The Vienna orchestra that pays musicians $100 per concert
OrchestrasDer Standard has uncovered low practices at the Vienna Mozart Orchestra, a privately owned enterprise that plays in wigs at the rented Musikverein for the benefit of unwitting tourists.
It appears that musician fees in the orchestra have been stuck at 100 Euros per concert since 2012.
The recommended minimum wage for musicians in Vienna is twice that amount.
The musicians are now getting unionised.
And Mozart? He wound up in a pauper’s grave.
More here.
On my occasional visits to Vienna I’ve seen fellows in the old jackets and wigs selling tickets to those unwitting tourists. And they’re not cheap! Always struck me as incredibly tacky, as though Vienna is still Mozart, Sacher Torte, and not much else. I assume they play reasonably well, but I wasn’t buying.
For what it’s worth, they do play reasonably well. And it *is* tacky. Amusingly (though it really shouldn’t be a big surprise), they play Johann Strauss better than Mozart.
Actually, I went in 2012, my first time in Vienna, when it was August and it was the only way I was going to get into the Musikverein. 100 Euros a concert? That was chintzy even then!
as far as I know it was „falter“ magazine who first made a report on this.
Oh dear, that’s bad. Is that the orchestra that Pierre Pichler directs? Or am I thinking of another one. That’s a shocking fee.
He is one of a many conductors there They are all listed in the little program for 6€!
Heard a concert with him in the Golden Hall Musikverein in September.
It was terrific! He has charisma and a lot of energy when he conducts even with the wig and the costume. And he also
played the clarinet concerto by Mozart which was breathtaking.
I guess the conductors will hopeful get more money!
This he does, but his main meal are his “exclusive” concerts with the Residenzorchester in the Wiener Konzerthaus lol
Well one can’t tell if it’s his “main menu.”
But conductors are busy especially the good ones. I guess it’s easy money for him to conduct these kinds of concert in vienna.
So why not. It’s not the conductor who pays the musicians.
No envy at all.
But hope he and the musicians get paid well.
I was on a viking river cruise in July and they offered us a concert at the vienna concert house.
I was a musician myself in NY and all i can say- wow!what a concert!
The orchestra played very well (what a sound for this small chamber orchestra) and his conducting, playing-fantastic!
And he is very charming. The audience loved his talking and how he guided through this evening!
I am a musician and i sometimes play concerts with the Vienna Residence Orchestra and also with the Vienna Hofburg Orchestra.
As you can see on the homepage of WRO. Pierre Pichler is the Artistic Leader of these concerts in the Vienna Concert House and Guiseppe Montesano is the Artistic Leader of the Hofburg Orchestra concerts.
These concerts at the Concert House a very special for me as a Musician.
They don’t remind me that i am playing a “tourist concert”
There are so many low class tourist concerts in Vienna. Many Colleagues are frustrated about that.
I like to play there at the Concert House.
High quality, good selected musicians and good singers!
You find that rarely with the other “tourist-orchestras” in vienna.
But of course the fee could always be higher.
Leave it to Musikverein to drain every Cent out of its audiences: with the Wiener Mozart Orchester tourists pay between 59 € and 125 € to bask in Mozart’s greatest hits in the Goldener Saal for 110 minutes and take as many selfies as possible.
For regular concerts (zB Wiener Symphoniker) expect to pay twice as much as tickets for the same artists/orchestras at Konzerthaus. Very often Orgelbalkon tickets – which have NO view of the stage – cost more than a seat with an unobstructed view at Konzerthaus.
To open the season, the Symphoniker played three performances of „Gurre-Lieder” at Musikverein with the cheapest seat (with a view of the stage) at about 65 €. Last week, I heard an unforgettable Mahler VIII with the same orchestra (plus three choruses and eight soloists) at Konzerthaus. Cost me 26 €.
Musikverein is now just a museum, or a mausoleum.
And the Philharmoniker? I just compared two performances of the same programme played at both halls: at Musikverein, the cheapest full-view seat is 80 € and seats with no view are 37 €; at Konzerthaus the cheapest full-view seat is 44 €.
Back in 2015 I paid 110 Euro for good tickets to the Musikverein and still quite a bit for the Konzerthaus, depending on the artist and the demand for the tickets.
These used to be held at the Kursalon – or are they a separate beast? Look at the yearly program for the Musikverein and you’ll see far too many of these unworthy, Rieu-inspired concerts.
tbf the money for playing a concert with the Vienna Philharmonic was basically the same just a few years ago. I doubt prices have changed much there either.
(Not talking about members of the orchestra ofc)
My First trip ever trip to Vienna last month Kurtag Fin de Partie yes, Brad Meldau Trio yes, Mozart Idomeneo booked but performance cancelled, Vienna Mozart Orchestra NO WAY WOULD I ATTEND SUCH TOURIST TRASH
Tourists get nothing but Mozart, Mozart, Mozart when they visit Vienna. The same place of Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert and Brahms but you’d never know from all the Mozart hype!! Mozart is so yesterday. Sorry!!
Many musicians will just simply become unemployed. Swings and roundabouts in all of this for musicians. Allegedly at one time in 2012, I was told that a small opera company in London were not paying their singers.
Vienna is a city with tons of musicians. Some make a good living but most aren’t paid mich better than this.
You can play as a substitute regularly for twenty years in the Staatsoper, right next to and with the regular members of the Vienna philharmonic, but only getting around 140€ per gig and then when you do the audition, not be “good enough” to become a regular.
It’s a two class society.