Orchestras commonly draw on endowments and investments which account for a significant share of their total income. In 1965, the Ford Foundation gave a grant of 80.2 million dollars to 61 U.S. orchestras as a matching grant. An audience survey is done on the premises of a production, for example, at a theater. The people attending are interested in a particular type of the performing arts. We would measure such things as age, gender, occupation, education, income level, an d race to get a specific view of the audience, the centralized tendencies of those attending, their tastes and preferences, and the circumstances of their visit.
Audiences differ from place to place.
This type of survey is important in understanding the audience for reasons such as knowing how to price tickets and who to target for advertising. This type of survey is important to conduct as the people who attend live performances constitute only a sub-group of art appreciators. Yet it is very expensive. This survey gives a broad view of the population and the tendencies of those who appreciate the arts to aid in the formation of public policy. These types of surveys are extremely useful to many different groups of people.