The Ridge Address: A Warning-Response Opportunity

It is well-known that there is tension between many musicians and the League of American Orchestras, so let’s talk about it. I actually have a slightly different viewpoint. I think the field needs the League, but we also need the League to change. We need the League to use its resources in developing positive messaging. There is a seemingly instinctive negativity that comes from the League at times, and it is being noticed by some of its own members. The League relies on the collection of $1.9 million in dues money to survive, and to pay considerable salaries to its upper staff. This year, one ICSOM orchestra left the League, citing the “dispiriting” rhetoric that emanates from the League. There are other managers who have privately expressed this same thought. I feel that the League must address its image problem, for if it was to fail, imagine the negative press then. The media instinctively covers the negative story, and if the League fails it would be perceived as a death knell for all symphonic music. It wouldn’t be, of course but it would be perceived that way.

I have done a lot of work for the League though, certainly as much as any other sitting ICSOM Chair. I have spoken at League conferences, served on the faculty for many training sessions, and I’ve met regularly with the leadership. This year, I will again attend the League conference, even though I have expressed my concern to the leadership of the League that their programming may be viewed as negative by musicians, and that the chasm may well widen.

Many wonderful people work at the League, but the League must become an organization that more effectively uses its resources for advocacy.

I recognize the difficulty inherent in that though….I really do. For example, when a board member of the League makes very public and damaging statements, particularly in a published editorial about how a specific orchestra is unsustainable, terrible harm is done to the field, to that orchestra, to that community, and to relationships throughout all areas of the industry. The leadership of the League must speak out against such destructiveness, and when they do not it weakens the organization in the eyes of musicians and managers alike.

I understand the difficulty of such decisions, and such statements. As ICSOM Chair, I once had to make a very difficult decision about a legendary figure who found himself in a situation that was not acceptable to the ICSOM Governing Board. It was heartbreaking, as this legendary person did more to elevate the lives of symphonic musicians that any other person in the past 50 years. It was a devastating personal decision for me, so powerful that it seriously damaged my health for a two year period. I understand how hard it is to make the difficult decisions, and to issue the controversial statements. But that is what leadership is all about. And if the League wants to be a leader in our field, it can no longer stand by in silence and then claim to not understand why musicians and managers alike find the organization “dispiriting.”

Musicians have willingly entered the room for a partnership, only to find themselves a little singed in the process. I think the whole field had hope for the Collaborative Data Project, which brought ICSOM, ROPA and the AFM into an effort to work with the League to develop a shared data set, as it has long been recognized that the numbers collected by the field for analysis are inconsistent at best. But instead, the numbers we were studying were given to a researcher who has produced damaging documentation based on imprecise data that has been used against musicians. This type of action is not positive, and this is not collaboration.

It brings me no pleasure to issue criticism of anyone, but our field is facing challenges and we must stop doing this to ourselves. In fact, in my writings I have called on musicians to avoid casting aspersions towards the League, and I have asked the League to issue similar statements to its members about the way they regard their musicians. While I’ve yet to hear my public appeal matched, I remain hopeful.

Still, I would much rather talk about solutions, and I will, but we can’t identify the solutions without first identifying the problems.

Right now, at this very moment, there are orchestra managements preparing their organizations for extended and unnecessary work stoppages. One in particular will be prominently in the press as early as this fall, but I don’t want to name the organization as I have hope that the management will avoid this destructive path. There is still time. But resources spent in this direction are also resources that could be spent promoting their organization.

Think of the damage done to the image of orchestras in the mind of an American citizen, struggling in the recession to care for his or her family, as they read that the Philadelphia Orchestra will spend over $10 million to go through the bankruptcy process. Imagine how that money could be invested in the community. But in this field, it seems there is always money for lawyers. Further, imagine the damage when that same citizen reads that the CEO of a bankrupt orchestra has received a substantial personal salary settlement, which newspaper reports indicate includes a personal financial planner.

Another manager has challenged the jurisdiction of national media contracts, appealing their lost case numerous times and spending who knows how much in legal fees. That money could have funded multiple projects that would have elevated the organization in the mind of the local and international community. Instead, money raised from donors has gone to lawyers.

It is, in a word, outrageous.

Still, some in this room might be wondering how I can overlook the recent bankruptcies in Syracuse and Louisville. The musicians of Syracuse will accomplish what their former management could not, and I have no doubt an orchestra will re-emerge. Louisville is maybe a little different I suppose, because what has been done to the community and the musicians there is even uglier.

In Louisville, an orchestra that has commissioned 120 original compositions and performed over 400 world premieres which served to spread the music of America across the globe is currently functioning as an organization that employs no musicians. It is an orchestra built by the people, and led at its founding by a mayor who believed in the concept of Confucianism that said that a city of high culture with happy citizens will attract wealth, business and power to the city. But now, this historic orchestra looks for musicians on Craigslist and through Facebook ads.

There is not merely one reason for these bankruptcies that can be applied to the entire field. The circumstances are quite different, and in the case of Philadelphia, if you follow a bad real estate deal with an extended period of time without a music director, a CEO, or a board chair, well, can there be any surprise that your organization might get into trouble?

But the negative rhetoric leads to stories that depict a mosaic of failure straight across the heart of America, a tornado traveling I-40 or I-70.

It just isn’t true.

What are the solutions? How do we change to preserve the legacy of great music? How do we continue to help educate the next generation of Americans while enhancing the business environment of our cities and elevating the spirits of audiences everywhere.

Well, first we must articulate that we do, in fact, do all of those things!

As ICSOM led at its founding, we intend to lead again into a new era of positive advocacy. To musicians everywhere, I call on you to join us in our positive message of advocacy. It is not enough to simply play your instrument. You must be among your audience, out in the lobby of your concert hall. Shake the hands of your audiences, thank your donors, and welcome them into an environment of community that surrounds every orchestra.

It surely must be clear to musicians by now that no one is going to do this for us. It has been the dedication of the musicians in Honolulu that has led to new orchestral performances in Hawaii. It is the musicians of the former Syracuse Symphony that are keeping the music and the hope alive in Central New York. This is our mission, and we must join together as never before, because something precious is at stake.

To the students of the music school who are here today, I especially ask you to join us. You are the future, and you are not going into a dying field. As you study to be accomplished instrumentalists, you must learn the message of advocacy as well. You must answer the negative messages in our newspapers about the future of orchestras with the truth of what you see. You must tell the story of how music changed your life, of how you have seen it touch other lives, and how communities are forever changed for the better by the presence of a great orchestra.

Should we fail to engage in this effort to tell the real truth, then we are allowing others to define us. It is now officially the job of musicians to introduce themselves to their communities, or they soon might find themselves demonized as the musicians in Louisville have.

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