Brooklyn Academy of Music to Make Program Cuts, Lay Off 13% of Staff

26 staffers are expected to lose their jobs at the 160-year-old institution, which has been experiencing significant deficits in the wake of the pandemic

Twenty-six positions are on the chopping block at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), a 160-year-old institution that stands at the heart of the cultural scene in New York City.

In addition, BAM will significantly reduce its programming for the 2023/24 season, having already cut its Next Wave Festival from thirteen programs to seven.

The layoffs coincide with an acceleration in leadership turnover at the organization. David Binder, BAM's artistic director, announced in January 2023 that he would step down in July, after serving for four years — a much shorter tenure than that of his two predecessors, both of whom held the role for more than three decades each.

BAM's president Gina Duncan, who only took over in 2022, was the author of the memo which communicated cuts to staff members. One of Duncan's predecessors, Katy Clark, became embroiled in scandal when she retained ownership of her $1.9 million-dollar apartment — half of which was paid for by BAM — after leaving the job.

According to local union representative Megan Grann, 17 of the staff members who have lost their jobs were members of the union — and just three of them have been offered a new position at BAM.

"We are really just not happy with this development, to say the least," Grann told The New York Times. "Our primary goal right now is to try to mitigate the damage as much as possible.”

"These difficult decisions were made after a rigorous organizational review process," wrote BAM president Gina Duncan in her memo. "We cannot spend our way out of a deficit, and we cannot present programming beyond what we can afford."

"This is us putting on our oxygen mask so that we can continue to fulfill our promise to be a home for adventurous artists, audiences, and ideas," Duncan added.