HISTORY OF SHOWTIME EL PASO!

Showtime El Paso! is a relatively new name for one of El Paso’s oldest organizations. Until 2003, we were known as El Paso Community Concerts. Here’s a brief history.

In the early 1930s, El Pasoans — like people nationwide — had an appetite for live performances.  At the same time, many stages were going empty because money was scarce to pay for touring entertainment. Promoters weren’t willing to go into debt on nationwide tours, gambling that ticket sales would come through. In New York, the managers at Columbia Artists had come up with a bold plan: Raise the money for touring acts in advance through a network of locally based organizations, who would sell a whole season at a time. Thus was born Community Concerts.

Community Concerts went nationwide to establish non-profit, all-volunteer organizations and to expand the touring network for the selected artist. El Paso joined this network within its first few years. The first El Paso concert was held in 1934, and the 1934-35 concert series officially established the beginning of El Paso Community Concert Association.

The Community Concerts network idea revolutionized the performing arts in America. The organized audience concept caught fire and spread: it fostered cultural development on an unprecedented scale. Families who had been indifferent to "highbrow" single artists were attracted to a whole season with varied offerings for a reasonable price.  El Pasoans who had never been to a concert before were being offered at a reasonable price.  El Pasoans who had never been to a concert before were being invited to attend by people they knew—ordinary folks who lived in their neighborhood, went to their church, whose children attended school with their own. They saw quality performances: Featured artists in the early years included Vladimir Horowitz, Nelson Eddy, Lily Pons, Jascha Heifetz, and Yehudi Menuhin. By fostering people’s hunger for live performing arts, the El Paso Community Concert Association and other associations also were contributing to the nationwide growth of local symphonies, theatres, and dance companies.

Faced with the advent of television, competing performing arts presenters and changing lifestyles the all-volunteer organization has responded by being proactive in understanding and meeting the needs of the community. At first, most of the concerts were strictly classical. Over the years they have changed to include jazz, rock, dance groups, Broadway hits and a broad range of other live entertainment.  The concerts continue to be of the highest quality, a vital mix of major stars and performers still on their way to prominence.

Now known as Showtime El Paso, El Paso’s second oldest performing arts organization has continued to adapt to change. In 2001, the national parent company changed hands (historically, the national network of non-profit community concerts associations were tied to a national for-profit company that provided most of its bookings) and the new company failed to meet its financial obligations to the performing artists. The national network disbanded, and groups like the El Paso association renamed themselves and booked their acts through alternative sources.