Ray Bayles writes:

>Sounds like there is a lot of provincial snobbery in Boston...  There
>is no corner on intellectualism in Boston for anybody who thinks that
>way... just uninformed narrowly focused people who don't have as much
>musical experience as they need.

There is csertainly provincialism in Boston, but I am sure that there
is a public for opera in Boston.  Sometimes things happen more or less by
accident, or by an accumulation of accidents.  IF Sarah Caldwell had worked
at a time of booming economy, just possibly her company would have gotten
off the ground.  Who knows? And as Stirling Newberry has testified, the
people who might get something done in establishing opera in Boston cannot
seem to work together.  The problem with Boston is not provincialism as
much as over-politicization of everything.  We can't keep blaming puritans
and narrow minded taste makers of yore.

Bernard Chasan