Drew McManus on the orchestra business.
Several readers have reached out since the end of last week asking when I’ll be writing something about the San Antonio Symphony. All things being equal, I would write something but, in this case, I must point out the Professional Disclosure policy published in the footer that has been in place at Adaptistration for the last 15 years. Given the author’s position as an arts consultant and technology provider, he does …
Music Directors are like milk in that they both have expiration dates; or, at least, so goes the old joke. Fortunately for conductors, they have a much longer shelf life and statistically speaking, that runs anywhere from 10 to 12 years. That amount of time usually consists of 2-3 contract cycles and provides most music directors an opportunity to get through the bulk of desired repertoire. If the group was amid …
In 2014, we took a deep dive into which International Conference of Symphony and Opera Musicians (ICSOM) symphonic orchestras paid substitute musicians the same rate as core musicians and in the wake of a recent conversation with ICSOM chairperson Meredith Snow and ICSOM President Paul Austin, it’s time to update that list. My thanks to Paul Austin for spearheading this effort and providing ICSOM’s list of changes. As with most comparative …
Labor disputes and institutional crises tend to garner plenty of attention in traditional media outlets as they unfold, but follow-up articles are fewer in number. Most tend to be puff pieces crafted more by an organization’s PR department than a genuine post mortem, but the 3/16/2018 edition of Texas Public Radio (TPR) published an exception to the rule. Their short segment examines the tumultuous week at the San Antonio Symphony (SAS) …
Now that the San Antonio Symphony (SAS) has made it past the darkest hour and are firmly headed toward the dawn, the stakeholders are now free to triage the next wave of challenges. The 1/20/2018 edition of the San Antonio Express-News published an article by Deborah Martin that takes a very detailed look at what the organization has accomplished and some of the challenges that lie ahead. Here’s an overview of …