No Excellence in New York?

A backstage fight at the plucky little New York City Opera burst into full view last week. A policy schism has long troubled the 12-year-old company. Was it to be a "little Met" and give second-class performances of the big company's repertory, or was it to seek out scores that the Metropolitan Opera would not produce and do them well? Manhattan Maecenas Lincoln Kirstein held the second view and, as managing director of the entire New York City Center (opera, ballet, theater), tried to make it work. Through a $200,000 Rockefeller grant, he helped commission such modern operas as Aaron Copland's The Tender Land and the daring stage designs for Von Einem's The Trial, revived such confections as Rossini's Cenerentola. The Center was losing some $100,000 a year, but Kirstein often helped with money fromhis own pocket.

On the other side of the artistic fence was the Center's board of directors, spearheaded by Morton Baum, New York lawyer and man-about-the-arts. Three years ago the board sacked adventurous Conductor Laszlo Halasz, installed Joseph Rosenstock, who is more tradition-directed. Last year the board fired key opera staffers without Kirstein's knowledge. Last week's last-straw news: the board had ignored Kirstein's plan to have Composer Gian-Carlo Menotti supervise the opera division and renewed Conductor Rosenstock's contract against Kirstein's wishes. Director Kirstein resigned in protest. Said he: "The board operates on the theory that you can't have excellence in New York. They think of the City Center as a money-making concern; I see it as a money-spending concern."

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