Posted by Jay Bertolet on June 16, 2000 at 15:02:09:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Re: Re: Who is he? posted by Joe Baker on June 16, 2000 at 12:57:11:
Joe, you rotten, no-good, such and such!!!! (j/k)
Seriously, I know that you know better than to treat me with kid gloves when it comes to expressing opinions. Let's all hope that the free exchange of ideas here is never hindered by even the faintest whiff of political correctness.
It is an argument as old as any with me. My father and my wife are both small business owners and you can imagine the discussions we've had over the years where I was characterized as a socialist, among other things. Ironically, I consider myself a staunch conservative but that is really another discussion altogether. I bring all this up because I don't feel that your ideas and mine are incompatible. For one, I do not oppose amateur musicians playing concerts! Except where it costs working musicians their livelihood. But your logic doesn't apply to the music industry in my opinion. Let's take your "gallon of milk" example.
You're right, competition is important in our economy. It keeps the best quality products on the shelves and it sustains businesses that do a good job. This logic does not apply to symphony orchestras! Why? Because orchestras cannot turn a profit. My motivation for selling the gallon of milk at less than the competition is to increase my business and turn a profit. Unless I'm an idiot or trying to corner the market, I'm not selling my product for less than it costs me to make it. So the incentive for me to sell for less is to turn a bigger profit by increasing volume. But orchestras can never do this. Ticket prices cover between 1/2 to 1/4 of a typical orchestra's expenses. Being a not for profit organization changes the incentives completely. Put yourself in the shoes of the management and board. Why raise more money? You can't keep it. The institution can never turn a profit. In fact, the motivation for orchestra managements around the country is to be more efficient, to trim costs wherever possible, and to make board membership (read as professional fundraiser for the institution) as painless as possible so folks will continue to do it. The only thing that drives a management of an orchestra to offer higher salaries to its musicians is the organization of the musicians into a collective bargaining unit.
But then along comes a group of amateur musicians who all have other jobs. For them, playing is a kick, they don't depend on the income for their livelihood. And they don't belong to the union so nobody can tell them what to charge or what working conditions they have to maintain. They don't even have to be very good because, like it or not, our audience is not as well trained in the art as we are. Audiences are ill equipped to discern the finer points of ensemble playing and the vast majority wouldn't know the difference. For example, any of you who have heard the CD the orchestra I play with put out of Mahler 1 knows what we can sound like. Yet, one of the local music critics has said many times that we and the New World Symphony Orchestra play at comparable levels. Remember that the NWSO is all students and they can stay with the ensemble a maximum of 3 seasons (except in rare cases) so they are constantly turning over their membership.
It is no surprise to me that managements lick their chops whenever this opportunity presents itself. In reality, there are thousands more amateur musicians than working ones. And they're willing to work cheap because it is "just for fun" for them. Like I said before, I don't oppose amateurs playing gigs. Everybody is entitled to pursue their own happiness. But the potential for abuse of these recreational musicians by cost cutting managements is very high and it is one place where some union control would be beneficial to all sides. This is how I see things working in states that are not right to work. Or maybe the pure professional musician is a dinosaur waiting to become extinct. Which do you think it is?
My opinion for what its worth...