Exclusive: What to do if your music director is sleeping with a player
NewsWe bring you, hot off the presses, a confidential addendum to the newly signed agreement between Local 802, representing the musicians, and New York City Ballet. The wording is clearly intended to be the new industry standard. Please try to read it with a straight face.
This letter memorializes the following agreements between Local 802 and the New York City Ballet:
1. The document titled “Code of Conduct, Equal Opportunity, Harassment and Complaints”, which is attached to this letter and incorporated by reference herein, shall apply to all musicians of the Orchestra and to all artistic staff, including the Music Director and all conductors.
2. The parties agree that a potential conflict of interest (or appearance of conflict of interest) may arise in the event the Music Director enters into or has entered into a romantic, sexual, or marital relationship with a musician of the Orchestra (a “Related Musician”). To remedy such potential conflict, the following shall apply throughout the tenure of the Music Director whenever such a relationship exists at any time during that tenure:
a. In the event the Music Director and the Related Musician both serve on an
Audition Committee for a vacancy in any section, a hiring decision shall require a
supermajority that includes at least two (2) musician votes. In addition, no
discussion shall be permitted during the audition rounds.
Following each audition for which the Music Director and the Related Musician
have served on the same Audition Committee, upon the request of either party,
the parties will discuss the effectiveness of the foregoing arrangement. Any
changes to the policy will be agreed upon in writing.
b. The Music Director shall not favor the Related Musician over other musicians
with respect to the Related Musician’s interactions with colleagues.
c. Neither the Music Director nor the Related Musician shall make the final decision
in the engagement of substitutes in the Related Musician’s section. Such decisions
shall continue to be made by the Personnel Manager.
d. If serving in a titled position, the Related Musician will have no involvement in
matters of seating or rotation.
e. The Music Director will have no involvement in matters of seating or rotation in
the Related Musician’s section.
f. The Music Director shall be relieved of any and all supervisory duties with
respect to the Related Musician. All day to day matters of concern in the pit that
involve the Related Musician, including but not limited to attendance,
communication, interaction with colleagues and pit related logistical issues, will
be handled by David Titcomb for resolution and, to the extent necessary, by
Brooks Parsons.
g. Issues regarding musical or artistic matters involving the Related Musician will be
handled by Andrews Sill, Associate Music Director. In the event that Mr. Sill has
a potential conflict of interest as a result of his spouse’s engagement as a
substitute viola player, the matter shall be handled by Jonathan Stafford, NYCB
Artistic Director.
h. Solo assignments should follow the established practice of using principal players
for chamber or quartet work, and Andrews Sill, the Associate Music Director,
would decide on exceptions to that practice.
i. In the event other issues arise in the workplace as a result of the relationship
between the Music Director and the Related Musician, the parties will
expeditiously meet and confer to address the problem. Unresolved disputes may
be submitted by either party to arbitration pursuant to the terms of the CBA.
Watch?
These dictators are probably so mean themselves that they’d make Barbie have sex with Ken and force GI Joe to watch!! (Old joke from ‘Murphy Brown’.)
what abut the associate director, section leaders, and other musicians? They can have sex with other musicians but only the Music Director can’t? Isn’t that discriminatory.
When you have babies with no agency you have to treat them like creche inmates. And this is what’s happening BIG TIME.
Whereas in Minnesota, that sort of thing is actively encouraged.
Your beat me to that one! Talk about disgusting.
Oh. Music Director nasty sexual activism is prevalent and encroaching in the Midwest, though some of it imported from overseas.
As long as the whole affair is MUTED, it appears to be fine and dandy. Some orchestra musicians believe it benefits and enriches performances which would otherwise be lacking verve.
Whatever happened to “consenting adults”. Well, we know the latter is certainly MIA. Grow up, please.
McDonald’s, a major corporation, relatively recently fired its CEO for having a “consulting adults” type sexual relationship with his assistant. In Chicago, of all places.
With all due respect: maybe it’s you, certain MDs, certain orchestra administrators and CHROs who need to grow out of the stone age.
If the MD was to have sex with a musician in the orchestra, I would prefer just to watch and not have to deal with all this legal nonsense.
And .. if the Music Director has sex with a staff member? What then?
I don’t know; perhaps you could police this yourself and urge others to dob on others whenever they hear about it. That way it will be much more like the USSR than it currently is. Then you’ll be really happy; everybody will have a job and nobody will be doing anything!! But the great benefit is the secret police.
you’re obviously trying to insinuate something, but if you have no proof behind this ridiculous accusation, please just stfu. nobody cares about your personal and, quite frankly, strange vendetta
Since “staff member” is a double double entendre the conductor should be ashamed of himself.
No. You mean “stiff member”.
I wonder how they’d handle the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center (couple directing it) or Chamber Music Northwest (couple directing it)? God forbid two talented musicians should live together AND work together!!!
“…will be handled by David Titcomb…”
LOL
That’s a name that has teeth in it.
Why so complicated? Let them simply corpulate and mind your own business.
Still doesn’t change what all your colleagues think of you for sleeping with the boss.
And if it is love?
Before the love, the original sin was still having slept with your boss.
It’s not. Narcissists are not capable of love.
Oh yes, gotta listen to those colleagues…somebody might have an advantage over somebody else. Quick; call the cops!!
My fly on the wall tells me that there is also a ‘secret addendum’ to be handed-out to the couple under suspicion, to make sure that their intimate behavior follows certain rules that make sure that any romance falls within the limits of socially accepted norms.
Why don’t we ask Ozzy Osmo in The Gopher State?
Is the Musical Director of that organisation actually married to a player or the orchestra? Is it a reason for such a ridiculous policy?
What if a Musical Director has sex fix numerous Players (happens quite often) – is he required to declare it? Are the players required to declare such relationships at all?
Well, the current NYCB MD is married to its principal violist. Apparently not everyone in the orchestra is happy with this arrangement.
He previously married a player in the Bournemouth Symphony while MD there…..
And before that a harp player from another major orchestra.
Wasn’t the music director of that orchestra at the time.
She left the orchestra shortly thereafter.
A harem of muses built around the music director could solve the problem.
You couldn’t make it up if you tried!
Well-intentioned, yet amateurish.
Visionary institutions, with visionary presidents, have defined positions whose main responsibility – off-the-grid – is to have sex with the Music Director.
All you need to do is to demonstrate plausible consent, and the problem is taken care of. Or so they reckon.
“Well-intentioned”? Yes, so was Bolshevism. They just ran out of body bags, that’s all.
“Oh, but our form of Bolshevism would be like that…”
Grow the hell up.
literally wtf kind of smear campaign are you trying to run here? this is just absolutely ridiculous. if you have something substantial to say, then say it. otherwise plz STFU
The number one nepotistic relationship is parent-offspring.
More sons-of and daughters-of are in positions that they never would’ve (or should’ve) gotten but for daddy or mommy, than any spouses-of or lovers-of are in their positions because of their spouse or lover.
OK, so we know the NYCB music director has been married several years to the principal violist, and IIRC they welcomed a child not long ago.
Anti-nepotism is important, but is this kind of language really necessary in a master agreement? It seems almost farcical.
Well, yes, and no. Obviously this situation has had problems and at least some felt the best(only?) way to handle it was through the CBA. I suspect there are some pretty specific problems in this situation to warrant something written this way.
OTOH, too many CBAs are filled with cruft from past one-off problems. Usually because management wouldn’t deal with a problem or stick to industry norms, so someone has to have it put in the CBA that only 3 musicians at a time are allowed to be juggling oranges in the dressing rooms or whatever. Then 40 years later everyone is scratching their heads about why is that in there.
You know nothing. The music director was having an illicit affair with NYCB’s principal violist, and when it came to light because she wound up pregnant, they got married in order to avoid the consequences of their actions, which should have been his immediate termination. Their actions and behavior have resulted in a toxic work environment for the musicians of the orchestra due to their inability to behave professionally and keep their personal lives at home. This document was created out of a need, due to their constant disregard for rules and political manipulations and abuse of power.
This is exactly accurate. And no doubt the NYCB musicians are aware of the horrible situation that exists in Minnesota because the board there would do nothing when a similar situation occurred. Including the very, very messy and public break-up of a marriage.
Several years?? Try several months. The new baby is about the same age as the relationship.
They are probably overworked and very tired. Let them sleep.
Is MARRIED to a player………
Yeah, but — c’mon, John. You know nobody* cares about anything unless it’s about SEX.
*(nobody in the general public, and almost nobody on this site)
It could be worse. A desperate viola player has married a tuba player in the past. At the very least, they’re NOT screwing up two other people’s lives……
Marrying a tuba player is a sign of reckless courage which should be admired in a viola player.
The tuba would be bringing home Principal pay!
So the US TV series “Mozart in the Jungle” wasn’t entirely off the mark?
“into a romantic, sexual, or marital relationship”
Married couples should be exempt, because God knows once they’re married, there goes the romance and the sex…
Lol, in fact, the policy is probably there to PROTECT the married player FROM spiteful and retaliatory action of a spurned MD…
I like the distinction: “….. romantic, sexual, OR marital relationship”.
This seems to suggest: as soon as a relationship is socially approved-off, the fun disappears.
What says an expert on the subject?
“In married life affection comes when people thoroughly dislike each other.”
“If we men married the women we deserved, we should have a very bad time of it.”
By Wilde. There’s more, but I hear footsteps.
When Erik Bruhn was Artistic Director of the National Ballet of Canada, he began an affair with a member of the company.
When Pinchas Zukerman was appointed to the MD job at Ottawa’s National Arts Centre, he met and later married the Principal Cellist. A bit later, the Concert Master married a first violinist, who then or later became Associate Concert Master (she would have become so anyway, being a Zukerman protégée and the best young violinist in the Orchestra).
People meet each other on the job. Happens in every job.
I do not believe that the current Mrs. Zuckerman was actually the principal cello of Ottawa until AFTER Mr. Z arrived. Nor was she a “soloist” of any note at the time. As far as the abilities of the Concertmaster’s new wife I think it is telling that she was Z’s student who got into the orchestra first violins and then becomes Assoc. concertmaster after marrying the concertmaster….that she was “the best young violinist in the group” is rather like saying the goose in a group of ducks is the biggest bird. How many “young violinists” abound in a small chamber orchestra?
Nobody should be allowed to have sex with a subordinate and keep their job! Gotta choose one or the other, but can’t have your cake and eat it too!
Hmmmmm….what if the music director wants sex with himself? Now there’s a conundrum!
There are special protocols for such situations. Orchestras keep them in a special drawer which is firmly locked.
“What to do if your Music Director is sleeping with a player” (?) . . . . keep the lights turned off and try not wake them as you’re changing into your PJ’s. . . . either that, or pull the fire alarm in the hallway and run!
In the forty years I have been in the business, no conductor has tried to sleep with me.
Am I doing something wrong?
No, it simply never happens in the Midwest.
I suppose we could turn it around and ask if you have ever tried to sleep with a conductor/soloist. That might be a more interesting question.
It appears I come late to this spirited symposium! Pity!!
What needs to be understood by our European cohort is that the way American orchestras are run in not the same as most European groups. In America a Music Director might be considered to have outsize power compared to their European counterparts. From our side it seems as if there are possible counterweights within orchestras in Europe which make it possible for sexual encounters with conductors to seem not quite so fraught with the abuse of power. In America there is no comparable safeguard of orchestra members being able to protect each other except thru very specific language in a contract (either the contract with the Music Director or with the orchestra). The fact that there was such a contract drawn up is absolutely because there had to have been actual provable improper intent on the part of the “related” musician. What the music director thinks on their own is already enough of an issue but to have a lover or spouse who is in the orchestra who has their own agenda whispering pillow talk/gossip/opinions in the director’s ear is something that has needed to be addressed for decades. This takes the act of politics to an entirely new level and it puts everyone else in the orchestra into a position of needing to treat the “related” musician like a royal person, especially if the “related” musician is one who fancies power and has grievances to settle. I will say that I think the concertmaster position is always at the discretion of the music director and the relationship of concertmaster and music director is one that IS different than with ANY other member of the orchestra. It does not apply to any other principal position. The fact that the “related” musician didn’t resign from the orchestra is one that has not been addressed. They are not longer in a desperate financial situation as many musicians in NYC are right now. This was never about sexual encounters between orchestra members although with varying level of powers there can be power/political plays that are used this way among orchestra members.
Don’t mess with NYC musicians…as can be attested to by the resignation of a recent music director.