Simon Rattle’s orchestra shouts out for Northern Ballet
OrchestrasThe Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and their chief conductor have sent a visual protest to Arts Cancel England (ACE) over its cuts to Northern Ballet that have left artists dancing to a pre-recorded tape.
The sooner the new Government stops the ACE rot the better.
Good for them.
Good to see the momentum behind this campaign is still going strong. The NB leadership is clearly trying to front this out, will the Chair and his Board finally wake up and call time on this PR fiasco?
We’ve had amazing support from orchestras across Europe as well as here in the UK. We can’t thank them enough but sadly the Northern Ballet management is still refusing to change its position and is now breaking the agreement it has with the orchestra. It is looking to replace that agreement with a type of zero hours contract. Is that a fair way to treat musicians who have spent their whole careers, spanning 35 years in some cases, at Northern Ballet?
There are now no performances whatsoever scheduled to include the full band in the foreseeable future. Though NB is advertising live music for some shows next Spring, these will be with only 10 musicians so hardly the full product that audiences should expect.
And it would appear that the Arts Council is supporting that.
Worryingly, Matthew Bourne gives the same number of performances each year, with a higher number of them using orchestra, on an Arts Council grant roughly a third of what NB receives. Can the company actually survive this? We’re not sure they can which is why we can’t believe that the NB management and board are not united with us and campaigning publically.
Great to see the Bayerische Rundfunk supporting the NBT orchestra, as did the Berlin Phil recently.
I wonder, does the Arts Council not have a mechanism for withholding a portion of NBT funding, on the basis they’re not delivering what was promised in their funding application? Cutting the orchestra is devastating for the players financially, and outrageously detrimental to the artistic product. This company has a unique approach and history, with its largely original repertoire, with much bespoke music written especially for this orchestra. The musicians are superbly experienced and flexible. It is an artistic tragedy and a travesty that this is being allowed to happen, apparently without any obvious negative consequences for NBT senior management.