Access singular expertise

THOMAS HALL, FOUNDER | MANAGING PARTNER

Tom is one of AHA’s founders and its managing partner. He is a nationally recognized arts leader and practioner and has overseen the firm’s practice since its inception. As AlbertHall&Associates’ Managing Partner, Tom oversees the firm's practice from its office in California. Prior to joining AHA, Tom had a distinguished career as an executive director and theatre producer with success across multiple disciplines at the national, state, and local levels. As Managing Director of the Tony Award-winning Old Globe Theatre, he oversaw its steady pattern of growth from a well-respected regional company to one of the nation's most influential nonprofit professional theatres. While with the Globe, he produced nearly 300 main stage productions, many of which transferred to leading regional theatres and Broadway. As a commercial producer, he was producer or associate producer of over a dozen plays and musicals on and off Broadway, on national tour, and in London's West End, including the international hit THE FULL MONTY.

As the Executive Producer of performing arts programming for San Diego’s Soviet Arts Festival - Treasures of the Soviet Union, Tom was responsible for curating, programming and producing works by the Moscow Circus, the first U.S. performances of Georgian Rezo Gabriadze's famed Tbilisi State Puppet Theatre and, the American premiere of the world-renowned Maly Drama Theatre’s epic production, BROTHERS AND SISTERS.

With Alberthall&Associates, Tom continues to engage in a broad practice as consultant, executive coach, teacher and leadership trainer. For two decades he has advised or recruited executives to many of America's leading theatres such as The Old Globe, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club, the Huntington Theatre, South Coast Repertory and The Public Theater, among many others. He has also had the pleasure of working with such renowned non theatrical companies as HBO Films, the Sundance Institute and the Redford Center. Over that same period, Tom has served the broader non-profit sector in California as a facilitator, trainer, and executive coach for the Fieldstone Leadership Network in Southern California.

In addition to his professional activities, Tom has served on many public boards and commissions, including three terms as President, and two as Vice President, of the League of Resident Theatres (LORT) and nine years as a member of the California Arts Council, three as its Chair. He has served on the Board of Governors of the San Diego Foundation. Tom has been a panel chair, panelist, and site visitor for the National Endowment for the Arts, the California Arts Council, and the San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture. On numerous occasions, He has testified before congress and state and local governments concerning arts policy, legislation and public sector funding. He often lectures on arts administration and labor relations at leading universities and law schools including, Duke University and the Yale School of Drama. He is also sought after as a speaker/presenter and planning consultant by many nonprofit organizations and service agencies, including Theatre Communications Group, Theatre Forward, TACA, the Calfiornia Arts Council and Fieldstone’s Crossroads board development program, to name a few.

Tom is an honors graduate from University of California and is certified by the Institute for Cultural Affairs (ICA-US) in Organizational Planning and Group Facilitation Practices, and by the Nonprofit Leadership Alliance in Equity and Nonprofit Organizational Success.

NAOMI GRABEL, SENIOR ASSOCIATE Marketing and Brand Strategy

Naomi has been a senior executive for a number of the world’s iconic performing arts organizations and is currently the Executive Director, Development Strategy and Growth for the Metropolitan Opera. Her prior executive experience includes working as Vice President of Marketing, Publicity, Sales and Education at Disney Theatrical Group, CEO of The Friends of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and Director of Marketing and Creative Services at Carnegie Hall where she oversaw that iconic institution’s advertising, licensing, e-strategy, brand management, publications development and retail operations.

From 2006 through 2008, Naomi was Director of Marketing & Development, for the Sydney Opera House. In that capacity she led a major re-branding project for the organization as well as launching the first-ever philanthropy program for Australia’s leading arts center. Prior to that tenure, she was the Vice President of Marketing and Communications for Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center. Other professional experience includes serving as Managing Director of Philadelphia’s Wilma Theater, Marketing Director of South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa, CA, and Director of Communications for Houston’s Alley Theater.

Naomi has served on peer review panels for the National Endowment of the Arts and the New Jersey State Arts Council, and was on the Executive Committees of the League of Resident Theatres and of the Greater Philadelphia Theatre Alliance. She presently serves on the President’s Advisory Council of the Penn Museum, on the Board of Directors for Doug Varone and Dancers where she chaired the strategic planning process, and is the Co-President of the League of Professional Theatre Women, an international service organization promoting visibility and opportunities for women in theatre.

She has been a guest-lecturer at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, NYU, Duke University, SMU and Texas A&M. Ms. Grabel is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama and the University of Pennsylvania.

KEN DENISON, SENIOR ASSOCIATE Production and Organizational Management

Having worked at senior levels for premiere commercial and nonprofit companies, Ken has exceptional abilities in executing production initiatives in highly complex settings. He currently serves the theatre sector as a highly successful producer and general manager in both non-profit and commercial settings. His experience as a senior manager for some of the country's premiere non-profit theatres and his commercial producing and management resume make him uniquely qualified to assist organizations find the best solutions to operational, production, and capital expansion issues.

Ken's work for such prestigious companies as Disney Theatrical Group, The Old Globe Theatre, Berkeley Repertory Theatre and WaxmanWilliams Entertainment, among others, gives him a breadth of training and experience shared by very few working in the field today. As the associate producer in charge of The Lion King for Disney, he mounted and managed productions of the Tony Award-winning hit musical on Broadway and in cities around the world. He served for nearly twenty years as the Director of Production for both the Globe and Berkeley Rep, maintaining financial and production oversight for over 250 productions in that capacity while simultaneously supervising plant operations and major capital projects. He has also had significant experience in site development, theatrical systems installations, and development of systematic interface between production, administrative, and financial functions in highly complex, multi-venue organizations.

A graduate of the Pacific Conservatory of Performing Arts with dual degrees in arts management and technical theatre, Ken also holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in arts management from Webster University. In addition to his consulting assignments on behalf of AHA clients, he maintains an active career in the commercial theatre as the owner of Aruba Productions, Inc. in New York City.

DONALD HALL, PROJECT ASSOCIATE Business and Systems Development

Don has over 35 years of experience in the entertainment, hospitality and transportation industries both as an executive and board member. He has successfully assisted countless non-profit and private sector companies meet the complex challenges associated with business and systems planning and execution. Don has held senior management positions with companies in the entertainment and hospitality field and chaired or served on countless non-profit boards in his efforts to assist and support nonprofit institutions in the fulfillment of their missions.

As Vice President/General Manager of Operations for Sea World of California, Don was the executive in charge of that company’s daily operations for over 25 years. He went on to become Vice President/General Manager of the Transportation Network, a large commercial transportation provider in Southern California, and had a highly successful career as a hotel management executive at a number of premiere properties.

Don’s expertise spans a broad spectrum of areas including operations, facilities design and management, business analysis/cost accounting, strategic planning, wage and salary administration and food and beverage and retail design and management. He has initiated, supervised and coordinated design and construction projects of facilities ranging in size from $1.5 to $400 million. He has worked with a wide range of clients in developing strategic and business plans, often designing and implementing sophisticated systems that serve to project future business on a daily and long-range basis. Don has a comprehensive background in complex entertainment environments and has participated in the development and supervision of “best use” studies for operational aspects of a broad spectrum of performance and entertainment entities.

Don studied business management at California State University, San Diego and is certified as a Worker’s Compensation Claims Administrator and in the media training program with Fleishman/Hillard of Chicago, IL. He has been active in non-profit policy and trusteeship either as a consultant or trustee on boards of such organizations as the YMCA, the San Diego Blood Bank Foundation, San Diego Hotel/Motel Association and the Mission Bay Master Plan and Oversight Committees, among others.

ZANNIE VOSS, OUTSIDE PROJECT CONSULTANT Research and Analytics

Zannie is Director of SMU DataArts as well as Chair and Professor of Arts Management and Arts Entrepreneurship in the Meadows School of the Arts and the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University. Prior to joining the SMU faculty, she was a Professor in the Department of Theater Studies and an Adjunct Professor in the Management Area of the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University, where she also served as Producing Director of Theater for Previews at Duke, a professional theatre company that specializes in developing and co-producing new works that go on to have a life either on Broadway or in other nonprofit professional theatres. 

Zannie serves as a site visitor and panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts and is a consultant for Theater Communications Group, co-authoring TCG’s Theatre Facts since 1998.  She holds an affiliate professorship at the Euromed School of Management in Marseille, France, and has published research in many prestigous journals including Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Academy of Management Journal, Organization Science, and International Journal of Arts Management, for which she serves on the editorial board. 

Zannie is the co-recipient of research grants awarded by the National Science Foundation, Marketing Science Institute, American Marketing Association Foundation, the Sheth Foundation, and the Aspen Institute, among others.