Stick a fork in it?
February 3, 2010 In: UncategorizedAnn Midgette of the Washington Post writes about the current state of the classical CD business. It’s not good: The dirty secret of the Billboard classical charts is that album sales figures are so low, the charts are almost meaningless. Sales of 200 or 300 units are enough to land an album in the top […]
The Cleveland Orchestra strike: underlying issues
February 2, 2010 In: UncategorizedA shared vision On February 2, 2005, Gary Hanson (ED/TCO) paid a visit to the storied offices of the AFM at 1501 Broadway in the heart of NY’s theater district. TCO was in town, set to play Carnegie Hall that evening. Hanson was clearly asking the AFM for forgiveness rather than permission – the meeting […]
An Orchestra Fantasy Camp–What A Great Idea
February 1, 2010 In: UncategorizedFantasy camps for adults have been popular for years—auto racing, cooking, all types of sports, you name it. For music there are camps for cabaret singers and jazz musicians, and now one for those who want to experience orchestral music-making. The article that follows below tells how the Baltimore Symphony and their Music Director, Marin […]
Seattle settles
In: UncategorizedSeattle Symphony management and musicians have reached a tentative agreement: The 23-month, three-season contract — which could be extended for an additional eight months — would immediately cut musicians’ pay by 5 percent until the end of this season, with the current pay scale resuming in 2011. Musicians also would pay a greater share of […]
How AFM members can help in Haiti
January 27, 2010 In: UncategorizedUnionPrivilege, which is a benefits program run by the AFL-CIO for members of its member unions, is matching contributions made by union members for earthquake relief. Details are here.
Reboot in New Hampshire
In: UncategorizedApparently the New Hampshire Music Festival is doing a pretty thorough 180-degree turn: Less than two weeks after abandoning pursuit of a new artistic vision and restructured orchestra, which sparked bitter controversy last summer, the Board of the NH Music Festival shuffled directors and management when it met last week.
A tiny perfect strike
January 25, 2010 In: UncategorizedIt was a tiny perfect strike. (Torontonians and expat Gary Hanson will get the reference. The rest of you can Google David Crombie.)
Learning From The NFL
In: UncategorizedThere’s a music blog on ArtJournal.com called Creative Destruction, but no author is indicated. Instead this descriptor appears under the link, “Fresh ideas on building arts communities.” I was curious so I checked it out and found that the blogger is John Thomas Dodson. He’s a conductor. You can find out more about him here. […]
An unhappy customer
January 24, 2010 In: UncategorizedA left-leaning political blogger in Philadelphia, age 37, is not happy with his concert-going experience: I go to about half a dozen concerts per year, and the problems the orchestra faces are pretty obvious to me. Their marketing is horrible, their ushers and ticket sellers treat people like crap (not all, of course, but many), […]