San Francisco Symphony

An Updated Look At Top-Tier Musician Compensation 2016

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Currently, two of the top eight orchestras with the highest base musician annual salary are negotiating new collective bargaining agreements: National Symphony and Philadelphia Orchestra. Interestingly enough, both of these ensembles are in positions where the outcome of those negotiations will likely have a larger impact on their future competitiveness than some of the upcoming negotiations for their peers. In order to visualize these distinctions, here’s a chart illustrating the current …

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Let’s Take A Look At Big Eight Musician Compensation

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Big 8 Base Musician Salary

Now that Cleveland has settled, we can begin to get a sense for how base musician compensation compares across the highest tier of big budget orchestras, which we’ll call The Big Eight (Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, LA, National, New York, Philly, and San Francisco). Granted, we’ll be updating this chart with Cleveland’s figures once that data is available and when it is, it will be interesting to see how they compare with Philly, …

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Alex Ross Couldn’t Be More Right

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In an 11/25/2013 article from The New Yorker, the ever sharp Alex Ross vents some frustration toward the Minnesota Orchestra Association (MOA) leadership, the growing difficulty of mid and smaller budgets org to pull funding from the name brand institutions, and the ennui that is political concerns about culture. Ross doesn’t mince words and goes so far as to accuse the MOA management of “stoop[ing] to ruthless union-busting tactics” and calling …

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A Difference Of Opinions In San Francisco

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Following up on yesterday’s post about the assertions made in a San Francisco Symphony (SFS) musicians’ statement that the SFS attribute their decision to go on strike due, in part, to ineptitude on the part of the board’s negotiation team. I contacted SFS Director of Communications, Oliver Theil, to see if the SFS had any response. The SFS musicians stated the following: The Musicians agreed to look at ways to help …

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Ratified But Unresolved In San Fran?

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Over the weekend, the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra (SFS) and its musicians finally wrapped up the contentious labor dispute that led to a strike and tour cancellation. Details of the agreement have been trickling out in edited press release format but any meaningful analysis won’t be possible until the complete agreement is made public. Nonetheless, what’s interesting is the continuing degree of animosity between employer and employee stakeholders in the wake …

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