Northern Ballet Sinfonia are told to play their own funeral
OrchestrasMembers of the orchestra of Northern Ballet, which is being scrapped for lack of public funding,have been asked to make a recording of their accompamniment to several ballets. The plan is for this recording to be played instead of a live orchestra at future ballet performances.
It is hard to decide which is more preposterous – the abolition of the orchestra or the sheer bloody chutzpah of its management in asking the players to make themselves redundant.
This is the state of the arts in our country at the end of 2023. Thanks a million, Arts Council England.
You read it here first.
pictured: NB musicians protest
Sadly, this has been common practice in Poland for quite a long time now. Even ballet groups being part of opera companies, who obviously all have orchestras, have
been performing to tape since, as far as I remember, my high school years.
Doubtless accompanied by ‘sympathy’ and crocodile tears from the senior management as they await their next salary increase. See also ENO.
What a scandalous attitude by Northern Ballet management! The orchestra should tell the management exactly what to do with this ‘suggestion’ (also known as diktat!)
How very British of you to assume that a stern word with management will change their minds
Both are preposterous.
But the more important issue is how Northern Ballet has been expected to transport story ballet (narrative works rather than abstract works) productions with lavish costumes and sets all around the country for years, with a tiny budget a fraction of the Royal Ballet’s and Birmingham Royal Ballet’s.
Their funding is tiny and yet the company are expected to charge much cheaper ticket prices than the Royal Opera House and other ballet companies of similar standing around the world.
On top of transport costs for the productions, there is also the accommodation and travel costs for the dancers, musicians and small crew and artistic team. The dancers and musicians have been paid peanuts for years, but yet are very good at what they do- lots of talented stars have emerged from Northern Ballet.
The government needs to release some of the tax revenue they’re using for parties and politicians’ alcohol and lunches, and use that to pay Northern Ballet who bring the arts to local communities more fairly instead.
So true, ML! And we do have some sympathy with the management’s dilemma. The recent touring weeks were averaging 86% audiences, which is very respectable, but the company lost on average £40,000 each of those weeks, if we are to believe what we are told.
Also, the top two people in the company are not to blame directly for this mess because they have only joined fairly recently but unfortunately mistakes are still being made. One question we ask repeatedly is how come we are the only mainstream UK ballet company not performing over the lucrative Christmas period, when profits can actually be made?
But finally, why is it always the performers who take the hit?
I think the difficulty that both Northern Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet have (that Royal Ballet and English National Ballet don’t, and that Scottish Ballet with a choice of several Scottish cities, can work around) is that BRB and NB use theatres that host panto as well, and I presume the rent/hire costs go up when it’s near Christmas and New Year, so it’s in competition with panto as to who can pay more to have the theatre between Dec 20 -Jan 6 during the lucrative school holiday period. Or whether the theatre management have chosen to stage panto instead of Nutcracker.
If Northern Ballet were to come south to perform Nutcracker during at Woking again, or at Sadler’s Wells, during 20 Dec- 2 Jan, they would be welcome with open arms and great box office takings. (Can the capital manage 3 Nutcrackers simultaneously in December? They definitely could! Pre Covid, BRB regularly came to perform Nutcracker between Boxing Day and New Year’s Day at the Royal Albert Hall- and that venue is a big one to fill at over 5000 seats!
I’m wondering how the £40,000 is calculated. But perhaps the figure includes selling every single seat- which opera and symphony concerts never expect to do (unless Jonas Kaufmann is in the cast). That figure and the box office sales suggest that NB should probably do shorter runs at each venue and visit more locations. I know audiences in Sunderland, Liverpool and Plymouth would love NB to visit. Looking at the prices compared to other dance companies and other entertainment genres, NB could afford raise prices for some of the more popular dates in Nottingham and Norwich this season, eg weekend evening and matinee performances, and to try to perform on more Saturdays and Sundays rather than weeknights. Eg make a 5 show run Thu, Fri, Sat mat, Sat eve, Sun mat rather than starting Wed and finishing Sat eve.
Darren Henley, Nicholas Serota and Claire Mera Nelson should all be relieved of their duties. They are destroying culture in the UK and are totally unfit to hold public office.
One of the problems of the musical world in modern times, is the growth of the management layer. The bureaucratization of modern life, and the logistical complications of running a musical institution, demand specific skills, but they have not much to do with the content of the enterprise: the music. There are places, I won’t mention them by name, where management staff has grown to such proportions – sometimes almost as many people as the orchestra itself – that the impression emerges that staff use the orchestra to provide them with nice office jobs. Because part of the management is dedicated to gather subsidies, sponsoring and donations, so also the budget grows and grows. Such climate invites the development of the specific human type of ‘art bureaucrats’ who could not care less about the art form they are supposed to serve, but skim it for personal gain and status, and the kick of feeling powerful. They are more prevalent where state subsidies are involved. How come that such impressive art form can become a victim of such parasitism? Subject for cultural anthropology.
The LSO.
The management of NB is holding a gun to our heads in these ‘negotiations’. The only possible power the orchestra has is in the legal strength of our ‘Agreement’. This is amongst other things a guarantee of 150 sessions work a year and the wording of it raises questions as to our employment status.
Two years ago, we were duped into agreeing a two year suspension of the guarantee, being told that the reduction in work offered to us would be roughly 20% but in reality it was closer to 60%. This has caused very real financial consequences for some players with some even having to turn to using food banks. If we make a legal challenge based on our ‘agreement’ we are being told that the company couldn’t afford to defend itself and would go bust, which of course none of us would wish for. At the same time, there is no way that we want to be responsible for the likely future ramifications for the ballet sector of any agreement to record then to allow them to use our recording in return for an insultingly small usage fee. Not to mention destroying the ‘live’ experience for our audiences.
Since the announcement was made re sacking the orchestra, before every performance we stand outside theatres in all weathers handing out leaflets to ask the public for support. If we ever doubted the impact we make on our audiences then no longer!
If we are going to preserve the arts in this country, now is the time to make our voices heard.
They say they can’t defend themselves against a legal challenge, Leeds Insider? They signed a contract with a new employment law team called Howarths at the start of the year, who promoted the fact in press releases. Any lawyer will tell you such an arrangement would normally include insurance against a claim.
The dilemma for the company is that to our best knowledge there is no legal precedence for musicians’ ‘contracts’ such as these so no lawyer could predict a ruling with any great certainty.
Have they considered reducing all other contracts at Northern Ballet in the same way? Would a 40% saving in salary costs save the orchestra?
Am I wrong in saying, for the perseverance of accurate press reports, that Northern Ballets orchestra will remain employed for seasons In Leeds and replaced by recordings in certain touring venues? Not that it makes it right but accurate press should be maintained.
For me, ballet without a live orchestra is not really ballet. Matthew Bourne for example, I consider a show with ballet dancers: not necessarily bad, but simply a different genre of entertainment. I guess the Arts Council thinks that the public doesn’t need more refined forms of art. Does it?
“I guess the Arts Council thinks that the public doesn’t need more refined forms of art. Does it?”
In a sense, the Arts Council is right. The damage is being inflicted at an earlier stage in our schools. By the time people have grown up and become important at the box office, it’s too late, the interest is not there.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not letting the Arts Council off the hook, but attaching blame to one organisation or institution doesn’t help, the problem is much wider than that. Gill, below, alludes to that.
This is absolutely heartbreaking to see what is happening to the arts funding in this country, compared to many European countries where orchestras are funded and supported by their governments. It’s devastating to see the British government being utterly ignorant to their own, precious British classical music culture.
Wake up, British government! Music helps to educate people. It supports the academic learning in schools. Listening to the best examples of the classical music make people appreciate finer things in life. It educate the society , teach them to think outside the box. Classical music inspires, widens horizons, and it heels wounded too.
However it’s not what you, British government, need.
You help certain individuals to become wealthier by making the whole country poor and uneducated. Stop selling weapons, but better invest in your country’s culture and education.
Do not kill your own culture. This is disgraceful.
Save Northern Ballet Symphonia.
You’re in cloud cuckoo land if you think the depth of this problem is purely governmental.
Anything to say about this, or ENO, Association of British Orchestras?
Sophie Lewis?
No?
Those cosy advice sessions with Serota and @ACEngland…
Might you be complicit in the destruction of the sector you preposterously claim to ‘represent’?
The sector thinks you should fess up. Your time is up.
Arts Council of England: “Pre-recorded musical accompaniment guarantees the enhanced reliability of musicians, and is to be mandated across all performance arts platforms.”
I’m with you, Leeds Insider.
If the company were to use recordings for future performances as a standard practice, with only 1 or 2 runs in Leeds having live music, then in fact Northern Ballet becomes no different to the other ad hoc and pick up companies operating in the UK and around the world- it no longer deserves the ranking and regard of being one of the country’s top 5 ballet companies (the other four being Royal Ballet, English National Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet, and Scottish Ballet who all have their own orchestra and perform with live music).
Despite management proposals that the London performances would retain live music, London has actually become the first venue to be subjected to a recording this season- with New York City Ballet luminary Tiler Peck’s acclaimed Intimate Pages being performed to a recording thid autumn instead of with 4 musicians playing the Janacek string quartet live. Despite the beautiful dancing, that was truly upsetting, given that Ms Peck’s home company NYCB is such a great champion of live music and even having the musicians on stage for some ballets.
Musicians shouldn’t be forced to accept “it’s your death or our death, and our death is more tragic than your death”, which is what the naysayers and management have been espousing- “oh, the musicians can lose their livelihood, no problem, it’s the lesser of two evils, but the company closing- no sir, that would be unthinkable!” How is a musician’s job less valuable than a dancer or an administrator’s job?! They’re both equally valuable.
If Northern Ballet are going to use recorded music for most of its performances rather than looking at broadening the repertoire, increasing the numbers of towns/cities visited (there are many locations with large audiences who would love a visit from NB), and changing ticket price structure, then maybe it ought to close and re-form as a smaller, non standard troupe like a copy of Adventures in Motion Pictures (who do use recorded scores).
The amount of misinformation around this subject is incredible. As with everything, there is often more than one side to a story. This article is absolute drivel. Focus your energy on lobbying the Arts Council.
If only that were true, ‘.’!
What I have written here are the brutal facts of the situation but if you’d like to give examples of misinformation please do.
The premise of Norman’s story is entirely accurate though we can still refuse to record for Northern Ballet. In that case, the management say they will make the recording in Eastern Europe for a fraction of the cost though I’m not sure how that fits in with their contract with the Arts Council?
Finally, this story focuses on the most recent ambitions of NB to get rid of the orchestra but the longer story is equally shocking. There are players in the band who have been loyal members for over 30 years. The company was then under Christopher Gable whose ambition was to take live ballet to as many venues as possible on a shoe string budget and small administrative set-up. The orchestra was employed for 40 weeks a year. Some time after, that reduced to 32 weeks and roughly ten years ago dropped to 20 weeks. Coming out of Covid, we agreed to suspend our guarantee of work to help the company back on its feet and that offer has been repaid in the crueltest manner. This current year, we performed for 9 weeks and now next year they want to use us for 4 weeks in the Spring and then play to CD.
Enough is enough!
We thought Thatcher was a pain in the arts. Maybe the Nation’s spending priorities need reviewing to preserve our culture.
Is “Fuck that” appropriate?