ReportWire

Tag: washington national opera

  • Washington National Opera bows out of Kennedy Center – WTOP News

    [ad_1]

    The Washington National Opera announced Friday that it had decided to end its arrangement with the Kennedy Center in the nation’s capital, though it said it was hoping for an “amicable transition.”

    WASHINGTON (AP) — The Washington National Opera announced Friday that it will move performances away from the Kennedy Center in another high-profile departure following President Donald Trump’s takeover of the U.S. capital’s leading performing arts venue.

    The opera said it will seek to end its affiliation with the Kennedy Center through an “amicable transition” and will return to operating independently. It cited financial constraints imposed after Trump fired the Kennedy Center’s board and installed allies to oversee it.

    The opera will reduce its spring season and move performances to other venues “to ensure fiscal prudence and fulfill its obligations for a balanced budget,” the opera said in a statement.

    The statement did not mention Trump or the decision by the Kennedy Center’s new board to add the president’s name to the venue. Though Congress still formally calls it the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the building’s exterior and website now refer to it as the Trump Kennedy Center.

    Ric Grenell, a Trump aide serving as the Center’s interim executive director, said the venue has spent millions to support the Washington National Opera but it continues to operate at a deficit.

    Parting ways will provide “the flexibility and funds to bring in operas from around the world and across the U.S.,” Grenell wrote on X.

    Artists ranging from “Hamilton” creator Lin-Manuel Miranda to rock star Peter Wolf have called off events at the Kennedy Center since Trump ousted the previous leadership early last year and arranged for himself to head the board of trustees. The December rebranding as the Trump Kennedy Center led to a new wave of cancellations.

    Opera officials said the Center’s new business model requires productions to be fully funded in advance, which it said is “incompatible with opera operations.” Ticket sales cover only a fraction of production costs, and opera companies rely on grants and donations to make up the difference but can’t secure them years in advance, when they’re planning productions.

    The business model also doesn’t accommodate the opera’s model practice of using revenue from popular works to subsidize lower-grossing, lesser-known works, the opera said.

    “I have been proud to be affiliated with a national monument to the human spirit, a place that has long served as an inviting home for our ever-growing family of artists and opera lovers,” said Francesca Zambello, the Washington National Opera’s artistic director for the past 14 years.

    She vowed to continue offering a variety of shows, “from monumental classics to more contemporary works.”

    Late Friday, WNO productions of “Treemonisha,” “The Crucible” and “West Side Story” were still listed on the Kennedy Center website.

    Copyright
    © 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.

    [ad_2]

    WTOP Staff

    Source link

  • Washington National Opera is leaving the Kennedy Center in wake of Trump upset

    [ad_1]

    In what might be the most decisive critique yet of President Trump’s remake of the Kennedy Center, the Washington National Opera’s board approved a resolution on Friday to leave the venue it has occupied since 1971.

    “Today, the Washington National Opera announced its decision to seek an amicable early termination of its affiliation agreement with the Kennedy Center and resume operations as a fully independent nonprofit entity,” the company said in a statement to the Associated Press.

    Roma Daravi, Kennedy Center’s vice president of public relations, described the relationship with Washington National Opera as “financially challenging.”

    “After careful consideration, we have made the difficult decision to part ways with the WNO due to a financially challenging relationship,” Daravi said in a statement. “We believe this represents the best path forward for both organizations and enables us to make responsible choices that support the financial stability and long-term future of the Trump Kennedy Center.”

    Kennedy Center President Ambassador Richard Grenell tweeted that the call was made by the Kennedy Center, writing that its leadership had “approached the Opera leadership last year with this idea and they began to be open to it.”

    “Having an exclusive relationship has been extremely expensive and limiting in choice and variety,” Grenell wrote. “We have spent millions of dollars to support the Washington Opera’s exclusivity and yet they were still millions of dollars in the hole – and getting worse.”

    WNO’s decision to vacate the Kennedy Center’s 2,364-seat Opera House comes amid a wave of artist cancellations that came after the venue’s board voted to rename the center the Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. New signage featuring Trump’s name went up on the building’s exterior just days after the vote while debate raged over whether an official name change could be made without congressional approval.

    That same day, Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) — an ex officio member of the board — wrote on social media that the vote was not unanimous and that she and others who might have voiced their dissent were muted on the call.

    Grenell countered that ex officio members don’t get a vote.

    Cancellations soon began to mount — as did Kennedy Center‘s rebukes against the artists who chose not to appear. Jazz drummer Chuck Redd pulled out of his annual Christmas Eve concert; jazz supergroup the Cookers nixed New Year’s Eve shows; New York-based Doug Varone and Dancers dropped out of April performances; and Grammy Award-winning banjo player Béla Fleck wrote on social media that he would no longer play at the venue in February.

    WNO’s departure, however, represents a new level of artist defection. The company’s name is synonymous with the Kennedy Center and it has served as an artistic center of gravity for the complex since the building first opened.

    [ad_2]

    Jessica Gelt

    Source link