Alexandra Kennon

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egular readers may remember our story from September 2020 titled, “The Future for the Performing Arts in Louisiana,” which detailed the challenges faced by our region’s performing arts organizations during the 2020 COVID19 pandemic. When, a few months ago, I pitched a follow-up to that story, I envisioned a very different piece than what follows.

Just a few short weeks ago musicians, actors, and other artists were ecstatically—if cautiously—returning to their livelihoods on stage as the rest of us excitedly and loyally clamored back into venues as audience members. The mutual joy of performers and patrons coming back together—to connect, to share space, to share art—was palpable in each precious interaction. After a painfully long year and a half apart, isolated, distanced, or connected only through screens, Louisiana performers and audiences experienced a beautiful reunion; reaffirmed in our understanding that live music, theatre, and dance are integral to our culture, our way of life, and our happiness.

I so looked forward to interviewing performers about the rush of returning to

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the stage after a long absence, and venue owners about their audiences’ renewed appreciation for live performance.

Needless to say, things are different now. Instead of attending the plays and concerts marked on my calendar, I’m now writing from my own quarantine, as my COVID-positive (and vaccinated) musician partner isolates on the opposite side of the house after returning from tour. A mask mandate has been reinstated statewide, and New Orleans has implemented vaccine or negative test mandates for all indoor public spaces.

Jazz Fest’s cancellation (yet again) felt like a harbinger of things to come, and other major annual festivals like Festival Acadiens et Creoles and French Quarter Fest have surely enough followed suit.

At this point in time, perhaps the only thing that is certain for the performing arts is that they are needed, now more than ever.

That’s not to say that artists and producers have not persevered despite the hurdles. Outdoor stages that allow for distanced audiences have popped up in unexpected places—Beauvoir Park in Baton Rouge, The Broadside in New Orleans, and even private porches like

S E P 2 1 // C O U N T R Y R O A D S M A G . C O M

the Constantinople Stage in New Orleans have kept music playing and money in musicians’ pockets, albeit on a smaller scale than we’re used to. Several of the venues that closed and were up for sale this time last year—d.b.a. (which has now expanded to include the open air venue across the street, d.b.a at Palace Market), Gasa Gasa, and The Joy Theater—have since reopened.

The Acadiana Center for the Arts’ James Devin Moncus Theater was originally designed with the intent of also functioning as a studio/recording space, and not being able to fill the three hundred-capacity house during the pandemic provided incentive to finally outfit it with the necessary equipment for recording and broadcasting virtual content. Even with those worthwhile investments—which provided an outlet for local artists to produce their own content, and for the AcA to produce Festivals Acadiens et Creoles and Festival International 2020 entirely virtually—the center still received special permission from the state to host a limited-attendance concert on December 10, 2020.

“Because we just felt like we couldn’t let the calendar year end without doing

something,” said Executive Director Sam Oliver. “If we knew that we could do it safely within every standard set out, then we were saying to ourselves, well, why don’t we do it? We’re here to serve an audience. We’re here to serve artists, and to be a connector, so if we’re going to be a live and in-person connector, let’s do it in whatever way makes sense.”

Many arts organizations made creative and impressively agile shifts to producing virtual content in 2020. Now, the same companies who successfully and enthusiastically embraced digitally broadcasting performances a year ago are acknowledging that their patrons and staff are thoroughly burnt out on these virtual productions. Opéra Louisiane is one of many organizations who proved their resiliency last year by producing online and virtual content. “However, nothing beats a live performance,” admits Leanne Clements, General Director of Opéra Louisiane.

As of press, Opéra Louisiane plans to hold its Summer Soirée in person on September 9, along with its Open Air Fair at the Baton Rouge downtown library on November 6, and a full in-person production of the Menotti holiday classic