There’s been a change in the news coming out of symphony orchestras over the past summer. Usually there’s a background drumbeat of struggle as orchestras fight to stay alive. But for months now, the beat has shifted, and we’re hearing about orchestras that are not only surviving but thriving.
Yes, Fort Worth Symphony musicians are on strike, the Pittsburgh Symphony is in the middle of contentious contract negotiations, and the Philadelphia Orchestra is still struggling with crushing financial challenges. For every good news story below, there are other orchestras struggling to just stay alive, but here are some recently-reported successes:
- Colorado Symphony: “For the first time since it was organized in 1989, the Colorado Symphony is beginning a new concert season with a budget surplus, $1.7 million in cash in the bank and substantial financial commitments toward a goal of creating a $50 million permanent endowment.”
- St. Louis Symphony: “Total ticket sales for all performances reached $6.87 million, up 3.8 percent compared with last season. Even though there are three fewer concerts this year, attendance rose more than 1 percent to 190,817, officials said.”
- Kansas City Symphony: Kansas City Symphony Sets Attendance Records, Virtually “Selling Out” Its Season “The symphony reported a record of nearly $5 million in total ticket revenue for its 2015-16 season, with $2.9 million of that in subscriptions. Perhaps more impressive, the symphony series performances sold 95 percent of available tickets, on average.”
- Indianapolis Symphony: “After the bitter 2012 contract battle that led to a monthlong lockout for musicians, ISO cites a string of successes, including three straight years of budget surpluses and major growth in ticket sales and fundraising.”
- Atlanta Symphony: “The ASO announced yesterday that it closed the 2015-16 fiscal year with a budget surplus for the second straight year. ASO spokeswoman Tammy Hawk said the final budget numbers won’t be released until a final audit is complete. In addition, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Musicians’ Endowment Fund has raised over $20 million and is expected to reach its $25 million goal this year.”
- Omaha Symphony: “Symphony officials say subscription ticket sales for next season are 8 percent higher than they were on this date last year. Subscription revenue is up 9 percent so far. The fastest growth is in the Rocks and Movie Music series.”
In addition, the Buffalo Philharmonic has raised $23 million in endowment, the Detroit and Grand Rapids Symphonies have each raised $40 million for endowments and Kansas City is close to meeting a $55 million endowment campaign. In recent days Detroit has announced it’s starting a new amateur orchestra and rethinking a second performance space, and Buffalo has signed a new six-year contract with its musicians. Both Detroit and Indianapolis, which were in dire health just a few years ago, have impressively renewed and reinvented themselves. The Minnesota Orchestra, which lost a season to a bitter strike [lockout] a couple years ago, likewise seems to be recovering nicely. The Seattle Symphony has also been reinvigorated after a prolonged down period and seems to be announcing substantial new initiatives almost weekly.
It’s easy to cherry-pick successes and failures. It’s also easy to dwell on the bad stories and worry that they are cautionary tales. There doesn’t yet appear to be an obvious connection between these orchestras that appear to be doing well (aside from the fact all are mid-size orchestras or from mid-size cities). These stories might also not mean anything about the bigger state of the orchestra world. But I have been struck over the last several weeks by the number of good news orchestra stories we’ve been finding on ArtsJournal. In my experience, this is a change from the usual. Maybe not yet a trend, but who knows.
[Have I missed obvious other examples? Please add in the comments section below]
It’s insane you would construct an argument that these orchestras are “thriving” based only on dollar signs, with no mention whatsoever of the quality the artistry. Do you think American orchestras are institutions for meaningful and relevant music, or or they just poorly-managed hedge funds that we should be pleased to occasionally find in the black?
Good point. I obviously mean “thriving” in the sense of not just struggling to survive but growing audience and/or financial support. And I didn’t intend to equate this with artistic health. Are the Kansas City, Indianapolis or Detroit orchestras thriving artistically? Difficult to determine from afar, though each seems to be trying some interesting things.
I can make a related artistic argument though. The Philadelphia Orchestra, which I have heard somewhat regularly the past few years is a basket case financially, but has – in my opinion – rarely sounded better. It’s amazing to me that an orchestra can sound that good with all the turmoil going on around it. The Cleveland Orchestra, too, which seems to be holding its head above water financially, but just barely, is playing at a spectacularly high level.
Some other orchestras, desperate to survive, have obviously designed their programming to chase what they perceive will sell most tickets. They aren’t thriving artistically at all. Ironically, neither – usually – is the business side of the operation.
So artistic health is not necessarily always correlated with financial or managerial health. I think one of the problems in classical music is that while we have the “business health” side of the conversation all the time, we don’t have the “artistic health” conversation often enough. Partly this is because it’s a much more difficult conversation to have (for lots of practical reasons). But because of this, the artistic conversation is in rude health. You want to talk about artistic thriving, then being able to find a way to talk intelligently about what thriving is – would be a great place to start.
> I think one of the problems in classical music is that while we have the “business health” side of the conversation all the time, we don’t have the “artistic health” conversation often enough.
Perhaps true among the type of people who read ArtsJournal. But whenever I leave a concert, I hear actual audience members talking about the performance and the music, never the profit and loss.
Just one correction: The Minnesota Orchestra did not go on strike, they were locked-out by management.
I know Colorado Symphony plays a tremendous amount of Pops concerts which is probably a contributing factor to their resurgence. A chunk of people who have gone to their concerts have only witnessed pop shows and not the actual symphonic concerts. It helps financially, but I’m sure it’s probably not fun always playing pop shows.
The Colorado Symphony plays 20 subscription weeks and it’s pops series is full of symphonic repertoire. The major funders go to the subscription shows while the new audience and prominent new donors go to shows that feature Rock bands, movie music, comedy and hybrid classical shows. As a classical musician, can you honestly say that playing 35 plus performances of Beethoven 7 by the time you’re 40 is as rewarding as the experience of new repertoire? I for one would rather enjoy both the financial and artistic benefits of a stronger financial position than to rely on hope that people will just show up. Pops isn’t just a tribute to the eagles, it’s shows like a tribute to comic con, where orchestras are actually playing the music of todays most relevant composers.
The Colorado Symphony does play a fair amount of Pops. But earlier this year they performed Mahler’s 2nd Symphony, which was incredible. Their artistic health is quite well!
The Atlanta Symphony is thriving artistically as well as financially. Robert Spano and Donald Runnicles are excellent leaders.
I suspect that one reason several orchestras are doing better financially is simply because the overall economy is doing better; the financial struggles of a few years ago were partly the aftermath of the great recession.
Los Angeles seems to be doing all right,
No organization, institution nor Symphony Orchestra can survive on budget deficits – this is a fact of life!
Well done! Colorado Symphony, St Louis Symphony, Kansas City Symphony, Indianapolis Symphony, Atlanta Symphony and Omaha Symphony, and many more to come I most certainly hope
Our New Mexico Philharmonic rose from the ashes of the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra, which died not because the community didn’t want or support it, but because of bad management. The NM Phil is managing on a shoestring and does not pay musicians well at this point, but it is completely staying out of debt and is poised to survive for a long time to come. It’s not an ideal situation but we’re very glad to still have an orchestra. When NMSO went down, a lot of the city came together in support of the musicians, and most of the long-term players stuck with the city as well.
I’m a subscriber to the San Francisco Symphony, and it seems to be financially stable; on our nights, the house is full or mostly. I’m sure the less hard-core concerts–movies and their music; pops; holiday programs, etc.–help the bottom line. Like any other music goer, I too pay attention to its artistic “health.” What keeps people coming back? Michael Tilson Thomas keeps classical programming interesting,including new works and not well-known older pieces, The playing is consistently terrific, MTT is on a life-long Mahler tear and we avoid those concerts in our series. I always notice the audiences, and SFS seems to attract young people at a good rate, more than I’ve seen at concerts in other cities (including NY). Davies has a kind of dress-up, classy environment, and you can order a simple meal ahead of time to eat at intermission or beforehand. Add it all up–and SFS is very fine.
The Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra (& Music School) has experienced just under a decade of balanced budgets, and recent spectacular growth in audience. On the artistic side, it has never sounded better after 21 years under Music Director Larry Rachleff, who retires at the end of this season. A search is ongoing for his replacement. You need great governance, solid management, and great artistic leadership to be successful. You also have to continually take risks and re-examine your relationship with your community, as RIPO did when it merged with The Music School in 2000, and became the first successfully merged professional orchestra and community music school in the nation.