Dear Alma, I’m fed up with our fly-in music director
OrchestrasDear Alma,
Our fly-in music director has two other orchestras in Europe. I often get the feeling he looks upon us as second-best (maybe third) and that apart from the brilliant principal clarinet and a viola player with a Harley-Davidson he’s not got much time for any of us when he’s here.
There are three years still to run on his contract and the board chair is besotted with him. I don’t want to be the one to run him out of town but this is doing no-one any good – least of all him.
Give me a strategy, Alma. Most of us want him gone but we need him to think it’s his idea.
Helpless in Hay Country
Dear Helpless in Hay Country,
Reading your query, it seems as if you must feel as if the musicians don’t matter, as if you are simply a product to be sold to the audience. You don’t have a complaint about the conductor besides the vague feeling that you are not as important as his other groups, and that he is uninterested in mixing with the musicians. It’s very possible that the other orchestras have the same complaints. The administration is happy, which signals to me that finances and ticket sales are good, and audiences are healthy and satisfied.
It is the way, these days, for conductors to hold multiple positions, the more successful the more jobs they have. And often on different continents. I would say it’s better, as a musician, to have a high-level conductor rather than someone who lives in town and who would not offer the rich musical experience that an in-demand but busy conductor would offer.
Other than a coup, I cannot see a way for you to rush the exit of your fly-in guy. Are you on an orchestra committee? This would be the first step in assessing the opinions of the entire orchestra – taking an anonymous poll would be a great start, then actively being involved with the next conductor search.
If you put yourself in the shoes of your conductor, you can imagine that life for him is quite difficult. With three orchestras, he is rarely home, is extremely busy preparing repertoire and attending meetings, and doesn’t have the creature comforts (family, regular schedule, steady diet and exercise, dog) that the orchestra enjoys. How could he feel comfortable or close to the orchestra with so little stability?
What if you could offer some of these stabilizers to your conductor? What if he is a runner or cycler? You could pair him with a running partner in the orchestra. Or some home-baked goods – every orchestra has at least one master baker – some fresh scones in a basket by his dressing room, some home-made lentil soup or fresh berries from the farmers market?
Helpless in Hay Country, I believe that with a little good will, reaching out to your conductor with warmth and some friendly gestures just might open a two-way door for both the orchestra and director. A place that he can look forward to and can call home, if only for a week once a month.
Questions for Alma? Please put them in the comments section or send to DearAlmaQuery@gmail.com
Nice idea, but how? Just by reaching out you show that you think something is wrong from your side, it needs to be handled sensitively. Particularly if the maestro has a prickly ego and might take it badly. Good luck.
Exactly. No way you can push him out, if he has a contract. Then he will REaLLY hate you if you try.
Yes – if you think he doesn’t care about you now, wait until you start to complain. Then he will start to dig in to you and make your life miserable!
If you start to complain that the conductor “doesn’t like you as much as his other orchestras” and you wish he would go, you will look like a totally weak idiot.
He is the big shot. You are just a worker bee. He can squish you in a second.
Yes – just relax and do your job. You didn’t pick your boss. We all have bosses we don’t like. If you don’t like this one, then make sure to be involved in the next process.
Simone, as this conductor has taken a shine to a viola player with a Harley Davidson, could it be that we’re talking about a maestra rather than a maestro?
gay maestro
Kick him in the balls. And organise a pressure group to prove that 4=2, it often helps.
Good luck on that. He is much more powerful than you and he has a binding contract.
Are there any environmentally aware low carbon conductors ?
Actually this is a good point. I don’t think one could get a manager. Imagine, “I will be there in three weeks after my sailboat arrives”.
so alma’s response is essentially: “think of the poor conductor”
i don’t think any of these 3-4 job fly ins would be better than a local conductor needing to build their experience/resume. No matter how “brilliant” people will assure you all these conductors are, trade offs will always exist. someone will get the short end of the stick. It honestly feels asinine to explain this but people really genuinely think these people who are spread thin across multiple positions and continents are magically able to devote the proper attention necessary.
then of course everybody else is shafted and of course blamed when it all falls apart
It would be impossible to force the person to leave. Alma is right – be involved picking the next person and in the mean time try to have a pleasant last 3 years.
No orchestral musician can kick this conductor out of a binding contract. They don’t really have any specific complaint. Alma says to make the best of it. That’s the way to do it.
That conductors have any real effect at all is an unproven hypothesis.
Realize that you, as a musician and as part of the orchestra, are ultimately the product, and that strangely, the person in front of the orchestra is actually getting full credit for the countless hours of practicing and decades of expertise of an entire group of highly skilled players having survived a gruesomely competitive audition process. Also, reconsider your unhealthy need to get some sort of validation from what you perceive to be an authority figure, and which in many cases is just the continuation of decades of intense (self-)criticism and scrutiny, but also a form of infantile and mimetic sycophancy dictated by orchestra culture. Most conductors are overpaid poseurs, and in many cases outright charlatans. In my 30 plus years, I have seen perhaps a grand total of 5 or 6 conductors who actually made a difference and which I could genuinely respect as musicians. For the rest, I tend mostly to concentrate on the music, giving an occasional glance for critical cues — and making sure I am ignoring those other cues that could result in a train wreck for the entire orchestra — but for the most part, I am looking at the score, listening to my colleagues, and making sure I know exactly where I am in the music and how all the pieces fit together, making adjustments when necessary.
“Questions for Alma? Please put them in the comments section”
Dear Alma,
My ex-girlfriend is cancelling all our joint concerts, what should I do? It’s becoming publicly embarrassing because she doesn’t cancel all at once, she cancels each concert at the last possible minute, and each time the local press has to write about it, again, and audience members complain, again, and management is unhappy, again, and my agent is unhappy, again, and it makes me look bad even though I’m the one keeping my half of the commitment.
The old adage, “Keep it in your pants” then the problem is erased comes up at this point.
That’s why work place romances are frowned upon. ( no matter the workplace) In the event of ‘conscious uncoupling’, someone will be very unhappy. Hopefully Lesson learned.
Keep your little baton zipped, Klaus. 😉
As a wife and parent of musicians, I am speaking. ( I wasn’t disciplined enough to play on a professional level) I think you are forgetting a crucial point. This is the only group of people who speak different languages yet have the ability to move entire audiences without saying a word. It takes a conductor to help unify this talent! All the more powerful is a conductor who can cross continents and reach more of us! Doesn’t the world need this? The world needs you and what you bring as well as the conductor! I am grateful for all of you. I hope this helps. The conductor can not do this without you!
Funny the change in tone between this article saying “suck it up and deal with it” vs. the pearl-clutching last week about how dare Mäkela continue conducting other orchestras while he’s at Chicago…
Being saddled with a stay-at-home faithful conductor only works when he is worth keeping. If the assistant conductor is at-home and involved in the community, it helps. But all musicians fly around too much. When they arrive and perform, it is rarely grounded. Part of the problem is that people are too impressed by the traveling and being spread about.
Pull your socks up; enjoy the music. It could be worse. You could live in FL, like me.
you could move.
Conducting careers based around multiple jobs on multiple continents are no longer environmentally sustainable.
Oh, rubbish! The players in Chicago wanted Klaus.
It’s a shame that Alma is not recognizing the impact a “local” conductor can bring, even if they’re in a city as big as New York. A local conductor brings more to the orchestra as a holistic entity rather than them flying between continents – taking one of the few jobs away from the hundreds of other conductors who are equally excellent. I’m sorry you are feeling like a a product rather than a musician. My best advice is to (unfortunately) wait out the contract and join the recruitment for the next position opening.
Since SD’s posting has a photo of a mascot standing in front of the Met at Lincoln Center, I assumed (I guess wrongly) the letter is about the NYP or the MO across the way? But Dudamel hasn’t started his tenure with the NYP yet, and (and 800 miles to the west) neither has Klaus Makela with the CSO.
Philadelphia is around 80-90 miles south of NYC, so maybe Lincoln Center is standing in for the Kimmel Center? However, Marin Alsop is yet to be in charge of the Philadelphia Orchestra. BTW, did a first in Big-Five-orchestra history – the first female principle conductor – not stir things up as much as Makela’s appointment to the CSO?
Or maybe the letter is about Philly’s Yannick Nezet-Seguin? If so, is a “music and artistic” director the same as a principle conductor?
I’m so confused. My bad.
Or even a Principal Conductor, which could indeed be different from a principle(d) conductor.
The thing is: it’s not that simple. I agree, three orchestras is too much and your conductor must struggle to have his head completely focused on what your orchestra is doing that week, his attention is surely split. But to me, the choice is not between a fly-in and a in-town conductor, there is much nuance between the two. Fly-ins can be doing too much and not be invested in one place enough, but they could also have a right balance between guest work, flying in to their orchestra and being completely there when they are and may be flying-out to be with their family which has their roots elsewhere. And an in-town conductor could be just great, available and still interesting because of just the right amount of guest conducting internationally. But that’s a really hard balance to strike. The reality might be the conductor invests everything in one place, is really appreciated, and just because it’s time for everyone to move on after a respectable number of years, the conductor’s contract is not renewed and oups, no career was developed elsewhere for that conductor. It’s nuanced and quite difficult to achieve a good balance.
Hopefully his name is not Klaus
If the conductor referred to has two other orchestras thousands of miles away, it is likely the most number of weeks he is conducting you is 12-14. Many other conductors will fill in your gaps in the seasons. Just enjoy working with them. But the writer makes the really odd comment, “we need him to think it’s his idea.” Why? If you want rid of him and that really is the majority view, make your Board fully aware of your views in every way possible and, importantly, detailed reasons why you want him out. Get the media – traditional and social – involved if necessary. Your letter mentions your feelings. Why on earth would you want to consider the feelings of a conductor you despise? Huh? Sorry but this seems like yet another gossip column piece of fiction!