Drew McManus on the orchestra business.
For the past few years, one of the most popular items in the orchestra compensation reports is a big picture overview of all compensation alongside Total Expenditure figures. So if you’ve been looking for something that shows all of the report values in a single chart, this article is exactly what you’ve been looking for. 15 Year Trends Although the Orchestra Compensation Reports have been around since 2005 (which covered the …
Since the economic downturn, concertmaster compensation has failed to keep pace with executive and music director stakeholders and for the 2013/14 season, they were the only group to experience a decline in average compensation (-0.19 percent). Otherwise, the 2013/14 season didn’t witness any unusual items other than one positive note in the form of a new entry into the list of ensembles that report concertmaster compensation: the Kansas City Symphony. The Information …
If you were a music director (MD) during the 2013/14 season, odds are you generated pretty much the same amount of income as the previous season. Having said that, you may have also enjoyed one of the largest average increases in the past 15 years. Confused? Don’t worry, you should be as it was a very odd season for MD compensation. But first off, let’s cover some of the basic info …
When it comes to executive compensation, the 2013/14 season was the first in a while where a number of the traditionally highest paying executive positions which went unfilled for a number of years were finally occupied. As a result, this year’s reports produced a more realistic average compensation figure for this particular group of stakeholders. To that end, the average executive compensation increased at more than twice the rate of average …
As is the case with every annual orchestra compensation report, the most important element to keep in mind is these figures encompass the 2013/14 season and not the current season. Although it isn’t unusual to expect that the most recent figures available would cover the previous season, that’s not how things work thanks to a few key elements: Most professional orchestras maintain a fiscal year structure that begins and ends at …