Following up on this diary a few weeks back, about the contract settlement at the Minnesota Orchestra between musicians and management, the musicians formally got back to business with the first official concerts of the truncated season last night, at the newly refurbished Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis. Per this article from Graydon Royce in the Star-Tribune, the orchestra's principal trombone, Douglas Wright, put it succinctly:
“Ladies and gentlemen, we’re back.”
You can imagine the audience reaction. Of course, in a situation like this, the concert is the easy part. The hard work is all the behind-the-scenes dynamic, which is pretty poisoned now, to put it mildly. But maybe there are flickerings of, if not hope, at least mildly constructive change. More below the flip.....
One key change is the election of a new board chairman for the Minnesota Orchestra Association, Gordon Sprenger, age 76, the retired CEO of Allina Health Systems. Obviously with his diplomat hat on, Sprenger's remarks to the audience included, per Royce:
“We need to forge a partnership among the musicians, the board and the entire community. The hall is full tonight, and that’s the way it needs to be.”
Royce had
this article from last Friday where he quoted Sprenger:
"My style is to engage people. I am going to meet with musicians next week to see how we can collaborate — what areas they have interest in.”
Yes, it's pretty anodyne, but relative calm is what's needed now.
Regarding the hall itself, the review of the concert by Larry Fuchsberg noted that:
"Lobbies are spacious; restrooms have proliferated; seats are wider (reflecting the growth of the American torso since 1974); people with disabilities are suitably accommodated."
All the
Star-Tribune articles have waxed eloquent on the apparent preservation of Orchestra Hall's high-quality acoustics, which even the
NYT's James R. Oestreich noted in
his review (quite a sign of importance of this story that the
NYT sent Oestreich to review this concert):
"Orchestra Hall has always been considered an acoustically excellent hall, at least for audiences, but some players have said they had a hard time hearing one another across the stage."
Actually, for those here who live in the Twin Cities, sorry to burst your bubble (not to mention those at the
Star-Tribune), but from the two times I've been to Orchestra Hall, Minneapolis, it was not that good a hall acoustically, OK, but nothing great. The middle frequencies sounded like the equivalent of middle-age spread, which was a similar impression that I had of NYC's Avery Fisher Hall back in the 1990's. Even from listening to a few of the Minnesota Orchestra's Beethoven symphony recordings with their former music director, Osmo Vänskä, the sound seemed slightly distant, and rather lacking in richness, almost as if the engineers were deliberately placing the microphones to deal with the inadequacies of the hall. Granted, that's normally in any orchestra recording, but it seemed more so with those. But 3CM digresses, as usual. Hopefully the renovations have indeed improved the sound. If I ever get back to hearing an orchestra concert there, will note any differences.
One feature of the very start of the concert was how the orchestra arrived on stage, as Oestreich noted:
'"Along with the music came a couple of obvious symbols of unity. At the start, the players took the stage European-style, as a unit rather than individually, and were greeted with a full-minute standing ovation."
However, it has to be noted that not all the musicians on stage were members of the orchestra at the time the lockout began, again per Oestreich:
"Of the 83 players on stage, only 50 were full-time members of the orchestra (the other 27 members being widely dispersed, fulfilling engagements taken on during the lockout); 33 were substitutes, from the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and elsewhere."
One other major factor in the whole Minnesota Orchestra story is the question of what will happen regarding Vänskä and his relationship with the orchestra, now that he is no longer music director. Public sentiment is pretty obvious, again per Oestreich, before Sprenger could address the audience just after intermission:
"But before [Sprenger] could speak some cries rang out from the audience, 'Bring back Osmo,' drawing loud applause. 'We are addressing it,' Mr. Sprenger said, to more applause."
According to Royce, Sprenger said just a bit more than that:
"We appreciate that, we understand that and we are addressing that."
On the "Osmo question",
this Star-Tribune blog post noted that:
"Vanska reportedly still has his residence in Minneapolis, but he has been guest-conducting all over, with recent stops in Lyon, France and at the San Francisco Symphony."
A random comment on another blog (the blog of the worst writer in classical music, with the initials NL) indicated that Vänskä has "other reasons" for wanting to keep ties to Minneapolis. For the record, his marriage broke up during his time in Minnesota, but presumably Vänskä has moved on, hence the "other reasons". But that aside, Vänskä is a highly respected conductor and can easily rack up the frequent-flyer miles as a guest conductor with orchestras all over the world. For example, he's a pretty regular guest conductor with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and I could easily imagine the LPO choosing him as their next principal conductor if they wanted to move on from the current principal conductor, Vladimir Jurowski. (No sign of that this time, though, the attempts by the gossip-mongering sleazebag NL to stir the pot aside.)
The other long-term concern is how relations between the musicians and management will play out long-term, of course. This situation is not unique to Minnesota, given the current overall hostility towards unions, as noted by Stephen Paulson, principal bassoon of the San Francisco Symphony, in this long article from San Francisco Classical Voice that reflects on the Minnesota Orchestra situation:
"As a friend of mine put it very well, 'when did we become the fat that needs to be trimmed?' I fear there's a philosophical thing going on that’s anti-union and anti-musician. It's just fashionable now. I don't see why these people [management], who are all reasonable and progressive, would buy into this Tea Party-like philosophy. I just don't understand it. I know these people; I like these people."
The public face of that TP-like philosophy, besides past board chairman Jon Campbell and lead negotiator Richard Davis, has been Michael Henson, the UK-born executive director of the orchestra:
"The animus against Henson was not merely his perceived abrasive and condescending management style but the feeling he had demonized musicians to the press."
Henson's past job included heading the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra in the UK, where, among other things, he disbanded the highly respected chamber orchestra within that orchestra, the Bournemouth Sinfonietta. Reports generally say that he hasn't been as visible publicly since the settlement of the dispute, although there's this one remark in Mark MacNamara's
SFCV article, on the question of a "lesser, more commercial orchestra":
"But a great orchestra is about practical music and it’s also about a great orchestra being adaptive."
One wonders what "practical music" means, unless it's just the most popular works all the time, with nothing new or remotely unfamiliar. Or movie soundtracks or pops, which, John Williams or Golden Age of Hollywood aside, aren't the meatiest fare. But even something like the recent Beethoven Festival with the St. Louis Symphony didn't fill the hall completely, even with iconic works like the Symphony No. 5.
MacNamara cites a book by Robert J. Flanagan, The Perilous Life of Symphony Orchestras: Artistic Triumphs and Economic Challenges (which I've not read, but I'm starting to think that I should), where he paraphrases Flanagan:
"His thesis is that what inevitably kills orchestras is not only declining audiences but the inevitability of 'cost disease.' In sum, performance revenues can never keep pace with performance expenses, partly because there’s no real downward pressure on expenses from productivity. As a result, orchestras are inevitably limited by boutique economies that reflect the nature of a particular place, less the laws of supply and demand.
Then throw in a Great Recession, such as in 2008, which drains endowments as well as ticket revenue, and disaster is inevitable. Referring to the 25 percent increase promised by the board to Minnesota orchestra musicians in 2007 (phased in over the contract’s four-year span), Flanagan noted, 'the people who pushed that through are as responsible for the problem facing the orchestra as the people now asking for a raise.'.
His advice is that while boards should be careful in deciding what they can afford, musicians should be careful in thinking in terms of comparable compensation. And so boards must master 'the art of living with deficits' and musicians must 'learn to live with the luck of where you’re located.' Neither side should get locked into a sense of entitlement.
That seems to have been a great part of the drama in Minnesota. Musicians felt entitled, or had earned, the right to be compensated among the top 10 orchestras in the country; Henson felt he was entitled to his $202,000 bonus for 2011 and 2012; and the people of Minneapolis felt entitled to high quality music at about the ticket price they were used to."
I'll admit that I'm struggling with completely understanding the phrase about "no downward pressure on expenses from productivity". I suppose this is something like a situation where even if the orchestra gives a spectacularly well-played concert, but the hall is only half-full, the musician's pay doesn't go down as a result. In other words, unlike bands that play clubs, the orchestra's pay doesn't depend on box office intake. Yet from a quick Google Books search that pulls up Flanagan's book, Flanagan notes at the start:
"....no orchestra in the world earns enough to cover its operating expenses; no orchestra is self-supporting. Instead, orchestras around the world face common economic challenges with different sources of nonperformance income."
Just to indicate what we as a nation value,
this MinnPost profile of Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, the conductor for the Minnesota Orchestra concerts this weekend, commented on the new stadium for the Minnesota Vikings compared to the travails of the orchestra:
“Almost a billion will be spent on the stadium. In comparison, all they needed at the orchestra was $6 million. Art goes by the wayside.”
"Stan", as he is affectionately called by orchestra fans in Minneapolis, waxed a bit nostalgic about "the good old days" also, with maybe a hint of rose-tinted glasses:
"He recalled influential board members of the past: Kenneth Dayton, John Pillsbury, Jr., Charles Bellows, all gone. The lockout wouldn’t have happened were they still in charge, he said.....
'I remember saying to one of the gentlemen from the newspaper three years ago when there was news of the renovation of the hall, ‘This can be dangerous. They should have money for musicians, not for renovation.’ You see, for people like Ken Dayton and me and others, the hall was supposed to be a temple of music, a temple of meditation, of spiritual experience. The outer parts, like the lobby, were unimportant. I remember Ken saying, ‘From the outside it looks like a factory or a school. It’s gray. But when you open the inner door, there suddenly is this wonderful, brilliant hall. Everything changes – spirit and everything.’ This was the idea and I carried it with me. Every time I entered the building, through the lobby or backstage, it seemed bleak and not nice. But that was unimportant, because then I would open the door and walk into the temple. That’s why I said this renovation could be dangerous.”
I would actually respectfully dissent from Maestro Skrowaczewski on the point that the building isn't so important. Having a good physical working environment helps greatly with work productivity, in whatever area you're in, when aesthetics can be factored in. (Obviously if you're working outdoors or underground, for example, this isn't an issue.) And by the accounts I've read, Orchestra Hall was badly in need of renovation and revamping. But there is the question that I've posed often: why couldn't the energy and fund-raising put in to the hall be applied equally to the endowment, and to musicians' salaries? The answer is probably partly in the quote from Stephen Paulson earlier, but also, I suspect, because it's easier for a wealthy donor to put his/her name on a building, in a more public sense, compared to endowing a principal chair in an orchestra. Buildings vs. people, it seems.
For now, at least, as Oestreich put it:
"But the point of the evening was to celebrate the orchestra as a whole, and to all, welcome back indeed."
Oestreich did add a quick "postscript":
"And oh, yes, bring back Osmo."
We'll see what happens there, and elsewhere.
With that, if you've made it this far, feel free to talk about this subject, or otherwise indulge the usual SNLC protocol.......