For those that know me, you already know what a figure skating nut I am.  Back in the day, I was considering either going the figure skating route or the music route.  I chose music, but the love of figure skating stayed with me.  I’m an avid fan now, and I am eating up the Olympics this year.  While watching, my mind did travel to what can we learn from figure skating for audience development.  Here is what came to me:

• The details are important!  From the costume to the choice of music and everything in between, all the movements and choices add up to either a well executed program or not.  The details are what makes a program pop.  Everything needs to come together to create a world class skate.  In audience development, in order to engage your audiences, you need this same type of care in all the details.  Everything you do adds up to a good or bad program and whether or not the audiences will continue to support you.
• You have to go for it!  During Michelle Kwan’s Olympics skates, she skated mostly clean, the details were there, but she didn’t go for it as much as Sarah Hughes or Tara Lipinski, the two young skaters that took her Olympic glory away from her.   Although she had the experience they didn’t have, she forgot to put all her heart into it.  I have seen many performances that were well acted, well played, well executed, but they lacked that heart that really gets an audience excited.  All the technical elements were there, but without the flare, the emotion, the events fell flat.  For events that keep the audiences buzzing about you and your art, you have to go for it with all your heart.
• Don’t be afraid to fall.  Spoiler alert here if you haven’t seen the Men’s short program.  Jeremy Abbot took an extremely hard fall, bashing into the boards.  It took him a few seconds to decide to throw in the towel or to keep going. With the crowd cheering him on,  Jeremy kept going!  Many skaters have had to make this decision.  Some keep going, some decided to quit.  The ones who keep going are the ones that will succeed, in life.  Also, you have to take into account how many falls they take during their practices.  A lot!  They fall and they get right back up again to achieve what people thought couldn’t be possible.  They try new moves, spins and jumps, falling all the while, and they keep working at it until they execute it right and consistently.  We can learn a great deal from these skaters.  Many artists do practice long hours like they do.  I am now calling out the arts administrators.  We too need to learn to be okay with falling (failing) in order to test our new programs, new art, and new presentations.  Otherwise, we may never reach our best potential.
• Be gracious in good and bad times.  My favorite skaters are the ones that take everything in stride.  They realize that there will be good and bad moments.  This quality makes them stronger in my opinion.  They don’t blame it on anything, they simply accept that if the times are bad, it wasn’t their time.  If the times are good, they enjoy the moment without ego.  Some artists and arts organizations can take a cue from these types of skaters.  Getting rid of the blame game, accepting good and bad, and ridding of ego will help you to relate to your audiences better and keep them happy.  Audiences can see and feel when you are behaving badly, and this is not good for audience development.
• Hard work may seem like it will kill you, but it will make you stronger.  And, we do have to make time for it.  These skaters work hard!  Artists work hard too.  When it comes to the administrative details, we need to work just as hard.  The same dedication and hard work needs to be there if you want an audience these days.  I have witnessed some of the community orchestras doing better in terms of audience numbers compared to some professional orchestras.  It was the same program.  The professional orchestra even had a world class artist headlining.  The community orchestra gained a better audience because they worked harder for it!  Without the hard work, many of us will simply blend into the woodwork of competition.
• Lastly (or firstly as I always say), know yourself.  Many skaters know their strengths and weaknesses.  They know what they like in regard to music and style, and they know if they are not true to themselves, they won’t skate with all the gusto they can muster.  I have seen skaters attempt to go beyond their technical abilities or not believe in themselves to know they can challenge themselves further.  I have seen them choose music and costumes that do not fit their personalities and skating styles.  These wrong choices have made their programs fall flat.  The skaters that truly know themselves and do everything in relation to what they know about themselves create a complete program that works!  One of the skaters from Canada said that he only wants to skate to heavy metal music.  It’s the music he loves and feels, so why not?  It sets him apart from the others and makes his programs eligible for his personal best.  ACDC got the crowd going! We as artists and arts organizations still have a ways to go in knowing ourselves and branding ourselves properly.  Forget what other people think, be true to yourself!

I am looking forward to the rest of the Olympics figure skating drama to unfold.  It’s been an exciting year mainly due to all the heart that is going into these skates.  The world is watching.  When it comes to building audiences, I hope you give it all you got!

Cheers to happy and loyal audiences,
Shoshana

Shoshana Fanizza
Chief Audience Builder

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