Assembly LVII : The Performing Arts at Yale
Executive Summary
October 26-28, 2000              

Thursday Afternoon
Opening Plenary Session: A Retrospective on the Performing Arts at Yale

Assembly Chair Susan Addiss ’69 MPH, ’69 MUrS launched the Assembly by reflecting on the many ways in which the performing arts have flourished at Yale. Music, drama, and dance have touched the lives of all students. She expressed her hope that the attending delegates would be touched by and reminded of their experiences of the arts at Yale.

Professor David Chambers ’71 MFA of the Drama School moderated the session that included Alexander Timbers ’01 and Graham Norris ’03 of the Yale Dramatic Association, and Thomas Duffy, director of the University Bands and Professor of Music and Deputy Dean of the School of Music.

Professor Chambers began by reflecting upon the 75th anniversary of the School of Drama and gave an overview of the history of the School and its mission.

• Two signal events occurred in 1925. The York Street Theater was constructed and George Pierce Baker, who taught a popular drama course at Harvard, came to Yale to found the School of Drama.

• Yale excels in its professional conservatory training. The School’s teaching is driven by the text, rather than theory or technique. The School of Drama believes in the living presence of the playwright and celebrates the centrality of the texts.

• Vocational goals from the 1930s to 1950s focused on getting on to Broadway, but as the serious plays on Broadway declined, this was no longer feasible. Today most look toward off-Broadway, city and regional theaters as well as to film and television.

• Robert Brustein who served as the Dean of the School of Drama from 1966-1979, was a deliberately challenging and provoking critic. He challenged moral, ethical and artistic choices in the theater. And he challenged his students to be artistic advocates and made sure that they “took over” in order to “save” the regional theaters. Many of Yale’s School of Drama students went on to head regional theaters.

• Lloyd Richards followed Brustein as dean. Richards probed the sources of contemporary drama which led him to the Russian Theater. He brought an internationalism to the School which remains to this day.

• Stan Wojewodski, now at the end of his term as Dean, brings a special sensitivity to the language of drama to the School.

• The School produces 60 productions a year. The School believes the best way to learn is to act, act, act. The students’ days are divided between classroom work from 9:00-2:00 and rehearsals from 2:00-11:00.

Professor Tom Duffy compared the growth and development of the School of Music to a city that grew up without a civic plan.

• In 1855, Gustave Jacob Stoeckel was appointed instructor of church music and director of the Chapel Choir and other musical activities at Yale College.

• Originally, only sacred music was allowed on campus but this gradually gave way to the formation of the Glee Club and other musical groups for pleasure and purpose, including the Yale Band.

• In 1888, the alumni of Fairfield County formed a community to appeal for a School of Music. They argued, “Athletics was at its height at the time of the fall of the Roman Empire. Music was not.” The Yale School of Music was created in 1889.

• Yale alumni and faculty have won 30% of the Pulitzer Prizes for composition.

Graham Norris presented the history of the Dramatic Association at Yale.

• Founded in 1899, the Yale Dramatic Association is the second oldest college theatre association in the country and the largest undergraduate theatre organization at Yale.
  

• Early meetings had to be held in secrecy because students were forbidden to act.
  

• Theater Studies at Yale College emphasizes history and theory, not performance. The Dramat offers undergraduates the opportunity to practice what they learn.
  

• The students involved make huge sacrifices, typically logging over 100 hours in rehearsal time on at least 3 productions. They constantly struggle to find practice and performance space.

The question and answer period that followed the panelist’s presentations addressed issues of practice space, preparing undergraduates for life in the theater, and digital media art.

Self-Paced Tour of Yale Performance Arts Spaces
Following the opening plenary, delegates took a self-paced tour of some of Yale’s performance arts spaces, including the Yale Cabaret Theatre, the new Gilmore Music Library set into the heart of the Sterling Library, the Costume Shop of the Drama School, the Collection of Musical Instruments, and the New Theatre at the Holcombe T. Green, Jr. Hall on Chapel Street.

Dinner and Performances with Students
Delegates had dinner in the residential colleges with students active in the performing arts. Afterward, they attended student performances in the colleges. These performances included a production of Anouilh’s version of Antigone and performances by the Yale Dancers, an improv troupe and various musical groups.

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