Major: This is April 10th. I’m Jean Major. I’m talking with Clay Barr about the Virginia Symphony and its history. Can you tell me, how did your involvement with the symphony begin?
Barr: Well, my parents took me to hear the symphony when Edgar Schenkman was head of the symphony. So that tells you how long I go back, when it was just a little group, and I became a board member . . . at a relatively early age, I guess in my mid-20s perhaps, and when John Meek became president, he asked me to come on his executive committee, and then it escalated from there.
Major: So, in . . . the 60s you went on the board? Is that what . . .?
Barr: Yes.
Major: And . . .
Barr: I would think so, yes.
Major: And you—your--are you still on the board?
Barr: I finally this year have gotten permission to get off the board, and I’m now on whatever that is I created years ago, that sort of was, you know, the people of the area who we wanted to bring in and make them feel an attachment. I’ve forgotten what we called it.
Major: Is that the Trustees’ Council?
Barr: I think it’s called the Trustees’ Council now.
Major: In all of the time that you spent on the board, what different roles did you play?
Barr: Well, as I said, I was on the board. Then I was on the executive committee. Then I was head of the finance committee when I was the finance committee. I think I probably did 90% of the fundraising. Then I became . . . the first woman president, and at that point I was the youngest president; the only president who I think has ever been younger than I was Louie Ryan because he came on at a younger age even than I did. And . . . I was very involved with the merger of the three orchestras. I think I was the second president after the merger of the three
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orchestras. I’ve spent many, well quite a few trips have I gone to Williamsburg to meet with the Richmond Symphony to talk about merging. You name it; I’ve kind of done it.
Major: I’d like to know a little more about how the, the board is structured. What is the role of the executive committee compared to some of the other committees? I know there’s a finance committee, there’s an education committee, and so on . . .
Barr: Well, I can’t address how the symphony is today.
Major: No, how was it when you did it?
Barr: Back in my day, the executive committee, as in most organizations with which I have been involved, kind of runs things, and the board comes forward to question every now and then, but basically to support the decisions of the executive committee.
Major: And the executive committee makes all of the substantive decisions?
Barr: Well, they certainly come up with the plans that you hope the board will approve, and usually does.
Major: But you also mentioned the finance committee, and in this case finance doesn’t mean the same as budget; it means fundraising?
Barr: Back then it was.
Major: And . . .
Barr: That’s a lot of years ago.
Major: Umm hum, umm hum.
Barr: And we, I think the second year of my presidency was the first year that we were not . . . losing money. We ended up with a balanced budget, and I think Louie carried that on, and then back into deficits we went.
Major: Are there other committees that were especially active or especially significant?
Barr: Well, I was very involved with the nominating committee, which I think is critical for an organization like the symphony that covers such an area. We were actually the first organization that brought together, when we merged the three orchestras, that brought together the community as a forerunner of what has been an effort that my father tried to follow up with the Future of Hampton Roads, to try and bring all the communities together. And it, I’m not sure I’m going to live
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long enough to see it really become a cohesive area, but we keep trying it, but I think the symphony made a giant step in bringing the three orchestras together.
Major: At that time, how hands-on was the board?
Barr: Well, when we merged the three orchestras, we had something like 127 board members. Because we said, if we merged the orchestras, nobody would get fired as a board member. So it was a major responsibility; I think at that point, I was head of the nominating committee, and one of the things we had to do was try and convince people to drop their names, ‘cause they really didn’t--an awful lot of them didn’t do anything anyway. They just added their names to a list. And . . . that, and obviously a 127-person board isn’t going to do anything. I don’t need to tell you that; it tells you for itself. I think the symphony has always had a big enough board that a lot of people did nothing. Some people were there obviously for different reasons. There were people who were there that you called on ‘cause they were of influence when you needed them to exert their influence, but they didn’t come to board meetings. My father use to brag he was on the board for 37 years and never attended a board meeting. So, you know, there were people just like that. And when I got worn out with being a board member, I said I’d only stay on as a Vince Mastracco board member, which meant you never showed up at a meeting, but when they needed you for something, they called on you. So there were certainly those. There were . . . at the time of the merger, it was a very painful time. I don’t know how honest to be with some of this, but anyway . . . Walter Noona had his diehard devotees who thought that he had to be co-head of the orchestra along with whoever was the director of the symphony, he being in charge of the pops. Cary McMurran could not have been more helpful and wonderful and wanted to see it work. His supporters were so relieved to not have to try and hold up an orchestra because they adored Cary and that he wanted to go with this, they just sort of went “Shhhewww,” and that made it easy. It was very difficult with the Beach . . . orchestra, and some of the people who were just so afraid that everything you were doing was going to diminish the role of their pops conductor, which was the reason they existed. It wasn’t that they had an orchestra, and they hired Walter Noona; they had Walter Noona so they created a pops. Which is understandable. I mean that’s where their devotion was, but it was a very awkward time, and when you had supposedly two heads of the orchestra for hiring and firing, and . . . each one had their own people who they would look out for. It was a mess. [Laughter] It was just dreadful. And it took a lot of . . . time and worry, and I had some good guidance to lead us out of having two heads of the orchestra. There just is no way; you have to have one person in charge. One person to say, “This person should be hired;” “This person should be fired.” You can’t do it by two. And during my presidency there were times, in fact I may still have them, but I think I’ve destroyed them at this point, that . . . Richard Williams, who was then conductor of the orchestra, insisted that any conversations between the two of them be taped. So that there would be no question of what had been said. So it
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was not an easy time, but we got to the other side, and we’ve had wonderful JoAnn. And you know it’s a totally different situation.
Major: It is.
Barr: But it was--there were birth pangs of the Virginia Symphony for sure.
Major: That—yes, we’ve had enough conversations so we have some sense of . . .
Barr: That’s not news to you . . .
Major: turmoil, too. What do you think . . . led it to finally be successful?
Barr: Well, I think, several things, I think when Jerry Haynie said we either have an orchestra under contract or we die. And we had to have the courage to say we’re going to spend that much more money, that we’re in a deficit situation. We’re going to take the giant leap to fund an orchestra by contract. That was . . . it completely changed the type of orchestra that we had.
Major: It was a per-service orchestra before?
Barr: Yes, yes, absolutely. And it just gave us a chance to hire different people than we could hire in a per-service orchestra. So I think that was a giant step and a leap of faith. I think one of my most painful things was when we started out our first endowment campaign, and it was announced that we had raised 3.4 million or something; of course 90% of that is in pledges, as is with most endowment campaigns, and the orchestra decided, “Well, if they have all that money, then we’ll go on strike.” And these musicians were standing on Freemason Street with signs, these people who you know we’ve been working so hard to pay them what we were paying them, saying, “Honk if you love the musicians,” and it was just awful. It was really awful, and I, I think that was one of the most negative things for me personally in all of my tenure with the orchestra, . . . and it was just misguided. I mean, I don’t know who was the Al Sharpton behind it or whatever [Laughter] but there was somebody who was saying, “Look at all this money they have and look how little you’re being paid.” And of course we were just trying to insure the future of the orchestra, so they continued to be paid whatever. You never could pay them what you want to pay them or what they want to receive. It wasn’t that we didn’t want to pay them what the New York Philharmonic gets paid, but we couldn’t.
Major: And still can’t.
Barr: No, no. Still can’t.
Major: No. Are there--you mentioned several very significant obstacles to this merger. Where there any others that we haven’t covered?
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Barr: . . . Well . . . I, I’m just, you know, the general inclination to be supportive. It’s what’s kept Richmond and Norfolk from merging, as far as I’m concerned, which probably wouldn’t be a bad idea, but the people are so behind the Richmond Orchestra. Wouldn’t be so behind it any more and the people behind the South Hampton Roads Orchestra wouldn’t feel the same responsibility to it. If we had the orchestra rehearse in Williamsburg and go and perform in Richmond and go and perform down here, whose orchestra is it? So we certainly had that sort of feeling when we brought these three orchestras together. And at one time it was called The Virginia Orchestra Group, and then some people who were anti, it came up across something of Ghent . I can’t even remember what the V was, but instead of orchestra group being of Ghent that though Richard Williams lived in Ghent, and it was just perceived as a Ghent orchestra [Laughter] and all these other people were trying to do what they could to undermine it.
Major: One of the, the transcriptions that I edited in the last couple of weeks made reference to the Ghent Vultures.
Barr: The Vultures of Ghent . That’s exactly what the V stood for--Vultures of Ghent, yeah. [Laughter] That was it, and obviously that was not very happy, either. So . . .
Major: High feelings. I, I have discovered through this interview process that there were people who served on the board for 30 years . . . and for various reasons I presume, you did say that there were some who had some very specific gifts to . . . to contribute, or why is it that so many people serve for 30 years on this board?
Barr: . . . Well . . . I think it depends on who the person is. I think . . . in the instance of Minette, I think it would be a dagger in her heart if anybody said, “Minette, you’ve been here too long; it’s time somebody else took your place.” I think because you want a recognizable board, there were certain people who you were reluctant to let go. I think that there were some people who, they said, “Oh, well, they give X amount of money; we can’t let that X amount of money go,” so they sit here for the X amount of money.
Major: But there was some--there are some who are recognized as identified with the, the symphony, and that’s a very positive asset?
Barr: Well, you know when you get a fundraiser--when I get a fundraising letter, and I assume it’s somewhat human nature, you look at who the board is, and you think, “Oh, well, if Joe Smith thinks it’s great, I guess I’ll send them something,” where if you don’t know anybody on the board, the trash can awaits. So, there goes that fundraising letter. And if you need influence with the city, you want somebody who can go and say to the mayor, “Look, it’s important that we do this” or somebody who knows the Virginia Beach City Council. And you know we’ve
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got so many city councils, mayors, constituents to deal with, with this organization, that there, you know, you try and have distribution, geographically as well as financially and importance, but it’s a handful who does the work, always. But I don’t know whether it’s still the same, but I would be willing to bet it is.
Major: It’s been my experience with the boards I’ve been on.
Barr: That’s what I said. You know, I don’t think this is one bit different.
Major: No, right.
Barr: As soon as you serve on the executive committee of an organization, you know how in the dark the board really is.
Major: That’s right.
Barr: And it’s very hard to go from being an executive committee member back to being a committed board member. Because you think, “Oh well, it’s already been decided, why am I making the effort to go to this meeting?” So . . .
Major: What are some of the high points of your--of the time of your active involvement?
Barr: . . . Well, certainly I think, as far as I’m concerned, the best thing I did for the organization was chairing the committee that hired JoAnn.
Major: Tell us about it.
Barr: Well, we had . . . what’s the man’s name?
Major: Silverstein.
Barr: Right! Joseph Silverstein . . . which was a great thing to do because he attracted candidates that we wouldn’t have attracted as a little country orchestra. He is a lovely man. There were some people, including my late husband, he said, “No, we are not ready for a woman conductor.” Obviously I didn’t agree with that. And . . . by the time we narrowed down to a few and had them come back a second time, it was like JoAnn just soared. And we used to meet in my house, the one that is being torn apart today ‘cause it’s had a leak. Again . . . and my husband at that time was already ill, and I can remember him coming down and saying “You know, is the smoke gray yet?” And it, it, she-- it was just--she was just so obviously the right choice. And I’m just so grateful that she’s had the commitment to stick with this orchestra because she’s had the commitment to the musicians, certainly not to me, but to the musicians that she has stuck with this orchestra so long, because she could have left us and gone elsewhere
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without looking back and been justified. But she seems to have the commitment. So I think that’s certainly a high point . Another thing I did for a while with the orchestra was, I had a dance committee. I’m very committed to dance. And, I wanted to--I remember sitting at Old Dominion in a little theater that Roseann Runte has just rebuilt the building --sort of near the drug store and hearing and you know all these people wearing tutus and wobbling as poor dance can be, and he says, “Oh! Have you ever seen anything like this? Isn’t this wonderful?” and I thought “Gosh, these people have really never seen wonderful ballet; we have to do something about that.’ So I made a major effort to bring top flight dance companies here with the orchestra performing in the pit. And I think bringing them here was particularly exciting the first time we had the Bolshoi and the Kirov here. I thought that was pretty wonderful. And . . .
Major: It is, and I didn’t know that happened.
Barr: Yes, yes and I sort of had--I tried to develop a separate fundraising arm of people who weren’t committed to symphonic music but were committed to dance. And I worked on that for rather a while, didn’t raise hundreds of dollars, hundreds of millions of dollars that you know would have been sufficient, that I wouldn’t need to work so hard for the Virginia Arts Festival, and they had to bring, bring dance here. But I think that was one of the things I thought was pretty terrific. And then we had a very successful fundraiser with the Diabetes Institute when we brought Tony Bennett here, right before he burst forth in his second youth. And . . . we paid him $30,000, I hate to think what you would have pay Tony Bennett to come here. But I remember we worked so hard on all these fabulous flower arrangements, and he made us move them all because they destroyed the sight lines. [Laughter] And I was ready to kill him at that moment, wasn’t I, Jan? “WHAT!” [Laughter] These flower arrangements, uhh, but it was it was nice in so many ways. It was nice that two organizations worked so well together. Of course, it cut the pot in half, but it, it just-- I’m a believer in having, I guess--had such struggles with the merger of these orchestras with all these people who “Let’s see what we can do to undercut” and having, I mean this sounds awful to say but, lived with the opera in its early stages when they just sort of shot people in the knee; you know, nobody’s good but the opera and don’t do anything for anybody but us, and I just don’t feel that way at all. I feel what’s good for one organization can only lift the water for everybody. So I felt very good that we had done this, this fundraiser for another very worthwhile cause, and people really had a nice spirit about it, so that--they were their certainly high points. There were certain concerts that stand out in my mind, but for very personal reasons, as opposed to them being any better than any others. But, it was where I was in my life and, what was happening and, in my own life that made those concerts particularly wonderful. And . . . I certainly have lived through a lot of conductors; enough executive directors to know which ones I’m grateful for and which ones . . . [Laughter] were just not, not so good along the way.
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Major: I, I do have some questions about both the music directors and the, the executives. But I want ask one question about the recruitment that ended up with JoAnn Falletta. As I was reading through all of the background material to get a sense of the symphony before we came to town, ‘cause we’ve only lived here 15 years, I got the definite sense that, until this time, there was an expectation in this area that the music director would come here and make his home here, and this would be his, principal professional association. Do you--can you explain how that idea developed, and what, what changed it to allow you to recruit JoAnn?
Barr: Well it, perhaps . . . and this was before my time, perhaps it came to be seen as a necessity when Edgar Schenkman, after being very successful here, just got an offer from Richmond and split his time between the two, and then this orchestra kind of, went downhill from lack of attention from, and I may be saying this all wrong, but this is--you’re asking me for perception. So I think after that, it was decided that we needed to have some one here . . . we had to have someone . . .
[Interruption]
Not only did they need to live here, but that eliminated anyone who was gay.
Major: Oh?
Barr: Norfolk , Norfolk could not accept a gay conductor. So, I went through that a bit. We also had . . . a lovely gentleman of color. What is his name? I’m so terrible with names. Maybe it’ll come to me in a minute. As a candidate . . . but he really sort of shot himself in the foot by saying that he--one of the questions he was asked in the interview process was, “What did he view as the position of the music director as far as programming that might appeal to an audience or whatever?” And he said his responsibility was to come up with the program such as he thought was great, and then it was the board’s responsibility to raise the money to make sure it happened Oh, what was his name? I really liked him so much. I thought he was great. I just liked everything about him, until he made that remark. But you know, he didn’t have to think about whether we could afford 87 musicians for every concert and whatever so, but, but I’m not sure that would have flown at that point here either. ‘Cause I can remember someone who I’m sure you’ve interviewed, saying when . . . Andre Watts broke his hand or something and couldn’t come, and they sort of said “Good” because he was of color. And . . .
Major: Oh! We heard a story, but there was no name attached.
Barr: I’m not attaching it either. [Laughter] But it’s somebody you’ve seen, no question. But you know, those were very discouraging, discouraging things. So it was really a push to say it’s time for this woman, the time is right. She’s great. Not that we have to have a woman; it just happens to be she’s the best
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candidate, and she’s a woman. And . . . at that point, I think we decided for the amount of money that we were able to pay, it was better to get somebody great part-time, than somebody mediocre full time. And also, even having somebody live here, you’ve got the problems of the wife, if it’s a man; and is she happy, and are the children happy, and is the marriage happy? You know you’ve got extra problems as well as the ability to entertain. I know that . . . when the Williams were here, Linda Williams was wonderful about entertaining after concerts. I still make a cake of hers all the time. And that was warm and fuzzy, but it wasn’t really worth it. That wasn’t really all that we, all that we needed. You know we, we sort of had outgrown that.
Major: That, that after concert entertaining?
Barr: That that the conductor’s wife had—that we needed the situation that a conductor lived here, had a home, had someone to prepare whatever, et cetera, et cetera; all that went along with that.
Major: Wow.
Barr: And you know when their marriage was breaking up, I’d have one of them come see me one day, and one the next. And you, you just … had all sorts of “stuff.”
Major: Both Richard Williams and Winston Dan Vogel were short-timers. Why was that?
Barr: Well, first of all, the average tenure for a conductor is five to six years, or at least it was the last time I read about it, but that is the norm. Richard Williams, I think Richard Williams was here during the transition and the problems with Walter Noona or such that it was just almost impossible to succeed. It was just a time to clean up our act, and I think perhaps he was a victim of that. Winston Dan Vogel . . . had no people skills. And he would embarrass orchestra members when they did not--you know, he would say “Susie, why did you miss that note?” in rehearsal. Rather than afterwards taking Susie aside and saying “Bar so and so,” and he’d scream and oh, I, I could tell you tales, that other conductors, earlier conductors using profanity to musicians. One calling up a musician and heard she was in the shower and said, “Oh I can imagine what she looks like,” and the husband calling me up screaming, “How could he say that?” And, so you know there . . . [Laughter] all sorts, all sorts of lovely things that, thank goodness, we’ve outgrown with JoAnn. We don’t--I don’t think the president of the symphony has to deal with those sort of calls any more.
Major: I hope not
Barr: It’s just gotten to be a bigger situation than that.
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Major: In, in terms of music, were there any things very distinctive about either of their . . . periods?
Barr: I’m not enough of a musician to answer that. Ask Minette; she could tell you that better than I.
Major: Okay . . . what can you tell us about the Russell Stanger period?
Barr: …what can I tell you? Ummm . . . Russell . . . was very, became too comfortable here, and . . . you know his wife had a business here, and they never aspired to go any here else because of that. And, I think that was perhaps my greatest, I don’t want to say my great regret, but that I had to do something to extract us from Russell Stanger was one of the hardest things I ever had to do.
Major: Really?
Barr: And to this day . . . it sort of haunts me that this man who really . . . wasn’t going to go any further . . . lost the orchestra that he needed to make him legit. But was my responsibility to Russell Stanger, or was I shepherding the orchestra? And I felt I owed it to the orchestra that we couldn’t just keep on under Russell. We couldn’t go any further. He had gone as far as he could go . . . and the orchestra needed to keep going. And if Russell had stayed there, it wouldn’t have happened. I think it would have died--I think the orchestra would be gone. But, I feel like I must have hurt this man very much. And I hate having had to do that. But, we just--we were just in a quagmire with him. And you couldn’t think somebody--you waited, hoping somebody would come and hire him away. But you know, after a while you knew it wasn’t going to happen. So, what were your choices? But I, I hoped we’ve managed to give him enough dignity through the years that it’s tempered the pain that must have cost him. But it, to this day it bothers me that I had to sort of pull the rug out from under Russell Stanger. It’s not something I like doing, or feel good about, or anything; it was just a really rough decision as far as I was concerned.
Major: Is there anything more to say about the Edgar Schenkman period?
Barr: I was a little girl [Laughter] in the Edgar Schenkman period.
Major: Well, I can believe it, I--he was 1948 to ‘66.
Barr: But you know, I don’t even think of him being here that long. I think of him, maybe you know, if you’d said to me, I would have said ‘48 to ‘56. But I guess it was because he had sort of moved on to Richmond .
Major: Yeah.
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Barr: I’m not sure exactly when he went to Richmond . But I remember him as I was a little girl rather then when I went off to college and came home or when I married and came back in ’63. I don’t remember Edgar Schenkman being here. Was he? If you say so. But it was like, I think that’s what happened, I think that’s why it became the necessity that we be number one and whoever it was live here.
Major: Yes.
Barr: Because we were so neglected once he went off to Richmond .
Major: What executive directors did you work with?
Barr: So many . . . my favorite, of course, was Jerry Haynie. I worked with Tiknis, Michael Tiknis. You have had to have heard about Michael Tiknis.
Major: Is that Tik-?
Barr: - Nis .
Major: Okay, yes I’ve heard the name.
Barr: You haven’t heard wild and wooly stories about Michael Tiknis?
Major: No.
Barr: I can’t believe that. Michael Tiknis was a snake oil salesman . . . He was a charmer; he had a lovely wife. He came into town; he was the music man, he was the pied piper. He was going—came up with all these great ideas, and man, they sounded terrific, and they were going to be wonderful, and he spent all this money. And . . . he . . . just spent all this money on advertising and promotion that we didn’t have to spend on advertising and promotion. I remember going back to Francis Crociata. Have you heard about Francis Crociata?
Major: I came across the name today.
Barr: Francis Crociata was a very nice young man. He was quite young at the time. And I remember going into a meeting with him and him announcing at the start of the meeting we had a $14,000 dollar profit, and by the time we came out of the meeting we had like a $100,000 in debt. He was so bewildered; very nice. Peter Smith, isn’t that his name? Have you come across him? I remember Peter.
Major: I’ve heard that name.
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Barr: He was very nice. The ones I think I spent the most time with were Jerry, who as I say—I still keep in touch with him. I’m devoted to him. But he was the one who pushed that contractual orchestra that I think did us more good. I think Michael Tiknis did us harm at the time. I thank goodness we survived it, but . . . he could get you in the paper and, you know, get publicity and pay for advertising—he was—but he just wasn’t a straight shooter, you know he—I don’t want to say he was dishonest because that—I remember when he moved on, and we were warned that if we got a call to make sure we said, “No comment” if anybody called to ask for a reference because he could certainly sue us and would do so if we kept him from getting any job in the future, but he certainly left under a cloud, but he keeps going. It’s one of those things that, it’s like, “What, he landed another job? and he’d done it to another orchestra?” You know, it’s one of those—‘cause he’s charming, he’s really a charming guy. I think they’re the main—oh, I remember Matt Werth coming in briefly. Do you know Matthew Fontaine Maury Werth?
Major: Oh, I never heard the Maury part before. Is that Worth?
Barr: Werth.
Major: Werth, okay. Yeah, his name has come up a few times.
Barr: Yeah, he was just sort of one of those little quiet people who were sitting around, who when you were desperate, and you say, “Matt Werth doesn’t have a job right now. We’ll use Matt Werth.” So, I remember him, I’m trying to think if I remember . . .
Major: What was particularly effective about Jerry Haynie?
Barr: Well first of all, he was a musician, and he loved music and . . .
Major: Was he the French horn player?
Barr: Yes, I think he was.
Major: Okay.
Barr: I think he was a French horn player. He was calm; he was levelheaded; he knew you couldn’t spend wildly to promote something just to say I’ve sold $10,000 worth of tickets if it cost you $30,000 to sell $10,000 worth of tickets which is what Michael Tiknis would do. I don’t know—you know, you just have a rapport with certain people, and I just had a very easy rapport with him, as I did with certain musicians. I mean, you know, Rob Cross and I go back to when he was just a young musician just starting out with the orchestra and coming to me and saying, “If you don’t do something with having two music directors at once, this orchestra will go down the tubes,” and just begged me to take the plunge that
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people said I was going to destroy the orchestra if I fired Walter Noona, that it would never survive . . . and I would hear Rob saying, “Can’t have two; it’s not working; this is terrible.” And . . . so you know, they just—figuring out how to do it the most gracefully I could and . . .
Major: Sure.
Barr: I had three board members get up and walk out of the meeting, and I can tell you one of them every time he sees me apologizes that I was so right, and he was so wrong because he was a Walter Noona devotee,and you know the orchestra wouldn’t survive if Walter Noona was disassociated from this orchestra. So, you know you just—but that’s what leadership is, you—and . . .
Major: Right.
Barr: That’s what happened with me with Russell Stanger. You know, you can’t say, “Gosh this would be nice to let Russell stay here and conduct forever,” or “This would be nice to let Walter Noona keep his associates happy,” and we can have this lovely little pops group under our umbrella, but it wasn’t that way; it didn’t turn out to be that way. He wasn’t happy to be a little pops orchestra.
Major: Right, right,
Barr: So those were the tough things, but I had some wonderful people with me when I was president. Louie Ryan was terrific. Allan Donn was just magnificent. I mean I just couldn’t have done it without them, because I just had to say, you know, “What do we do? how do we do this?”
Major: Yeah, yeah, right.
Barr: We worked together to make it go forward.
Major: Let me ask about a couple of the other organizations or bodies that are part of the whole. How has the Foundation contributed to the symphony’s viability?
Barr: Well, I think the Foundation has been a foundation for the orchestra. I think it has been—Minette was very strenuous about its funds not being dipped into. That it was there for the future of the orchestra, not for the present of the orchestra. I think that it existed allowed to borrow money at times when we were desperate and would have gone down the tubes if we—they hadn’t said, “Well, they do have this money sitting here, so we’ll lend them enough to get them from now until the next time tickets are sold.” We lived off of ticket sales. As soon as they came in, instead of the fall when we were providing the ticket holders music and then we were doing something else. I mean the time I had to run to Norfolk Southern and say, “Can we have your check now? We’ve got to meet payroll.” Oh, it was awful; there were times it was really . . .
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Major: I’ve had experiences like that.
Barr: Oh, oh and frantic; it’s just awful.
Major: But the fact that there was a foundation . . .
Barr: Yes, I think made a huge difference to banks.
Major: What—is the fundraising primarily done by a few individuals, or is it done by a group within the board?
Barr: Well not—I can’t tell you about now.
Major: No, tell me about . . .
Barr: Well, the year I was head of the annual fund, I think we had a $225,000 annual fund back then, and I think I probably raised 190 of it.
Major: Personally?
Barr: Umm, umm.
Major: Yeah.
Barr: But you know, when was that? Yikes! 1980 or ’78 or something. I mean, we’re going way back. So I don’t know; I just can’t address how it’s done now.
Major: But at least when you were very active, much was . . .
Barr: But it got better. I mean that was sort of, you know, that was sort of a desperate time; then it got better and better. Then the Peninsula kicked in; Patsy Carpenter Blackwell--don’t know if she’s on your list to interview—but she . . . knew everybody on the Peninsula that one needed to know, so she got that kicked in and going, so it certainly improved a lot from that point on. You know one person just couldn’t do it all.
Major: No, but she is a Peninsula person?
Barr: Yes.
Major: Her name has come up, and I didn’t have any association with her. Her name was not familiar to me, and I didn’t know where to hook it to.
Barr: Really. Well, she is terrific, and she was on the nominating committee that I was chairing, and we were ____ who in the world were we going to get to be
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president. This was when we were still in what’s now the Junior League headquarters . . . and I can—the funny thing is what you remember so specifically and how little you remember of other things. We were sitting in this meeting and we were saying, “There’s nobody, there’s nobody.” I wasn’t, but other people were saying, “There’s nobody to take over, and how are we going to do it?” and I said, “Well, I have somebody who I think will be really great,” and they said, “You do?” and I said, “Yes,” and they said, “Who is it?” and I said, “Well, it’s a woman,” and I said, “And it’s you, Patsy,” and she went ____. She was a secretary at Ferguson Enterprises. She sort of ___special events for—definitely a staff person, not a senior person, and of course never could afford to give much money; that wasn’t what she was there for, and as president couldn’t give much money, but she was terrific. She—and it changed her opinion of herself. It was, where I regret what I did to Russell, I feel really good about what I did for Patsy because she just became a very . . . much more of a leader and so just being—and she’s a terrific, terrific person, has very good insights, and she was on the committee that helped select JoAnn, and I can’t say enough good about her. I really can’t, and, you know, as I say I think she was the third woman president ‘cause I think Minette was the second, and I think Patsy was the third.
Major: What has the Symphony League done for the viability of the Symphony?
Barr: You are asking the wrong person. I think it’s great they’re there; I was never ever involved with the League. I think, I think they’ve been wonderfully helpful in their own dogged, consistent, being their fashion, and I’m sure they’ve picked up more guest artists and delivered more meals at rehearsals, and you know, I think they do all those things, but I have really not been involved with the League. I think, you know, musicians could tell you what they’ve done for them, et cetera. I’m not denigrating them in any way.
Major: No, no.
Barr: Because I think it’s great, and they’ve done a fine job, but I just haven’t been that involved with them.
Major: What about the, the over-all importance of the contributions of the women in this community to ensure the continued viability of the orchestra?
Barr: Well I think the orchestra never would have made it to anything but a little group of volunteers if it hadn’t been for women because there’s an anonymous gift at the Norfolk Foundation that is from a woman that has brought us out of more scrapes and whatever and . . . certainly Winnie Maddock Baldwin—I can remember when I came on the board, and everything would get suggested, and Winnie would say, “We tried that in 1942, and it didn’t work,” and Winnie’s just, you know, she’s just been there through how many fund drives and how many this and how many that. I certainly think if you go back way ahead of me, wasn’t there a Mrs. Ferebee who was there?
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Major: Mrs. Ferebee, umm, umm.
Barr: So . . .
Major: Connie Ferebee’s mother, isn’t it?
Barr: I don’t know. Somehow she was related to Betsy Philips, I think, that she was her—somehow . . .
Major: That I don’t know.
Barr: I don’t know, but there certainly have been women early on to whom this was very important, even before my time. So I think we wouldn’t have an orchestra if women hadn’t—and I gather that there was a great competition and resentment between the orchestra and Mr. Feldman and his supporters.
Major: I’ve heard that.
Barr: But that’s before my time even, and I think, you know, I think that there was—I know Elise Margolius wrote a history of the orchestra that I’m sure you’ve seen that.
Major: We have it.
Barr: … deals with all that sort of stuff, and I think . . . I think we’ve certainly and Minette—bless her heart—the huge thing about Minette is that Minette will give her money out of proportion to most everybody else and will still take the lowliest, worst job and get it done. It isn’t that, you know, so many people if they give money—give them accolades, and they don’t do the dirty work—not Minette’s problem. If its dirty work and it needs doing, if she’s committed she does it. The worst problem about Minette was Minette is too darn democratic. When you have a meeting, everybody should talk and talk and talk and say, you know, and she—just couldn’t get stuff done because everybody was getting to be heard and trying to balance everybody’s opinions. It made it very hard to get—I used to, when I was president, I used to have a separate file that said ‘Minette Notes’ because she’d call every day or send something every day.
Major: Oh my gosh.
Barr: Whatever. [Laughter] Well, I had a file that just read Minette Notes.
Major: How did the symphony become a nationally recognized symphony?
Barr: Well, I think probably the best moment was when we were at Carnegie Hall. There’s something about seeing you at Carnegie Hall, and I remember, I
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had a connection with Katie Couric who, of course, as you surely know, went to the University of Virginia, and I contacted her and said, you know, that we were bringing this Virginia orchestra and could we get them out there, and that was really sort of fun to see our musicians on the Today Show being interviewed, and I think, and I think JoAnn’s stature certainly just lends us credence that we wouldn’t have without her.
Major: How serious was the investigation of the possible merger with Richmond ?
Barr: Which time?
Major: Oh [Laughter]
Barr: There have been more than one.
Major: Really?
Barr: Yeah.
Major: It comes up every so often.
Barr: Well, it did back when I was active. I can remember the last time, probably, Jim Babcock and I went up with Jerry Haynie to one of those ____ motels and spent a day meeting with people from Richmond . You know, we’d just look at it and talk about the practicality of having a core—I mean there were so many ways we tried to look at it. You know have 40 musicians there and forty musicians here, and then when we did Mahler we’d all get together, but the rest of the year we’d play pieces that didn’t—it just boiled down to, what’s the women’s group going to say? Are they going to be there if it’s not their orchestra because so many of the women who’d been so great—it’s really been their favorite pastime, and would they feel that way if it was the in- between orchestra of Virginia or something? [Laughter] You know where would the name go? Who would the main conductor be? All those sort of things.
Major: Right. Is there anything more to say about when the orchestra became a contract orchestra, a salaried orchestra? How did it happen? How did you manage to make it happen?
Barr: I would say Jerry Haynie could tell you the nitty-gritty of that far better than I because he was the one who was around.
Major: Okay.
Barr: You know, he’s in North Carolina , though I have his number somewhere if you have any trouble, I can . . .
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Major: Okay, okay I’m sure that we want to interview him, too. At one time there was an active partnership with Norfolk State where musicians were recruited to be faculty members at Norfolk State and to play in the symphony. How did that happen?
Barr: ____ when my memory doesn’t work. Who was that divine woman and you’ve certainly heard her name who was head of the music department ?
Major: Georgia Ryder.
Barr: Georgia Ryder, oh, she was just wonderful. I was devoted to Georgia Ryder. I think she made it happen. I think she—it was her—she was just such a wonderful human being, and I think she could hold out an offer to—this is my assumption, we really—I can’t say we ever discussed it at length, but to a potential professor that you’d have this added income and this added opportunity to perform if that was what you did, so I think really the credit goes to Georgia, and we certainly worked with Adolphus Hailstork and people on staff, Wesley Chapman, who was just a lovely man, who was involved with Norfolk State and the orchestra. So I think it was—I really don’t even know who from the symphony’s side alone, not from Norfolk State , was the one who made it happen. I really can’t tell you that; somebody can but I cannot.
Major: Okay. It’s I—I have a couple of people—Steve Carlson is on my list . . .
Barr: Right.
Major: . . . to interview so I will find out something different.
Barr: Yeah, yeah.
Major: Are there things that you thought I might ask or something you wanted to be sure to get out?
Barr: Would I hurt your feelings if I said I hadn’t given it much thought? [Laughter]
Major: No, it wouldn’t bother me a bit.
Barr: You know the truth is . . . after my husband’s death, I haven’t been able to go to the symphony. We sat there and held hands through every concert for all those years, and I find if I try and go, I just miss him so much that . . .
Major: Of course.
Barr: . . . it’s just painful, so I have really been so removed from the symphony for a lot of years now, and as I say, they finally gave me permission to get off the board . . . I helped with the Carnegie Hall thing. I went to people I knew who had
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lived here, who had grown up here and raised funds in New York to make that happen, and those sort of things I said I’ll do, but the day to day crisis of how we’re going to meet payroll, I said I’ve done my time; somebody else has to do it. I just can’t, I can’t do it any more. You know, it’s somebody else’s turn. I’ve been around long enough, but the symphony has a very hard time letting go of past presidents, and in some ways it’s good, but in some ways—and I don’t think it’s—I gather it’s not so much a problem now, but as I say I’ve been so uninvolved I can’t say that, but you know Minette’s there forever, and Jim Babcock was there forever. We just—Louie walked off. He said, “Forget it,” but I couldn’t quite seem to… have them say you can go, too, until this year. I guess enough new people had come in, and they didn’t know how vital I’d been holding it together at one time that they were perfectly willing to say, “Okay, let her go.” And so I don’t even go to that one meeting a year. It’s just somebody else’s turn; it really is. I did, I did my turn, and I think I made a difference in it and it’s here today because some of us were there making it happen then, and now it’s somebody else’s turn.
Major: This was wonderful, thank you so much.
Barr: Well, I hope it helped.
Major: Appreciate it very much.
Barr: I’m glad you’re hanging on to all this history ‘cause I think these are the things we really need to know.
Major: And I think that your observation that this merger was a precursor of a number of other things to make this region more cohesive is really true.
Barr: Well, I think that it is very hard for politicians to give of their territories and their responsibilities, so I think it’s easier for the arts to do things, and I think that’s, maybe that’s why I’m so interested in the Virginia Arts Festival. ____ Rob Cross ____ back--that I feel that’s a way to unite these areas.
Major: It certainly is.
Barr: And at some point, somebody is going to have to say, “Okay, you guys are holding out for nationalist reasons. We’ve got to work together as one big community,” and it was certainly my father’s greatest wish, and I second it. So anything it, it’s been something I’ve been glad to be a part of anywhere I could.
END OF INTERVIEW
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