From Today's NYTimes


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Posted by David on May 14, 2003 at 14:35:59:

I though this might interest some people.

As Funds Disappear, So Do Orchestras
By STEPHEN KINZER


After the Florida Philharmonic Orchestra finished playing Wagner and Tchaikovsky to an audience of 1,300 in Boca Raton on Friday, the orchestra's executive director, Trey Devey, took to the stage to announce that this might be its last concert.

"If you have the potential to help us and be a hero, then call us," Mr. Devey pleaded. "We need a hero."

No one called, at least no one with the necessary resources. Later Mr. Devey issued a statement saying the orchestra was "temporarily suspending operations and terminating the employment of musicians."

The apparent collapse of the Florida Philharmonic, the only major orchestra in South Florida, is the latest in a series of tremors that have shaken the symphonic world this season. Nearly a dozen orchestras across the country have either closed or are in danger of doing so.

This season's first orchestral casualty was the San Jose Symphony, which shut down in November. The Tulsa Philharmonic, the Colorado Springs Symphony and the San Antonio Symphony followed.

In February the 49-year-old Savannah Symphony Orchestra canceled the rest of its season. It was $1.3 million in debt, had gone through five executive directors in seven years and was unable to meet its payroll.

The musicians of the Houston Symphony went on strike for three weeks in March and April and in the end were forced to settle for a contract that imposed sharp curbs on wages and benefits. Their counterparts at the Baltimore Symphony accepted a similarly harsh contract after what their union leader called "difficult and painful consideration."

The Pittsburgh Symphony, one of the country's major ensembles, is facing a $2 million deficit, and its board has proposed selling its concert hall. It will also begin what are likely to be difficult labor negotiations this summer.

Earlier this month dozens of musicians from the 66-year-old Louisville Orchestra appeared in formal attire at the city's unemployment office to file for benefits. They had not been paid for three weeks, and their orchestra faces an $800,000 deficit.

Several orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, have recently issued emergency appeals to donors. Although the Philharmonic is in no danger of collapse, some others say they may not reopen next season if their appeals are not successful.

Orchestra administrators blame their woes on the weak economy, but critics say many of them have failed to adapt to changing times.

Ed Wulfe, a Houston real estate developer who helped mediate the dispute in his city, said "a combination of lethargy and `that's the way it's always been done' thinking" had shaped the culture of the Houston Symphony "and probably a lot of orchestras across the country."

"This is a competitive world, and we've got to find ways to tell the story better, to get out into the community, to reach out to new audiences," Mr. Wulfe said. "It takes people with some imagination."

The plight of the Houston Symphony reflects the challenges that orchestras are confronting across the country. Houston, the nation's fourth-largest city, has had a full-size symphony orchestra since 1972. Mr. Wulfe said the orchestra was vital. "We realize that to attract business, to attract broad-minded, innovative, creative people, we have to offer more than just a job," he said.

Critics of orchestra management are not so sure. They suggest that if a city cannot come up with the money to support a symphony orchestra, perhaps it does not need one.

Some cultural figures say it is hard to sell classical music in places where much of the population has no direct connection to the northern European cultures that produced most of it. Others lament that many universities today emphasize career training over the humanities, allowing students to reach adulthood without any exposure to fine arts. Still others share Mr. Wulfe's view that orchestra administrators are too slow moving and unimaginative.

"I don't think there's a deep systemic problem that's unique to symphony orchestras, since airlines and hotel chains and hockey teams are also suffering from this economic downturn," said Henry Fogel, who is about to leave the top administrative post at the Chicago Symphony to become president of the American Symphony Orchestra League. "During the great economy of the 1990's orchestras perhaps expanded faster than they should have. I believe that in really good economic times orchestras should not spend up to their revenues and should instead go for a surplus and keep a cushion for the future. I wish I'd believed that 10 or 15 years ago."

Mr. Fogel said some orchestras were run by insular groups that did not inspire donor confidence. "Are there enough people in a city who want an orchestra and are willing to support it?" he asked. "That becomes a difficult and tricky question when you ask whether an administration or board has done all that can be done in garnering that support, or if it has not done enough."

Those questions have been raised repeatedly in Houston. Ann Kennedy, who was hired in 2001 as the Houston Symphony's executive director, had never before run an arts organization, and some active in the city's cultural life said she had not managed to energize either the orchestra or donors. Her board is also considered weaker than those guiding the Museum of Fine Arts and other more successful Houston arts institutions.

"Somehow this board didn't become the board to go on in Houston, and that's very difficult to fix," said an arts administrator who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he deals regularly with the Houston Symphony. "When you have the wrong mix, the people of real power don't become interested in joining. It's going to take somebody of importance in the community stepping forward and taking responsibility for reshaping the board, and the board allowing itself to be reshaped."

The musicians' strike in Houston ended with the signing of a contract that calls for the cancellation of 10 concerts in the season, cuts in staff size and salaries, higher health care premiums and mandatory unpaid furloughs for musicians.

Partly because of tensions stemming from the labor dispute, nearly a dozen musicians have left the orchestra in recent months, either permanently or temporarily. A union survey suggested that 80 percent would leave if they had a good offer elsewhere. "The mood has changed," said Houston's music director, Hans Graf.

This season has forced many orchestra administrators to recognize the need for a new approach, but they are uncertain what it should be.

"There has to be a sea change in the way these organizations are run," said Jeffrey B. Early, a banker who is completing a two-year term as president of the Houston Symphony's board. "We have to find ways of putting more people in the seats."

Mr. Early said he hoped the Houston orchestra's new associate conductor, Carlos Miguel Prieto, who was formerly music director of the Xalapa Symphony Orchestra and associate conductor of the Mexico City Philharmonic, would find ways to attract more Hispanic patrons.

"And we've got Beethoven's `Ode to Joy' coming up," he added. "We ought to be able to fill the hall with that."






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