First of two parts
Re “Chop Concerts to 4 Next Summer, Then Replace Mandell, Advisors Suggest”
Having produced concerts since 1975, Gary Mandell is of an age this afternoon where he might be expected to start applying his foot ever so slightly to his career brakes.
Never mind that retirement is as remote to his life as high school graduation.
It would be nice if he could unlax, pause, reflect and smile with modest satisfaction over decades of entrepreneurial success.
The turmoil stirred by Tuesday night’s Cultural Affairs Commission meeting will not allow him to exhale.
Instead, his nimble mind that craves nothing more than launching a slyly delivered punchline, once again this year is preoccupied with the imperiled state of his 11-year arrangement with City Hall to produce the Summer Music Festival series.
Periodically during the past decade, the commission, even as it has changed faces, has seemed to take pleasure in threatening Mr. Mandell’s job stability. They aren’t exactly sure why. And they don’t know exactly what they want to do. They want to change the agenda, but they never get around to identifying how he should change the kind of acts he hires on a limited budget.
On Tuesday night, the commission unanimously voted to recommend that the already pared down Music Festival series be sliced in half, to four concerts, switched for the first time in the series’ 16 year history from Thursday nights to Sunday afternoons, and to dump Mr. Mandell after the fourth week to be mistily replaced by someone else, anyone else, who fill find different acts, and probably in a different venue. Otherwise, it is business as usual.
Mr. Mandell has been boxed into a corner by the free-swinging five ladies of the commission who seem to love playing the game of Pretend, pushing at least one of his feet over the cliff — as in, Heads We Win, Tails You Lose.
Appearances to the contrary, the restless, ambitious ladies are not Mr. Mandell’s bosses. He works for the Redevelopment Agency, who will make the final call on next year in a few months. The ladies are volunteer advisors.
(To be continued)
