This is only going to make me mad . . . but it doesn't take just time to ruin a perfectly great orchestra. It takes mismanagement on all levels. The orchestra either knew it was going to have to declare bankruptcy a long time ago, in which case it was foolish of them not to raise money a lot sooner (and no doubt this came up in their search for a new music director and probably informed why they wound up with Yannick Nezet-Seguin, who is a fine conductor but the Philadelphians should have been able to do better). The Orchestra, for example, plays several times a year at Carnegie but makes no effort to raise money in New York, even as the Met Opera has no problem advertising itself in the form of nationwide radio and film broadcasts. Or, it's bad faith as some of the musicians suggest. (The Orchestra has an endowment in the hundreds of millions but there's debate about how much can be spent.)
At the same time, the musicians are bemoaning the orchestra's tactics while at the same time trying to get jobs with the other major orchestras in the country. The New York Philharmonic -- a weaker orchestra in a hall that's actually worse than Verizon -- grabbed the first clarinetist recently. Speaking of the hall, the Kimmel Center no doubt has a lot of nerve charging high rent for a space that's acoustically lousy and not all that pleasant to hang out in. Lincoln Center's renovations were expensive, but no doubt worth it, even if it means putting [redacted for politics] on a building.
It's also difficult with waning public interest, though that argument only goes so far. There's always a balance between playing traditional music that will please the blue-hairs and some avant garde stuff that will get people in the door. Pieces that split the difference, like a Strauss tone poem, wind up over played. But Philadelphia is a larger metropolitan area than Boston, for instance,which has a major orchestra, not to mention the next tier American orchestras in places like St. Louis and Minnesota. It's also a major college and university town. There is no excuse not to be able to fill seats -- fiddle with prices, programming, whatever. All of the demographic and institutional resources are there to make money.
Though, having said that, it's a little late in the game to bemoan this. The fact we as a culture have so devalued music education -- or made music education so arrogant as to be irrelevant -- makes the decline of orchestras all but inevitable. Alex Ross in the New Yorker has some good thoughts on this, even if he is a little hard on those who might not want too much 12-tone and about zero minimalism.
I guess they had a good run. Maybe chapter 7 that thing and let something else come along, hire a smaller number of musicians, and update the sound a little bit (the Philadelphians can go a little on the strings, which is great for Tchaikovsky but not good for anything earlier than Beethoven or later than Ravel). The orchestra died a long time ago; the only thing that is still alive is the music.
What a mess! I got a small subscription this year. I'm 38, and whenever I go, I look for people my age or younger. I usually find about ten such people. Is this happening in other cities? If so, is Philly the canary in the mine -- an expensive orchestra in an expensive hall playing beautiful music that no one will come to hear? Or is Philly in a uniquely bad spot: a "big five" orchestra -- and therefore one that highly compensates its players -- stuck in an expensive hall, but in a market that while demographically big just isn't interested in its orchestra anymore? Sure, as the writer of the article notes, Philly is a bigger metropolitan center by population than Boston, but who populates those populations, and what kind of support are they giving their top orchestra? Seems to me Seattle, Nashville, and Minnesota survive: places where the novelty of having great orchestras points toward the future, whereas in Philly notions of the orchestra point to a great but fading past, something your grandparents were interested in?
I would think the Cleveland Orchestra would be the most similar comparison to Philly's, but I don't know how Cleveland is doing. Anyone?
I don't see Philly going Chapter 7 with that much money in the endowment.
Cleveland has an annual residency in Miami and stronger ties to Europe, but it has very similar problems with deficits, falling endowments, labor trouble, and falling subscriptions. The George Szell recordings also hold up a bit better than Ormandy's, though. Welser-Most is solid but uninspiring. The Cleveland Orchestra doesn't renew his contract as they recently did if they are planning on major growth or a dive into new programming. I saw him at Carnegie this year and he seemed excessively pleased with himself for programming Bartok. At the same time, the Philadelphia Orchestra has had to cancel tours recently, for financial reasons. There's at least some institutional stability in Cleveland that's lacking in Philadelphia, and Boston, and probably Chicago given Riccardo Muti's health. The latter two orchestras were able to weather drops in subscriptions with increases in single ticket sales -- though a new Music Director and James Levine's occasional bouts of good health played a role. Dutoit just isn't a draw, especially when the Philly Orchestra wouldn't give him the Music Director title, which amounts to announcing "don't bother with this guy."
(I have nothing but respect for Dutoit, though, as he successfully banged Martha Argerich in her prime, and I sang in a chorus doing Beethoven's 9th, Bernstein's Chichester Psalms, and the Carmina Burana with him conducting. He sort of assumes musicians know where the downbeat is, though, which is tricky with respect to pianists-turned-choristers who are not accustomed to being silent for upwards of 20 measures at a time.)
[Title revised since initial publication because I was too stupid to figure out the right title the first time.]
ReplyDeleteThis is only going to make me mad . . . but it doesn't take just time to ruin a perfectly great orchestra. It takes mismanagement on all levels. The orchestra either knew it was going to have to declare bankruptcy a long time ago, in which case it was foolish of them not to raise money a lot sooner (and no doubt this came up in their search for a new music director and probably informed why they wound up with Yannick Nezet-Seguin, who is a fine conductor but the Philadelphians should have been able to do better). The Orchestra, for example, plays several times a year at Carnegie but makes no effort to raise money in New York, even as the Met Opera has no problem advertising itself in the form of nationwide radio and film broadcasts. Or, it's bad faith as some of the musicians suggest. (The Orchestra has an endowment in the hundreds of millions but there's debate about how much can be spent.)
ReplyDeleteAt the same time, the musicians are bemoaning the orchestra's tactics while at the same time trying to get jobs with the other major orchestras in the country. The New York Philharmonic -- a weaker orchestra in a hall that's actually worse than Verizon -- grabbed the first clarinetist recently. Speaking of the hall, the Kimmel Center no doubt has a lot of nerve charging high rent for a space that's acoustically lousy and not all that pleasant to hang out in. Lincoln Center's renovations were expensive, but no doubt worth it, even if it means putting [redacted for politics] on a building.
It's also difficult with waning public interest, though that argument only goes so far. There's always a balance between playing traditional music that will please the blue-hairs and some avant garde stuff that will get people in the door. Pieces that split the difference, like a Strauss tone poem, wind up over played. But Philadelphia is a larger metropolitan area than Boston, for instance,which has a major orchestra, not to mention the next tier American orchestras in places like St. Louis and Minnesota. It's also a major college and university town. There is no excuse not to be able to fill seats -- fiddle with prices, programming, whatever. All of the demographic and institutional resources are there to make money.
Though, having said that, it's a little late in the game to bemoan this. The fact we as a culture have so devalued music education -- or made music education so arrogant as to be irrelevant -- makes the decline of orchestras all but inevitable. Alex Ross in the New Yorker has some good thoughts on this, even if he is a little hard on those who might not want too much 12-tone and about zero minimalism.
I guess they had a good run. Maybe chapter 7 that thing and let something else come along, hire a smaller number of musicians, and update the sound a little bit (the Philadelphians can go a little on the strings, which is great for Tchaikovsky but not good for anything earlier than Beethoven or later than Ravel). The orchestra died a long time ago; the only thing that is still alive is the music.
da capo al fine.
What a mess! I got a small subscription this year. I'm 38, and whenever I go, I look for people my age or younger. I usually find about ten such people. Is this happening in other cities? If so, is Philly the canary in the mine -- an expensive orchestra in an expensive hall playing beautiful music that no one will come to hear? Or is Philly in a uniquely bad spot: a "big five" orchestra -- and therefore one that
ReplyDeletehighly compensates its players -- stuck in an expensive hall, but in a market that while demographically big just isn't interested in its orchestra anymore? Sure, as the writer of the article notes, Philly is a bigger metropolitan center by population than Boston, but who populates those populations, and what kind of support are they giving their top orchestra? Seems to me Seattle, Nashville, and Minnesota survive: places where the novelty of having great orchestras points toward the future, whereas in Philly notions of the orchestra point to a great but fading past, something your grandparents were interested in?
I would think the Cleveland Orchestra would be the most similar comparison to Philly's, but I don't know how Cleveland is doing. Anyone?
I don't see Philly going Chapter 7 with that much money in the endowment.
Cleveland has an annual residency in Miami and stronger ties to Europe, but it has very similar problems with deficits, falling endowments, labor trouble, and falling subscriptions. The George Szell recordings also hold up a bit better than Ormandy's, though. Welser-Most is solid but uninspiring. The Cleveland Orchestra doesn't renew his contract as they recently did if they are planning on major growth or a dive into new programming. I saw him at Carnegie this year and he seemed excessively pleased with himself for programming Bartok. At the same time, the Philadelphia Orchestra has had to cancel tours recently, for financial reasons. There's at least some institutional stability in Cleveland that's lacking in Philadelphia, and Boston, and probably Chicago given Riccardo Muti's health. The latter two orchestras were able to weather drops in subscriptions with increases in single ticket sales -- though a new Music Director and James Levine's occasional bouts of good health played a role. Dutoit just isn't a draw, especially when the Philly Orchestra wouldn't give him the Music Director title, which amounts to announcing "don't bother with this guy."
ReplyDelete(I have nothing but respect for Dutoit, though, as he successfully banged Martha Argerich in her prime, and I sang in a chorus doing Beethoven's 9th, Bernstein's Chichester Psalms, and the Carmina Burana with him conducting. He sort of assumes musicians know where the downbeat is, though, which is tricky with respect to pianists-turned-choristers who are not accustomed to being silent for upwards of 20 measures at a time.)