It’s Share Your Favorite Music Librarian Anecdote Day

Adaptistration People 208Over the past few days, I’ve had several mutually exclusive conversations with colleagues about music librarians. In each instance, we exchanged anecdotes where a well-trained and experienced music librarian saved the day.

By saved the day, I mean the librarian either prevented a major performance related disaster, saved the organization fistfuls of dollars, or accomplished something of profound artistic accomplishment.

Each of the conversations was uplifting in its own way so I wanted to invite readers to leave a comment about a time in your career where a music librarian made a positive difference.

About Drew McManus

"I hear that every time you show up to work with an orchestra, people get fired." Those were the first words out of an executive's mouth after her board chair introduced us. That executive is now a dear colleague and friend but the day that consulting contract began with her orchestra, she was convinced I was a hatchet-man brought in by the board to clean house.

I understand where the trepidation comes from as a great deal of my consulting and technology provider work for arts organizations involves due diligence, separating fact from fiction, interpreting spin, as well as performance review and oversight. So yes, sometimes that work results in one or two individuals "aggressively embracing career change" but far more often than not, it reinforces and clarifies exactly what works and why.

In short, it doesn't matter if you know where all the bodies are buried if you can't keep your own clients out of the ground, and I'm fortunate enough to say that for more than 15 years, I've done exactly that for groups of all budget size from Qatar to Kathmandu.

For fun, I write a daily blog about the orchestra business, provide a platform for arts insiders to speak their mind, keep track of what people in this business get paid, help write a satirical cartoon about orchestra life, hack the arts, and love a good coffee drink.

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