News from the Balti-cancels-more Symphony
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Baltimore (September 20, 2019) Collective bargaining is ongoing with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and its musicians. Efforts continue to make progress, but unfortunately the Season Preview Concert, scheduled for Saturday, September 21 at the Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, has been canceled.
The BSO is making every effort to bring our concerts back to the stage as quickly as possible. As negotiations continue, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra is hopeful that an agreement will be reached soon.
Note here that management calls ITSELF “the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.” That’s the problem.
“L’orchestre c’est moi!”
Better to apply the label “The Pencilnecks of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra”
Without the management, an orchestra is just a bunch of free lancers busking for a few dollars the general public is willing to drop in their hats.
Nevermind the cost of 100 full time employees with benefits and retirement, just for a single concert of 100 freelance musicians in your local park, are you willing to pay your full share of equitably compensating 100 musicians for an hour of work?
Let’s do the math: The minimum wage in Maryland is $10.10 per hour. If you are willing to pay $500 for that public park concert, you’re just paying $5 per musician per hour, less than half of her hourly minimum wage.
Good thing there is management to make up for the rest in fund raising, because the price the public is willing to pay won’t even cover minimum wage.
Unfortunately, their statement is true. Legally, the BSO is a corporation that employs the musicians. I’m not taking management’s side, but they are technically correct and have every right to say what they said.
That the BSO management claims to make every effort, is laughable. Support the BSO musicians! https://www.gofundme.com/f/keep-the-o-in-bso