Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Houston Sym


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Posted by Rick Denney on March 11, 2003 at 16:42:06:

In Reply to: Re: Re: Re: Re: Houston Sym posted by Here we go again on March 11, 2003 at 15:59:46:

Tony, I don't disagree with you and I'm generally sympathetic to the musicians in Houston (my parents live there and I've been following along as best I can). Building an orchestra is far more difficult than losing one, and a year's worth of slippage can push out the best musicians, which may take years to recover. Compromising musician salaries damages the product just at a time the product needs to be at its best to gather new audiences.

But be careful about overstating the case. Most people live under the axe. I do. I have to bill hours every single week, and when I can no longer bill hours, I'll be standing out at the street with my stuff in a box. That can happen easily with the right kind of federal cut-back, too, because a large percentage of my business is with the feds.

Most professionals are expected to keep their skills intact, and usually on their own time. To list a poor example, I can't bill my clients for the time I spend reading journals, and I read them at home. But my clients surely expect me to know what's in them.

And those athletes. You know they spend more than 40 hours a week keeping their bodies in top shape. Yes, they get big money, but the reason they do is because people keep watching, either in person or on television.

In fact, people do spend the money for pop music. So, for the sports comparison to work, you can't compare orchestras to the sports equivalent of pop music. You have to compare it to the sports equivalent of classical music. Polo? I'm sure there are polo stars that do well, but the vast majority of polo players are paid little or nothing, even though they may have developed demanding skills. Audiences are sparse and survival revenues probably come from the participants themselves. The major sports are rolling in money, but the minor sports are often on the verge of bankruptcy. Symphony music is, unfortunately, a minor sport in the musical world, despite its importance to you and me.

The only long-term survival requirement is to make more musicians in the general population. The only reason people watch golf is because they play it, too.

But you have to get past these short-term problems, and the challenge is to do so with your most important product intact.

Rick "thinking this is too important for emotion" Denney


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