A recent article in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review by Mark Kanny reports that the Pittsburgh Symphony president, Larry Tamburri as making the following remarks: “A basic flaw in the economic model of American orchestras compared with most other businesses, says Tamburri, is that productivity increases in music are not possible to compensate for inflationary pressures on

I recently had a conversation with Lois Svard, pianist, academic, champion of new music, and creativity guru, about the work she’s engaged in at Innovera.  Innovera is a consulting firm that specializes in helping businesses and organizations learn how to access their own potential for creativity and innovation, thus improving not only individual and group

I was very pleased to receive an email from none other than Adrian Ellis, the gentleman responsible for the quote I scrutinized line by line in my article Diminished Philosophy.  He ran across the article via a regular web search and felt compelled to write in order to further explain his views. We had a

I had the good fortune to spend some of my recent time in New York City to pay a quick visit to the offices of the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and chat with their executive director, Marianne Lockwood.

The train ride back to Baltimore yesterday provided me some ample time to reflect on what happened during the Soundcheck program yesterday with John Schaefer. One of the strongest impressions I came away with was how broad based the callers were.  I was fully expecting the vast majority of callers to be professional classically trained

I published an article today at The Partial Observer which examines the Concert Companion and ORBIT programs in a different light than managerial point of view taken here a few weeks ago (part 1 and part 2). However, added to the mix this time around are some of the recent accomplishments of the successful tsoundcheck

Drama seems to be the status quo in Philadelphia these past months.  Yesterday, the musicians and management agreed to extend the recent contract negotiation extension another 10 days. Philadelphia Inquirer critic and columnist Peter Dobrin has been doing a great job keeping everyone informed of events over the past few days.  One of his recent

Last Monday evening, the 18th, I found myself listening to a live radio broadcast of the Milwaukee Symphony performing Mahler 1.  I have to say that it was a fantastic concert; the interpretation was poignant, the strings were tight, and the wind solos were superb.  Even the sound mixing was excellent; it was obvious that