Consultant Directory

EmcArts
Melissa Dibble and Richard Evans
127 West 122nd Street
New York, NY 10027
Phone: 212-362-8541
Fax: 212-362-7941
Email: mdibble@emcarts.com
Email: REvans@emcarts.com
Website: www.emcarts.org

Years Working in Field: EmcArts was founded in 1999. Our president and senior consultants have been working in the nonprofit cultural sector for over 30 years.

EXPERTISE:
- Arts in Education
- Board Development: leadership & training, roles & responsibilities, team building, board/staff issues and communication.
- Community Cultural Planning: assessment of needs & resources; collaborations & partnerships.
- Cultural Tourism
- Fundraising
- Mediation/Conflict Resolution
- Meeting/Retreat Facilitation
- Organizational Planning: assessment of needs & resources; mission, values & vision; managing change; strategic & long range plans; succession & transition.
- Organizational Management: crisis management; structure & management principles
- Program Assessment & Development
- Research/Publications: Arts Education Systems (www.emcarts.org)
- Specialized Workshops & Lectures: Innovation
- New Strategies Lab

QUALIFICATIONS/EXPERIENCE:
EmcArts has responded to the arts and culture marketplace by creating a social enterprise with the potential to transform organizations, communities, and whole fields of endeavor. With our clients, EmcArts creates solutions that stimulate real, long-term change. Our programs generate knowledge, develop networks, increase the effectiveness of local cultural systems, and build high-performance organizations.

EmcArts is a social enterprise with the potential to transform organizations, communities, and whole fields of endeavor. All of EmcArts´ programs are aimed at enabling our clients to achieve sustainable results. In every facet of our work, we seek to generate practical solutions and make high performance possible. Our approach requires our clients to change and to take calculated risks, so we equip them with tools to maximize their chances of success. And we constantly derive and share new learning from organizational change and experimentation.

Emc.Arts, LLC, was founded in 1999 by Richard Evans and John McCann as a merger of their separate consulting interests in the arts and culture sector. Following rapid growth and the development of an increasing range of services to groups of arts organizations and whole fields of work in the arts, the company was re-incorporated in January 2006 as EmcArts Inc., a tax-exempt 501(c)3 consulting firm with a broader mission of public service. Richard Evans now leads EmcArts as its President; John McCann serves full-time as the Director of the HYPERLINK "http://www.icpp.vt.edu/" Institute for Cultural Policy & Practice at Virginia Tech, with which EmcArts partners in some of its large-scale program management activities.

EDUCATION & SPECIALIZED TRAINING:
Melissa Dibble: Melissa joined the EmcArts team after a decade of experience in the orchestra field, where she fostered tremendous growth in the community programs and departments of major symphony orchestras. The emphasis in her leadership was on connecting classical music and musicians to the communities in which orchestras exist, by creating sustainable partnerships at the community level. At EmcArts, Melissa develops partnerships with clients in the cultural field, serving as a catalyst for continued growth in the organization's support for leading practitioners and funding agencies. As General Manager she directs most aspects of the organization's internal team and operations.

Melissa's EmcArts project delivery work includes engagements with the Aspen Music Festival and School, the New England Conservatory, The Wallace Foundation, Act II Playhouse (Ambler, PA), the Borough of Lansdale (PA), Indian Hill Music Center (Litttleton, MA) and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Prior to working at Emc, Melissa worked for the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra where she established the Community Partnerships Department, now a model in the American orchestra industry. As Director of Community Partnerships, she worked collaboratively with Orchestra and staff members and community leaders to design programs that were both relevant to the audiences they were created to serve and artistically fulfilling to the musicians who performed them. She focused on integrating community programs and initiatives into the organization as a whole, with particular emphasis on marketing, public relations and educational opportunities. In addition, she implemented complex grants from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Wallace-Reader's Digest Fund, Monsanto Fund and National Endowment for the Arts. During her four-season tenure, nearly 1,500 community events were planned and performed.

Melissa came to SLSO from the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra where she served as the first Community Outreach Manager. Her work focused on partnering the Symphony with wide-ranging community talents and resources, from schools to churches to civic organizations, in ten geographically diverse communities. While in Pittsburgh, she also gained a strong background in development through her work as the Symphony's Capital Campaign Coordinator.

Melissa is a Fellow of the American Symphony Orchestra League's Orchestra Management Fellowship Program. She holds a Bachelor of Music in Flute Performance from Boston University's School for the Arts, where she studied with Leone Buyse.

Richard Evans: As Founder and President of EmcArts, Richard Evans directs and oversees the organization´s programs, client engagements, and strategic partnerships. Client projects have included program design and delivery for the leadership programs of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation´s Orchestra Forum, and The Wallace Foundation´s Arts for Young People initiative; program evaluations for the Ford Foundation, Pew Charitable Trusts, Surdna and James Irvine Foundations; and planning processes for the Aspen Music Festival & School, City of Chicago Office of Cultural Affairs, Louisiana Division of the Arts, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, and New England Conservatory of Music, among many others.

Richard has developed his research capacities and analytical expertise through major field studies in the arts. These include the first national study of community schools of the arts for the Wallace Foundation (published in 1992 as Too Intrinsic for Renown), the evaluation for the MacArthur Fellows Program of fellowships and support structures for individual artists (published in 1994 under the title playing Diaghilev), and the first national study of British orchestras (published in 2000 as Knowing the Score).

Richard has led numerous projects in the design and evaluation of support programs in the arts, including The Magic of Music, the Knight Foundations national orchestra support program. For The Pew Charitable Trusts, he led the design of the Philadelphia Cultural Leadership Program and evaluations of the Trusts´ full suite of programs in support of individual artists - Meet The Composers New Residencies Program, New York Foundation for the Arts National Dance Residency Program, and Theatre Communications Group´s National Theater Artists Residency Program. Richard´s research work in the cultural field has included trend analysis of the purpose, design and distribution of state-wide arts and culture support, and national studies of organizational profiles within the fields of ballet/dance, theaters and orchestras (for Dance/USA, Theatre Communications Group, and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation).

In the field of organizational development, Richard served from 1991-1996 as a field consultant to the National Endowment for the Arts´ Advancement Program and to the Presenter Expansion Program of Chamber Music America. In 1992-93, Richard facilitated the formation of the National Alliance of Artists´ Communities, for which he acted as the first Coordinator.

Richard received his M.A. from Trinity College, Cambridge, England. He has held numerous senior positions in performing arts management and philanthropy, including Chief Executive of the Bath International Festival of Music & the Arts, England, and Vice President of the National Arts Stabilization Fund.

RECENT & REPRESENTATIVE CONSULTING WORK:
1. Carnegie Hall, New York City, May 07-July 07; Global Encounters Evaluation Contact Referral: Available upon request

2. Whitney Museum, New York City. July 07-12/07; Museum/Guide Choice Study Contact Referral: Available upon request

3. James Irvine Foundation, San Francisco, CA; June 08- May 09; Artistic Innovation Fund. Contact Referral: Available upon request

4. Settlement Music School, Philadelphia, PA; work through February 08 on planning. Contact Referral: Available upon request

5. North Regional Council of the Arts: Lansdale Performing Arts Center, Lansdale, PA; summer of 2007; strategic planning. Contact Referral: Available upon request

FEE/FEE STRUCTURE:
Average Daily Rates- $800-$1800. Fixed Price Contracts

AREAS OF NEW YORK STATE SERVED: All of New York State

The Alliance of New York State Arts Organizations has a 29-year history as New York s service association for community based arts and cultural organizations. The Alliance provides leadership and vision, and delivers services, resources and tools that strengthen cultural organizations. The Alliance informs the field on statewide and national issues affecting the arts and assists local arts agencies in building community support.

245 Love Lane, P.O. Box 96
Mattituck, NY 11952-0096
Phone (631) 298-1234 / Fax (631) 298-1101