ArtsWatch

Pretty pathetic. You'll never see a starving classical musician. Contrast that with visual artists. I guess a new multi-million dollar concert hall wasn't enough, now they need additional funding? 250K would fund dozens of visual arts organizations for the year. All this while art galleries are shutting every day and most visual artists are just scraping by. Lets just tell it how it is....Classical music organizations are bloated monoliths sucking up the majority of public and private funding while visual artists starve. Greed has no bounds. Shame on all of you.

I am very disappointed in the comment made that Classical Musicians are not "starving". I happen to be a Classical Pipe Organist and I am actually unemployed, coordinating a new arts festival with a friend, and attempting to finish my college degree in Music. Even church positions calling for Music Directors are not opening up.

Classical Musicians are hurting just as much as other Arts Professionals. The thing that is most wrong with Classical Music is the insular attitude it has. For example, as an Organist, churches and members of the general public love my playing. Yet, someone who is in cohorts with groups like the American Guild of Organists might not like the way I play. Classical Musicians have a hard time with people promoting them with certain bias: who plays more "technically" and "correct" might get elevated by his or her teachers and gain considerable promotion for their careers. One who wishes to focus on their own interpretations on pieces might be chastised by industry professionals, yet have a wonderful way with common laypeople that know what they like when they hear it. The same thing works with music criticism. A Music Critic may LOVE the way Diane Bish plays the Organ. Many Members of the AGO HATE her! In the words of the late and great Virgil Fox, "purists are those who talk because they can't do it"

BOTTOM LINE IS ALL ARTISTS ARE HURTING THESE DAYS. There is too much bulls*** and too much of a divide between us. We need to join hands, stop the insular attitudes, and deal with one thing: Emerging Artists and Small Arts Organizations are going to have to swallow pride and join hands to survive these days. Corporate Responsibility is starting to dry up: You can't even find a local winery to donate a case of wine for a fundraising dinner. Corporations are starting to encourage more Arts Organizations to solicit individual donors. Individual donors tell us to go apply for grants and do fundraisers. It takes money to apply for grants and do fund raisers. A good grant writer will want to be compensated for their services. It costs money to rent a venue for a fundraiser.

Professional Services are hard to find Pro Bono, even the Arts and Business Councils want some type of compensation for "volunteer" work.

Also of note is that Classical Music is aging. Let's just face it. The audience is dying. Yet, there are not willing attitudes to produce or present shows that are more interesting to younger audiences. For example, maybe dressing in simple street clothes and doing an Access performance is more interesting to young professionals.

Then you get into the whole thing with Academia. Curtis...Curtis......Curtis. Curtis is great. BUT I have heard musicians who are just as good from West Chester University, Indiana University of PA, and other "departments of Music". Yes, conservatories are great: I did some studies at one. But it's the person that makes the Artist...not the teacher. Students from Curtis and Temple will ALWAYS have a support structure for getting their names out there. Yet someone from West Chester University is viewed as more of a Public School Music teacher. They will always have some type of gigs going on. Heck, they go to Curtis for free!

If you ask me, I can turn the table and say that Visual Artists have more support than Classical Musicians do. This can be particularly noted in the Gay, Les, Bi, Trans community. Walk into Matthew Izzo's store or Absolute Abstract, and they've got all kinds of paintings up selling them for local artists at $500 and 600 a pop! They hold First Fridays, print postcards, and blast all their emails to affluent people to come see the works of the new artists all the time. But I don't know that I have ever seen them have a chamber ensemble do a tea or cocktail party in either of their venues. One other thing is that I know a visual artist that wants $2000 for one of his paintings! Maybe if he lowered is price, he would sell it. Something is better than nothing!

Having the attitude of Classical Music organizations as greedy monoliths is not going to get ANY of us who are emerging artists anywhere. What we need to do is join hands, use shed light on why the small unique organizations need to be valued, and stop being insular! We are ALL hurting right now...painters, pianists, vocalists...all emerging Arts professionals and all small arts organizations. Let's join hands and get some social change started within the arts to address these types of things!

Ben, your comment is very ignorant. You obviously don't know much about a life of a classical musician. I have seen MANY starving classical musicians, especially the ones right out of college. They accumulate so many loans from college that when they are thrown out on the street, they have over $50,000 of loans and the possibility of performing job is terrible. I have many classical music friends trying to get by that sometimes only have enough money to eat Ramen noodles. It may take over 100-200 auditions to land a half decent gig. The artists in the orchestra are not starving but they also worked SO hard to get where they are today.
You also must not know much about the orchestra. They RENT from the Kimmel Center. Yes, RENT. That means that they do not own the Kimmel Center in the least bit. The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts owns the Kimmel Center and rents it out to different organizations. You should get your facts straight before you comment ignorantly on items.
Thank you.