After Yo-Yo Ma's plea, Point Counterpoint II, Louis Kahn floating concert hall, may be saved after all

It is unclear where the funding for this project would come from. The asking price for Point Counterpoint II is currently at $2 million, shipping not included. This price point is nearly 5 percent of Kingston's annual budget and although the town's mayor has expressed interest in helping to make this happen, additional funding will need to come elsewhere.1

Now, after the eminent cellist Yo-Yo Ma made a passionate plea to save the 41-year-old vessel from being shipped to a Louisiana scrap yard, it could be going elsewhere — to a New York state artists' haven, about 90 miles north of Manhattan, that just hosted two Bob Dylan concerts and is home to a maritime museum.

Officials and activists in the Hudson River town of Kingston, N.Y., plan to meet with the boat's owner Aug. 4 to discuss the possibility of transporting the vessel there from its current berth on the Illinois River in Ottawa, Ill. Late last month, musicians performed aboard the boat in the town, some 80 miles southwest of Chicago.

"We think this could be a great opportunity, one more reason why people would come to Kingston," the town's mayor, Steve Noble, said in a telephone interview Tuesday. "I am excited to meet with them in August to figure out how best we can help."

"Help" will definitely involve raising money: The boat's owner, Robert Boudreau, is asking for $2 million — nearly 5 percent of Kingston's annual budget, the mayor acknowledged. To buy the boat and have it towed to Kingston, the town of roughly 24,000 people will almost surely need grants from foundations or gifts from "angel" philanthropists.

Boudreau is hopeful such manna will fall from heaven.