SYMPHONY TUNE CHANGES AGAIN

SAN DIEGO —  The San Diego Symphony is proving that although it has broad community support, it can flip-flop on its financial position with shocking ease. A creeping credibility gap is beginning to complicate the fiscal picture.

Last week, after 10 years of rather liberal budgeting, in which it ran up a $1.8 million debt, the arts group suddenly became a fiscal conservative. Unfortunately for the credibility of those charged with plotting the symphony’s financial path, it was pretty bad timing.

Just 10 days earlier, management had assured the community that if $2 million could be generated within 12 days, the symphony’s financial woes would be over and the orchestra would live happily ever after with no more than, say, a paltry $116,000 operating deficit.

Shortly after that someone at Symphony Hall must have eaten his spinach and, Popeye-like, gained the fiscal strength and fortitude to tell it like it is, or so we were told. The real financial situation, we belatedly learned, was that the orchestra had revised its figures to show that it could end the year $820,000 in the hole.

But wait. By Monday even that figure was being brushed aside as merely cautionary by symphony president M.B. (Det) Merryman. “A lot of things can go much better than that projection shows. It’s predicated on the absolute worst scenario,” Merryman said. That projection would be updated regularly as income figures improved, he said. Merryman stressed that the symphony would end the year without any carry-forward deficit--we repeat, no carry-forward deficit. Any operating shortage will be covered by the $2.1 million raised earlier this month and increases in revenue, he said.

KILLER SEASON: Meanwhile, the San Diego Opera has been experimenting with a more aggressive advertising campaign that has attracted attention, though not always the kind it would like. Fifteen billboards were plastered with the bug-eyed and bloodthirsty likeness of soprano Marilyn Zschau, dripping dagger poised for another thrust into the heart of the evil police chief, Scarpia, in a scene from the opera “Tosca.” The inscribed legend: “Subscribe Now to a Killer Season.”

Nancy Ochsner, a part-time behavioral educational counselor in National City, objected strongly to the message, which could be plainly seen from her home. Concerned that the violence portrayed might affect her 2 1/2-year-old son, Ochsner enlisted support from the media and elected officials in lobbying the opera and Gannett Advertising, which owns the billboards. “I was also personally offended,” she said.

By the time the brouhaha reached its peak, the billboard contract had run its course and the offending sign was removed. Ochsner and opera General Manager Ian Campbell called the matter a “difference of opinion.” Campbell was also less than happy with the immediate ticket sales that resulted from the advertising. Using the same graphic in newspaper ads, he said, brought a much higher response.

Asked how she counsels her son, Ochsner said that when scenes of violence are on television, she explains that it is garbage. The child apparently learned his lesson well. When Ochsner asked him about the opera scene portrayed so graphically outside their house, he replied gleefully: “Garbage!”

ARTS/TIX: An idea that was on the distant horizon a year ago that should benefit arts groups, including the beleaguered symphony, gets closer to reality with each passing month. The San Diego Theatre League’s ARTS/TIX, a central arts ticket and information booth, is more than half way to its fund-raising goal of $150,000.

Theater League President William Purves says the booth, which will offer discounted tickets to a wide range of activities in addition to theater, has worked phenomenally well in other cities. “Earned income--bodies in seats--is the key” to creating financial stability for arts organizations, Purves said earlier this year, and discounted tickets are a prime means to that end, he believes.

The operation will support itself through an add-on service charge for tickets sold, Purves said. Purves said on Monday he expects to announce the name of the Theater League’s first executive director within a few days. That individual will manage the ticket booth and other league activities. His initial salary is included in the start-up funds Purves has raised so far, which amount to almost $90,000.

Purves said he is close to finalizing the location for the booth, which will be near the main entrance to Horton Plaza. The booth is scheduled to open in October.

ARTBEATS: The San Diego Opera ended a five-month national search for a chief staff fund-raiser by choosing COMBO development director Sharon LeeMaster. LeeMaster replaces Ann Spira, who decided in September after marrying opera General Manager Ian Campbell that working together would be putting too many emotional and financial eggs in one basket. Spira will seek work in “the private sector.” LeeMaster, who was executive director of the La Jolla Chamber Music Society for five years, and before that operated her own consulting firm and was public relations director for the symphony, will take over responsibilities April 21 that include raising $2.2 million each year for the opera. . . .

Work on the Charles Ross sculpture moves ahead. The long-delayed light- and water-oriented piece at the Wells Fargo Plaza downtown has a date for its unveiling: May 1. . . . Old Globe artistic director Jack O’Brien will employ his directorial skills outside San Diego this year, restaging the Houston Grand Opera’s “Porgy and Bess” for a national tour, and Tina Howe’s play, “Painting Churches,” for the Public Broadcasting System’s “American Playhouse” series. The play will air May 19.