As many of you will know, our colleague, Gary Lindsey, recently announced the closing of his office in May.  We send him our very best wishes for the future.  His contact information follows this short summary of his career:

Gary began his career in the booking field in 1973, finding engagements for Michael Uthoff and Lisa Bradley (formerly with the Joffrey) of the Hartford Ballet. Prior to that, in 1970, he worked as Assistant House Manager for the Brooklyn Academy of Music, and as the first administrator for Lar Lubovitch, producing Lar’s seasons at the Public Theater and taking the troupe to the Spoleto Festival (Italy) in June, 1991.   In addition, he had the opportunity to work with Rudy Perez, Louis Falco and the Joffrey Ballet.

The National Endowment for the Arts’ Dance Touring Program in the 1970’s was very helpful for touring companies, their managers and agents.  Indeed, it was through this program that Gary got involved with the Hartford Ballet.

Gary believes that the difficulties facing those who were working with dance companies once the Dance Touring Program was phased out, impacted our industry significantly; and, does to this day.

With thirty-seven years in the business, he’s been “in the trenches”, working with the changes that our field has seen.  Specifically, it’s been frustrating to Gary that current presenters seem not to be educated about dance as a discipline; and, hence, don’t know the artists and the companies that are active today.  This makes it difficult for one to engage artists and companies if there isn’t a knowledge-base about their work in the presenting field.

Throughout Gary’s professional career as a manager and an agent, he maintained, and continually updated, a database of 6,000 presenters.  As he enters retirement after almost 40 years, his experience tells him that only about 1,000 of those on that list know and care about dance.

Gary takes pride in that he always represented artists and companies that he felt were the best at what they did and delivered a quality performance to the audiences that paid to see them.  His parting recommendation to those still active in the professional performing arts is the importance of knowing what artist or attraction to secure for your season; who to call to secure that artist or attraction that’s right for your needs; and, when to make that call.

A letter we received from Gary: