The Kennedy Center suffered a major setback after the Washington National Opera formally ended its 55-year affiliation, citing financial conflicts and operational incompatibility with new institutional directives.
In a statement to supporters, the opera said revised funding requirements mandating productions be fully financed in advance were incompatible with opera operations. The company confirmed it would complete its 70th season independently and move performances to other venues across Washington, D.C. Opera leaders said the separation was intended to be an “amicable transition,” but financial strain and declining donor confidence made remaining impractical. The company reported a 40 percent drop in ticket revenue — a figure previously cited by artistic director Francesca Zambello in an interview with The Guardian in November 2025, where she said Trump administration policies had “shattered” donor confidence.
Context behind the departure
The exit comes amid sustained upheaval at the Kennedy Center following President Donald Trump’s takeover in early 2025. Trump appointed himself chairman of the board and replaced existing members with political allies. In December 2025, the board approved renaming the venue the Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
The rebranding triggered cancelations by prominent artists, including Lin-Manuel Miranda, Rhiannon Giddens, Renée Fleming and Ben Folds. Fleming withdrew from scheduled May 2026 performances with the National Symphony Orchestra, citing a “scheduling conflict,” according to a message posted on the Kennedy Center’s website.
Controversy also followed the appointment of Ric Grenell as president of the Trump-Kennedy Center. In December 2025, Grenell threatened musician Chuck Redd with a $1 million lawsuit after Redd canceled a Christmas Eve performance. In a letter shared with the Associated Press, Grenell accused Redd of “political intolerance” and linked the cancelation to the venue’s renaming.
Statements from both sides
Kennedy Center spokesperson Roma Daravi told The New York Times the split followed careful consideration of what she described as a financially challenging relationship. She later told Newsweek that artists canceling performances over political differences were “selfish” and “intolerant,” adding that the Trump-Kennedy Center remained committed to programming that “inspires and resonates with all audiences.”
Zambello, who served as the opera’s artistic director for 14 years, said, “I am deeply saddened to leave the Kennedy Center. I have been proud to be affiliated with a national monument to the human spirit.”
Timothy O’Leary, the opera’s general director, called the move to George Washington University’s Lisner Auditorium “both a homecoming and renewal,” noting the company first performed there 70 years ago. He confirmed that Treemonisha and The Crucible will be staged at Lisner in March 2026, with details for West Side Story in May to be announced later….
DSD @ Politicaldog 101
image….The New Yorker
One new high-ranking staffer at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is now resigning from his role just weeks after his hire was announced.
On January 16, the Kennedy Center announced that Kevin Couch would be the new senior vice president of artistic programming at the vaunted institution. The Kennedy Center also announced Couch’s new role on its official X account on January 22. However, the Washington Post reported Wednesday that Couch submitted his resignation less than a week later.
While Couch confirmed his resignation to the Post on Wednesday, he didn’t issue any further comment explaining the reason for his sudden departure.
Prior to his 12-day stint at the Kennedy Center, Couch worked at his Dallas, Texas-based branding agency, CBC Creative. Before founding CBC Creative, Couch managed popular R&B acts, including 1990s group Color Me Badd. According to the Kennedy Center’s press release announcing his hire, Couch “oversaw all aspects of business operations, including booking, licensing, staffing, and strategic consulting.”…
“I am honored to join the Trump Kennedy Center at such a pivotal moment for the performing arts,” Couch said in the release. “I look forward to the extraordinary creative possibilities ahead — championing our artists and partners to deliver meaningful experiences at America’s cultural center.”
Couch’s sudden exit comes on the heels of world-renowned composers and performers boycotting the Kennedy Center in response to President Donald Trump’s takeover of the institution — including putting his own name above former President John F. Kennedy’s on the building’s facade. Earlier this week, award-winning composer Philip Glass announced he was joining the boycott, which has also been supported by musician Bela Fleck, Oscar-winning composer Stephen Schwartz, soprano singer Renee Fleming and others.
There’s a JD Vance joke in there somewhere..
Ok
Where?
I’m clueless
“That’s the tactic they use,” said Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island senator, pondering whether Donald Trump might attach his name to the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. “You float stuff and you float stuff and you float stuff until people get inured to what a stupid or outrageous thing it is that has been floated, and then you pull the trigger.”…
In November Whitehouse, the top Democrat on the Senate environment and public works (EPW) committee, launched a formal investigation into allegations of widespread cronyism, financial mismanagement and corruption at what he describes as a “secular temple to the arts”.
Democrats on the committee said they obtained documents that suggest the national cultural centre is being operated as a “slush fund and private club for Trump’s friends and political allies”, resulting in millions of dollars in losses and a significant deviation from its statutory mission.
Whitehouse sent a letter to Grenell demanding detailed documents and records. Grenell issued a fiery response accusing the senator of “partisan attacks and false accusations”. He claimed that neglect by the centre’s previous leadership left it in “financial chaos” and was “quite literally making the building fall apart”.
Whitehouse, an ex officio member of the Kennedy Center board, remains undeterred and determined to press on with his investigation. Speaking in his office on Capitol Hill, he explained: “We began to get information about mischief taking place at the Kennedy Center and we got strong enough signals that we mounted an effort to dig into it and see what seemed actually to be going on.
“It was out of that effort that the report and letter came, which basically suggested that, when the brigands took the ship, their first instinct was to loot it for their own benefit and hire their friends and put people up in fancy rooms at the Watergate [hotel] and let favoured organisations get free access and it was all part of a Maga party atmosphere.”…
A central charge of the investigation is that the Kennedy Center is providing preferential access and financial benefits to organisations connected to the Trump administration and its allies. According to a contract, Grenell granted world football’s governing body, Fifa, free and exclusive use of the entire Kennedy Center campus from 24 November to 12 December for the World Cup draw.
Estimates provided by Whitehouse show this will cost the Center $5,038,444 in losses from direct rental fees, programming rescheduling, labour, food and beverage and other services. Multiple events were cancelled or rescheduled to accommodate Fifa.
Grenell rejected the accusation in his letter, stating: “Fifa has given us several million dollars, in addition to paying all of the expenses for this event in lieu of a rental fee. Your focus on simple rental fees is no way to run an institution as diverse as the Kennedy Center. A simple rental fee would not have been enough to cover the magnitude of the event.”
But Whitehouse argues this defence is unsubstantiated by any documentation. Fifa has been “brown-nosing Trump relentlessly and giving him comical peace trophies to butter him up and at the same time getting free access to the Kennedy Center”, the senator observed.
Roma Daravi, vice-president of public relations for the Kennedy Center, said in a statement on Wednesday: “Fifa is giving the Kennedy Center multimillions of dollars – much more than what a rental’s revenue would have been – plus they are covering all expenses.”
Daravi accused Whitehouse of purposely sharing “misleading information” with US newspapers the New York Times and Washington Post, adding: “The press and the senator should be ashamed of the lies they print and reprint – we want a cultural center for ALL Americans but they push lies to sow division amongst Americans for their selfish moment in a headline.”
Contracts reveal steep rental discounts were provided to conservative groups: NewsNation received a $19,820 discount for a town hall event; the American Conservative Union Foundation received a $21,982.60 discount for a CPAC gathering entitled the Christian Persecution Summit. The contract file explicitly notes “waived costs from OOP” (the Office of the President).
Whitehouse added: “If they weren’t paying the proper ordinary Kennedy Center rates, they’re being given a benefit and those benefits seem only to be going towards groups that are affiliated with Trump and Maga. It’s basically a direct way to use this public facility to put money into the pockets of groups that are allied.”
The investigation also uncovered lucrative contracts awarded to individuals with personal or political ties to Grenell and his allies.
On 14 April the centre entered into a $15,000-per-month contract with a former colleague of Grenell’s from his time as ambassador to Germany. The letter states the contract is “devoid of any detail”, and there is no evidence of substantive speeches that would justify the payments.
In May the centre awarded a $10,833.33-per-month contract to Jeff Halperin, the husband of staunch Trump ally Kari Lake, for “social media capture/editing” services. In his response, Grenell praised Halperin for his “incredible multimedia expertise”.
Documents detail significant expenditures on luxury hospitality and entertainment for staff and associates, which the letter describes as unrelated to official fundraising or development purposes.
Between 21 April and 16 July, Grenell’s team charged the center $27,185 for rooms at the luxury Watergate hotel. These charges, which included multi-night stays, missed reservation fees and valet parking, are described as “unprecedented”.
Whitehouse contrasted this with previous administrations, where such hospitality was typically for performers or honourees, not “letting some guy who you know who you’re hiring be put up at the Watergate”.
Between 17 April and 2 July, $10,773.19 was charged for private lunches, dinners and alcohol. Receipts show charges for “champagne service”, multi-bottle wine orders including rosé, and charcuterie. Senior staff members Nick Meade and Rick Loughery, who also hold leadership roles in political organisations founded or led by Grenell, appeared on several invoices in this spending.
The investigation notes reports that the Kennedy Center is operating over budget amid falling ticket sales. Whitehouse suggested the decline is due to a “bad signal to Washington” from the new leadership, a change in programming that “appeals to a much narrower market of Maga enthusiasts” and major acts cancelling performances. He likened the Trump administration’s takeover to “the Vandals in Rome”….
[and several other examples at]
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/01/trump-kennedy-center-canceled-programs
An award-winning composer has canceled an upcoming performance at the Trump-Kennedy Center after a protester was shot dead in Minneapolis. Philip Glass called off the forthcoming debut of his Symphony No. 15, ‘Lincoln,’ themed after the nation’s 16th president. ‘Symphony No. 15 is a portrait of Abraham Lincoln, and the values of the Kennedy Center today are in direct conflict with the message of the Symphony,’ Glass wrote in a statement on X on Tuesday.. ‘Therefore, I feel an obligation to withdraw this Symphony premiere from the Kennedy Center under its current leadership.’
[Daily Mail]
The place IS going have a hollow centre until Trump’s name and control LEAVES the place….
Wynton Marsalis has announced he is retiring from leading the 40-year-old Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Trumping the Savoy; Jumping the Trump.
He, he….
That was careless of me — that was at the Lincoln Center, not the *****-Kennedy Center.
According to The New York Times:
After nearly 40 years as the charismatic founder and recognizable face of Jazz at Lincoln Center, Wynton Marsalis will step down as managing and artistic director next year, the organization announced on Thursday, ending a transformative tenure that raised the profile of jazz nationwide.
“It’s the perfect time to identify the next generation of leadership,” Marsalis, 64, said in an interview. “We want to make sure that we do what we can to nurture what we’ve already built with the understanding that this is an art form and it will continue to grow and the organization will continue to flourish.”…