Reader Response: BSO Keeps Union Away

After reading the article from Monday, March 21st, Cleveland Orchestra musician, Henry Peyrebrune, took the time to share an interesting observation about what he read from the article regarding how (in 1918) the BSO management allegedly offered their musicians a $250 bonus to prevent unionizing, “Another aspect of this story is that the BSO founder, Henry Lee Higginson, decided that in order to ensure the BSO hired and kept the best …

Read more

Back To The Future

Here’s some more intriguing insight from the October, 1918 edition of The Etude, there’s an article written by Constantine von Sternberg (a student of Franz Liszt) entitled The Music Interest of the American Man of To-Morrow.  89 years ago, Constantine had this to say about the burgeoning American orchestra scene (edited for length) in the introduction paragraphs of the article, Judged by its outward showings, our progress in musical culture is …

Read more

Something Special In St. Louis Part 3

In order to round out this series of articles about the uniquely special grand concert in St. Louis on March 13th, 2005 it seems fitting to allow the last voice to come from those who participated in the event as patrons.  If you missed the earlier installments, here are Part 1 and Part 2. Karen Coulter, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra Patron My friend, Mary Parks, told me about the concert and …

Read more

BSO Musicians Paid To Stay Out Of Union

Or, that’s how the story went back in the October, 1918 edition of The Etude, A monthly journal for the musician, the music student, and all music lovers.  In “The World of Music” column, the journal ran the following bit about labor issues at the Boston Symphony Orchestra, It was reported a few months ago that the Boston Symphony Orchestra (the only large organization of the kind which has remained non-union) …

Read more

Staring At The Crossroads In Salt Lake

Executive oversight is an issue which is high on the minds of the Utah Symphony & Opera (US&O) stakeholders. The two Salt Lake organizations officially merged at the beginning of this decade with the promise from their now CEO, Anne Ewers, that the new organization would be greater then the sum of its parts.  Prior the merger, Ms. Ewers served as the Utah Opera General Director and had built a positive …

Read more