In Wednesday’s (7/21) New York Times, Daniel J. Wakin writes, “Before the New York Philharmonic presented its first concert of the season in Central Park last week, the executive director of the orchestra had an announcement: Audience members could vote for an encore from the evening’s soloist by text message. The choices were a Chopin étude or, in honor of the guest musicians from the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, a traditional Chinese melody. The Chinese melody won, and so did marketers for the soloist, the piano virtuoso Lang Lang. Voters swiftly received a reply offering a discount to ‘pre-order’ his new CD set, ‘Live in Vienna,’ and an invitation to follow him on Facebook. … To one degree or another, orchestras including the New York Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Detroit Symphony have experimented with audience texting, a subject that was discussed at a meeting of marketers and public relations executives from the League of American Orchestras in the fall of 2008. The texting tends to be solicited at outdoor performances, at which audiences are larger and include many people who are not regular concertgoers.”
Posted July 21, 2010
