Seattle playwright Paul Mullin has been weighing in on the Pay-for Play scandal within the Seattle’s arts community that was examined here on 5/4/2010 (and even earlier @ Scanning the Dial). To paraphrase Mullin’s perspective, the decision by larger arts orgs to buy into the pay-for-play model as embodied by King5’s New Day Northwest program is ultimately self defeating but it’s the small budget groups who will suffer the initial brunt of diminishing returns…
Month: May 2010
In Richardson, To Tell Or Not To Tell (Again)
The recent conductor rant from the Richardson Symphony Orchestra that was caught on tape has produced an intriguing comment thread. One item that caught my attention was the notion that the group has been wrestling with their cash flow issues for some time and the decision as to whether or not this should be brought to public attention is one of the reasons for discord. As it turns out, this very topic was the source for one of my blog posts back in November, 2004…
Music: The 4th Worst-Paying Degree You Can Earn
Not exactly prime material for college recruiting material, is it? Nonetheless, this is precisely the news delivered by Charles Purdy, Yahoo! HotJobs senior editor, in an article that presents the ten worst-paying college degrees. Although the report doesn’t acknowledge precisely which music careers are encompassed in the categorization, it’s a strong bet that “instrumental performance” is a part of it…
The Sound Of Fury
Have you ever wondered what labor trouble sounds like? Anyone in this business long enough likely has a story or two of inappropriate public behavior and/or actions on part of musicians and managers alike but these sorts of things usually remain in-house. But in the digital age you can bring the indoors out and that’s precisely what happened in the Richardson Symphony Orchestra as music director, Anshel Brusilow, was captured in an audio recording allegedly using rehearsal time to chastise the musicians and call one player out in particular over a labor action…
Coattail Advertising: Good Or Bad?
Brian Sacawa posted an intriguing piece at his Sound Directions blog on 5/4/2010 about a Cleveland Orchestra radio spot for a Carmina Burana performance that ties directly into the Cleveland Cavaliers playoff bid. Sacawa wonders if this sort of coattail advertisement is ultimately worthwhile via a thorough and thought provoking piece…