Terrorism alert forces US orchestra to pull out of Edinburgh Festival
TIM CORNWELL ARTS CORRESPONDENT
THE international terrorism alert has caused the Edinburgh Festival to suffer its first loss after a prestigious American orchestra had its flight cancelled.
The Orchestra of St Luke's, from New York, has called off performances in Edinburgh and at the BBC Proms after it was unable to reach Britain.
But festival bosses are jubilant over a surge in ticket sales, with £2 million already taken, after losses of nearly £1 million last year.
The box office bonanza, with sales up 20 per cent on 2005, came after departing director Sir Brian McMaster - leaving the job after 15 years - assembled an extraordinary mix of talent for his grand finale.
The festival opened at the Usher Hall last night with the American soprano, Jeanne-Michèle Charbonnet, singing the title role in Richard Strauss's Elektra. In the audience were Sir Menzies Campbell, the Liberal Democrat leader, and Patricia Ferguson, the culture minister.
Musical highlights of the next three weeks include an appearance by Sir Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic, and Claudio Abbado conducting Mozart's The Magic Flute.
Apart from the American orchestra's problems, a security clampdown on cabin baggage is also making life difficult for festival organisers. Musicians typically take their instruments into aircraft cabins. Festival staff have been working to get clearance for the instruments, arrange flight-cases to carry them in the hold or have them shipped instead of flown.
"It has caused a huge amount of additional work and worry," a spokeswoman said. "But there has only been one casualty, and it's a single concert. This is as a direct result of the terrorist alert."
The festival is offering a full refund or a replacement ticket for the Opéra National de Lyon's performance of The Lindbergh Flight and The Seven Deadly Sins.
This year's festival features a mix of well-known musicians, directors and conductors, together with younger new talent. Performances in the first 24 hours run from the Brazilian dance group Grupo de Rua de Niterói to pianist András Schiff performing Beethoven.
Tonight sees two theatrical openings. One is Troilus and Cressida, directed by the legendary Peter Stein, Germany's most famous post-war director. He has directed Chekhov and Shakespeare at the festival in the past.
The other is Realism, a new work by the Scottish playwright Anthony Neilson, whose production of The Wonderful World of Dissocia took the festival by storm in 2004. Realism marks the first time the National Theatre of Scotland has brought a play to the international festival. Reports of previews are mixed. But Black Watch, an NTS production, has become the talk of this year's Fringe.
In a showcase of the young talent Sir Brian is proud of fostering, Elektra was conducted last night by Edward Gardner. He is now the musical director of the English National Opera.
Asked whether he had any mixed emotions on the eve of last night's opening, Sir Brian said: "I haven't had a moment to think about it." He expects to see about 80 shows this festival. His successor, Jonathan Mills - an Australian composer and festival director appointed to the job earlier this year - is also going to a lot of them. "He's coming to see how not to do it," Sir Brian joked.
The festival has already sold £2 million worth of tickets, two weeks earlier than usual. Last year it ran £850,000 in the red, after staging a series of expensive new shows. There are still tickets available for most productions, including the new series of Lloyds TSB Scotland Concerts, each lasting one hour and costing just £10.
Sir Brian said: "We are budgeted to break even. But you don't know what's going to happen."
Sales were up 17 per cent on last year, which was "pretty staggering", he said.
For his last outing, he said: "I wanted to put on the best festival I could. It's not individual performances, it's the coming together of a number of different ones.
"There are some fantastic performances on offer. Take a risk and turn up and we'll change your life. You have to be open and go in, and there are things that could really work."
Web links
Home Office - terrorism http://security.homeoffice.gov.uk/
Last updated: 14-Aug-06 02:02 BST
