It’s hard to hide something that can hold 420 people and is as large as a big barn, not to mention fancy enough to cost $9 million.
But six months after it opened in Stowe, Executive Director David Rowell is still working to reveal the Spruce Peak Performing Arts Center at the Mt. Mansfield ski resort to the world at large. Notwithstanding a growing reputation among performing artists, developing an audience for the nonprofit facility is the continuing challenge that faces Rowell, who came on board a year ago to try and put it center stage in the eyes of the public.
The performance center, which was opened the week of Dec. 27, 2010, with a bevy of big-names like James Taylor, Ben Vereen, and Eileen Ivers and Immigrant Soul , is a rarity, and not just for Vermont. New state-of-the-art performance spaces are unusual, let alone in this economy, and this one can lay claim to being the only one located at a ski resort in all of the East. Its Vermont location is a coup for the state and especially for the four-season resort town of Stowe, already a prodigious tourist machine.
Troy Hawks, spokesman for the National Ski Area’s Association in Lakewood, Col., said several western ski areas such as Beaver Creek and Aspen in Colorado have dedicated performing arts facilities, and in the last five to seven years, ski areas in general have been expanding their four-season resort offerings to appeal to a wider demographic. Spruce Peak fits that trend.
“I think we’ve seen a push there in the East,” he said.
Since it opened, the reaction to the elegant, comfortable space and its acoustics has been universally positive from artists and audience, said Rowell. Built at the heart of a $400 million redevelopment at the ski area, the center was constructed in a post-and-beam style with heavy timbers, an exposed truss roof and natural materials such as cedar, fir and Vermont slate. Inside, the seating is spacious, sight lines excellent and the sprung stage floor was designed exceptionally large to permit a wide range of shows.
Filling the seats, however, has been a tough sell at times, though not unanticipated, he says.
“The biggest challenge I would say is awareness at this point,” said Rowell, who has a masters in theater management, 16 years in the business and counts Spruce Peak as the third facility launch he has been involved with. Rowell, whose parents live in Middlebury, has long been a visitor to Vermont, though not primarily as a skier — rotund and professorial, he’s amused to be known among ski staff as the “theater dude.”
Marketing studies were done before the center was built, and the 530-seat Vilar Performing Arts Center at Beaver Creek was one of models looked at in the process. Being located at a ski area, Rowell notes, presented unique opportunities and challenges.
“Our location is both a positive and a negative,” he said.
There have been times when getting performers or their crew to the site has been a challenge, and two performances have had to be rescheduled because of snow. While artists love the space, Stowe’s rural location can also make booking them problematic, he said, and sometimes requires bringing performers in a day or two early. But he’s encouraged by Spruce Peak’s growing reputation as a great and intimate performing space.
“I think the word is starting to spread out in the industry,” he said.
Rowell has purposefully booked an unusually diverse array of performers, everything from magic shows to comedy, dance, musicals and rock, Celtic, country and classical music, both as part of the center’s mission and to see what works.”
The larger struggle is defining and attracting an audience. Rowell counted seven sellouts off the top of his head, and while he declined to say if any shows bombed — “that would be indiscreet” — he tactfully admits some have drawn “numbers that have been lower than anticipated.” (According to interviews with audience members, some shows have filled less than a quarter of the seats.)
Rowell insists that’s hardly unexpected for a new facility.
“We’re still getting people who are saying I had no idea you are out there,” he said.
Marketing a ski area performance facility is complex. Rowell jokes that for all the audience surveys and marketing you can do, programming is a “voodoo science.” For Spruce Peak, it involves targeting four distinct audiences, Rowell said: Stowe and the surrounding towns, the larger northern Vermont region, ski area visitors and out-of-state Stowe home and condo owners.
“We’re like any new business: We’re challenged, we’re building awareness,” he said.
Rowell has purposefully booked an unusually diverse array of performers, everything from magic shows to comedy, dance, musicals and rock, Celtic, country and classical music, both as part of the center’s mission and to see what works. The center has started out averaging about 6-10 national performers a month, from Shawn Colvin to Afro Cuban All Stars and Mad Science Presents Star Trek Live.
So far, Rowell’s a little surprised at the top audience response, which has been for classic rock like “Little Feat,” Broadway musicals and comedy. Since the center doesn’t sell season tickets, audience sizes are affected by numerous factors, from the weather to tourist business on any given day. Many tickets are sold in what Rowell called the “late buy marketplace,” anywhere from two weeks to 20 minutes before a performance. For the recent well-attended concert by pop star Paula Cole, 60 percent of the tickets went in the last 72 hours, he said.
The center may have been hurt to some degree by what Rowell calls “some misconceptions” that it is owned and run by the ski area for upscale skiers and homeowners. Nothing could be further from its purpose, he said. Spruce Peak is organized as an independent nonprofit entity, with its own governing board, and 37 “founders” each donated a major sum to largely fund its construction. Its mission is to be open for use by the local community, to foster arts education and bring in a diverse array of performers to a local and regional audience.
Rowell said that message may have been muddled somewhat by a New Year’s Eve James Taylor concert with very pricey tickets — $250 to $1,000. While they were part of a benefit for the center and its arts education programs, it still left the impression that the center was targeting an elite audience. Rowell says average ticket prices actually run from $25-$50 for nationally known performers, but family and local programs are considerably less (the lowest price tickets on the current schedule are $12), and the facility is available to local organizations and performers.
“That was always part of the plan,” he notes.
Spruce Peak recently hired a well-connected local resident, Nancy Jeffries-Dwyer, to work on long-term fund raising, development and public relations, and the center is also trying to build ties through memberships and sponsorships.
For Ed Stahl, executive director of the Stowe Area Association, the center has been “a great value-added amenity” and a positive for Stowe.
“Anecdotally, anybody who walks into that place goes ‘wow’,” he said. He’s scheduled two member meetings in the space, and use by local residents and organizations of the center is something that will only grow. The air-conditioned space has already attracted the vibrant Music Festival of the Americas at Stowe, which moved from the Topnotch Resort and Spa where it played last year in August.
“I think that’s going to play out over time,” he said.
Financially, Spruce Peak expected to take three to five years to get established and “we’re about where we anticipated,” Rowell said.
“I’ll be honest. Every performing arts organization has risk,” he said, but he remains upbeat about the Spruce Peak Performing Arts Center’s future.
“I don’t see it ever going belly up,” he said.
