Since Monday, the numbers of personal emails I’ve received along with public comments on this issue have prompted me to put together a little survey about applauding between movements and whether or not orchestra concerts are pretentious…
We Still Need To See A Psychologist
I had a fascinating lunch time conversation yesterday with a manager in my area and we were talking about the usefulness of approaching marketing from the view of a behavioral psychologist. The conversation brought my memory to an article I wrote back in February, 2004 entitled We All Need To Go See A Psychologist…
An End To Pretentiousness
The Partial Observer published an article of mine yesterday which examines just how entrenched some exclusionary behaviors are in this business. That’s not to say these behaviors are initiated out of malice, but they exist as hurdles when reaching out to a community nevertheless. Take a moment to read the article and weigh in with your opinions: Is classical music to pretentious? Is that perception off base to begin with? Do …
Improving The Sustainability Of Classical Music Though System Dynamics
Over the past year, I’ve had the pleasure of working with Bill Harris, a talented systems dynamics expert based in Seattle, Washington. In 1999 Bill founded Facilitated Systems to “offer collaborative solutions to executives who want strategies and initiatives that are tested before implementation, who want their organizations to work more productively in groups, and who want to build organizations that learn and improve more rapidly from their experiences.” Doesn’t that sound exactly like what he orchestra field needs?
Bill and I have worked together using systems thinking to explore methods to improve the sustainability of the classical music business…
Sometimes, The Solutions Are Right In Front Of Us
Audience development, identifying meaningful ways to connect to the community, and becoming culturally relevant; these are issues which exist at the core of the orchestral field and preoccupy the minds of managers, board members, and musicians alike. Everyone seems to be looking for new ways to extract results from existing methods and resources; but sometimes, the solutions can be right at your fingertips, yet completely out of sight…