Trends in Orchestras

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Published on Monday, 04 May 2009 20:51

Written by Simon Cole

The lot of orchestral musicians has taken (another) turn for the worse in recent years. Orchestras have found new ways of cutting costs(and quality). Faced with dwindling resources ( mostly due to attitudinal and programing errors) many orchestras have reduced the number of rehearsals for concerts and the number of hours for musicians overall.

  Concerts that formally had as many as 6 rehearsals may now have as few as 1. Now regardless how many rehearsals a musician is paid for a concert they still have to put in many hours of practice on their own time to stay in shape and learn the music.
The 60-120 hours a month of solo practice plus the cost of reeds, music and other supplies and concert and rehearsal time that formally generated say $1300  of income may now generate only $900.

eg. If the musician is paid $200 for a concert that consist of 5 hours of paid work and 10 hours of solo practice they are making $13 / hour minus the previously mentioned expenses. If they practice daily to maintain high standards they will be making even less. Furthermore orchestras are switching to smaller groups for much of their programming usually this repertoire requires even more solo practice.

What of the quality of these concerts  and how can player that don't play together enough perform repertoire in few rehearsals and hope to come up with a presentable product?