Year: 2021

2021 Orchestra Compensation Reports: Executives

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When it comes to executive compensation, last year’s artificially low average change (-11.62%) was offset by an equally artificial increase (19.74%). Having said that, the two-season average falls right in line with historic norms to continue the upward trend. The Information In order to provide information that is as accurate as possible, info from the 2018/19 season is gathered from the following sources: Executive compensation figures were obtained from their respective orchestra’s IRS Form …

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2021 Orchestra Compensation Reports: Introduction

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If you had to summarize this year’s compensation report trends in a single word, it might be “whipsaw.” Last year’s reports saw anomalies in averages thanks to several high paying positions going unfilled or occupied by someone for a partial season. As a result, we saw more artificially lower averages than normal. Now that most of those positions have been filled, we’re seeing the opposite. Which Season The Information Covers (spoiler: …

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Colorado Springs Discord Continues

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The Colorado Springs Philharmonic Orchestra (CSPO) labor dispute continues with little change from where they were months ago. What this means is while other orchestras are tooling back up for performance activity and moving ahead, the CSPO continues to shrink in their rearview mirror. While both sides in the dispute remain in arbitration, there is no progress to report. What has changed is an increase in local attention where KKTV recently …

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Juilliard Students to Admin: We’re Not Gonna Take It

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Getting a music degree from a name brand conservatory or school of music is mind-numbingly expensive. Investing in this type of career carries more risk now than I can remember and given the amount of debt students absorb chasing those degrees, it wasn’t unusual to see them do the comparative math and opt to take a year off over the pandemic. Now that things are starting to get back up and …

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More On The Dynamic Impact Of COIVD

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Usually, these posts focus on how the pandemic generates dynamic expenses and considerations for the organization but today we’re going to focus on musicians; specifically, string musicians. This dynamic cost consideration is really more of a double-edged sword. On one hand, if a string musician was playing considerably less over the pandemic, the need for regular maintenance items like changing strings or getting bows rehaired has been lower. At the same …

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