In the wreckage that is the Minnesota Orchestra a lot of us have been throwing around ideas on what the next move should be. Many of these ideas are intriguing, some are debatable. A large part of these discussion have rotated around very simple ideas which on the surface seem no-brainers. Unfortunately, many of these are a trap.
My neighbor Richard, who has been mentioned in more than one of these posts, is very fond of a phrase which I have started to adopt: “There is a big difference between simple and easy.” This cropped up in a post on the SOSMN website on Monday. The SOSMN group has done yeoman work in support of the musicians of the Minnesota Orchestra, and to help find a way out of this morass. On the surface this post makes tremendous sense for this and other orchestras. However, the Devil is lurking in the details. The post revolves around the following ideas:
- Reduce ticket prices to grow audiences.
- Market to the young, but don’t dilute the product.
- Extend fund raising outreach beyond the rich, into the middle and lower class.
- Beef up outreach.
- Make the musicians part of management.
Very simple ideas, but under no circumstance easy. Let’s approach these ideas from the perspective of an administration of an orchestra. First, a few basic facts:
- Most orchestras are understaffed – yes, I have worked at the CSO, and yes I remember that at one point the development staff outnumbered the violins (both sections, I might add), but I’d argue strenuously that situations like that are the exception to the rule.
- Nobody goes into orchestra administration for the money – with the exception of a very few at the very top orchestras no one is making payments on that 70′ yacht in the Bahamas off of working in orchestra admin.
- It’s hard to attract top administrative talent to an orchestra – perhaps this should be a corollary to the point above. It’s hard enough luring top talent into the non-profit sector, let alone an orchestra. Between the pay (low) and the stress (high) it’s a recipe for burnout… and I’ve seen my share of folks burn out in this business.
- Everything you want to do requires the one thing you don’t have – excess cash. That outreach you want to do? It costs money. Same for everything else. The number of orchestras that can reach into their back pocket and just come up with $500,000 is awfully small. $1 million? Even smaller.
- No matter if you have the money the Master Agreement is going to handcuff you somehow – let’s face it, orchestras are very personnel heavy. People negotiate rules for employment. That just makes sense. But frequently those rules are a byproduct of the 1950s, not 2013. For example, the broadcast agreement that grew out of that golden age looks fairly ridiculous in today’s world.
There are other rules but I’ll stick with those for the time being. Now, let’s go back and look at that list.
Take ticket prices. In would seem self-evident that if you reduce ticket prices you can attract new listeners. Cheaper = easier to get people into your concert. Unfortunately this is frequently a short term fix that will actually cause even more problems for the organization down the road. Data tells us that although more people may initially come to your concerts, the retention rate of those patrons is apt to be fairly low. In addition, you are faced with the laws of physics. Any cyclist will tell you that heading into a 15 mph wind you will lose more time than you will gain moving with a 15 mph wind. The same thing applies to the laws of money. You have attracted more people, but because you have lowered the prices you end up with the same amount of money, and it is much harder to retain those who you have attracted. The pressure of your budget will at some point demand that you start raising prices again, and at that point you are back in the same conundrum you started in.
There’s another issue here. The odds are that the people you attract with lower prices are not going to be subscribers. Rather, they will tend to be single ticket buyers. Subscribers are, of course, the Holy Grail of orchestras, their very life blood. But single ticket buyers are a two-edged sword. It takes nearly twice as much work to market to and retain the attention of a single ticket buyer than a subscriber. They are very expensive, and although they translate into “butts in seats” the orchestra that relies on single tickets is an orchestra about to go dramatically into the red. Subscribers are much more loyal. They are much more committed to your organization, and they cost much less to market to.
So, instead of dramatically lowering ticket prices, do the exact opposite that most orchestras have done – put a laser focus on making your subscriber happy. Retain them, market to them, focus on them. That base will serve you much better than the fickleness of the single ticket buyer.
There’s another issue that is mentioned in a thread at the bottom of that SOSMN article which should be considered. In any cosmopolitan area there are those already predisposed to coming to your concerts who may not be able to afford it – I’m thinking specifically of private and public music teachers. By all means an excellent way of reaching that constituency should include lower ticket prices. These people are artistic partners in the best sense of the word, and they will help spread the good news about an orchestra to their friends, peers, and students.
Now, about market to the young, but don’t dilute the product – another simple but not easy conundrum. When it comes to diluting the product what exactly do you mean? If you look at programs from the 1930s-40s there is a large amount of music there which is no longer in the standard repertoire. Much of that music is considered ‘light classical,’ and therefore not suitable for today’s ‘established’ audience. Yet it is this exact kind of music that most people refer to when the word ‘dilute’ is tossed around, whether it’s some obscure Von Suppe overture or a collaboration with a ‘Pop’ artist. So, if you’re not going to program lighter fare, how are you going to market to the young? How are you going to market a Beethoven symphony in a way that’s different, that will compete with, God forbid, Miley Cyrus? What methods are you going to use for that new marketing? I assume an on-line presence, which requires a staffer(s) who can actually do something beyond posting to a Facebook page. You have to build a new marketing program from scratch, sell it to a fickle audience which has a lot of distractions (school, friends, Lollapalooza, etc.), and the odds are these will not be subscribers. This takes a lot of money and a lot of staff time, something usually not found in the world of the understaffed non-profit orchestra. It can be done, but it is definitely not easy.
A more long term fix would be for orchestras to actually invest in education, whether that’s an on-site institute, a partnership with schools, or whatever. Get them while they’re young and plant the seed, which also gets the whole family involved in what you’re doing. Unfortunately for most orchestras, which live from one budget season to another, this requires very long term thinking, something that will span generations. Expensive, hard work, and tricky. And, of course, orchestras and orchestral musicians will have to stop treating education like the redheaded step-child.
Extend fundraising outreach beyond the rich, into the middle and lower class – in a word, yes. But the only way to do that is to focus on why these two classes would willingly part with their money, something that impacts their bottom line much more than it does the rich. In order to give to something people have to believe in it. In order to believe in it they have to feel like they are valued and that this organization is an integral part of their life. In order for that to happen these people have to be subscribers. Unfortunately, if your organization has followed through with the whole lowering ticket prices idea you have pretty much decided to focus your limited energy on those single ticket buyers, and the intensive effort that will turn a subscriber into a donor is now probably out of the reach of your organization. I will, however, guarantee you that trying to turn that single ticket buyer into a donor is going to be a colossal waste of time, money, and energy.
Instead, focus on households and families. Find out what the sweet spot is for people who are able to come to the orchestra. From my own experience I know that there are dozens of things I’d love to be able to catch, whether concerts, plays, productions, etc. I also know that I probably have to shlep one of my kids to a lesson that night, and those damn children are bloody expensive! Therefore, I’m not surprised when I conduct a concert for people in their mid-50’s and beyond. They tend to have the time to get out of the house, the kids are grown, and hopefully by that time in their lives they are comfortably middle class.
Beef up outreach – ah, yes. How? Through music, of course, which by definition requires the co-operation of your musicians…. which in many, many cases will have you combing through the master agreement and asking the orchestra committee for some leeway. Many of the master agreements I’ve seen are very restrictive of this type of activity, and in every instance I’ve seen that outreach is going to cost you money. The musicians will expect to be paid, and there are only a handful of situations where that won’t be extra money outside of the normal concert budget. In order to do more outreach you will have to run counter to how most master agreements have developed over the past 40 years.
That’s for if you are planning something with individual musicians or small groups. If you want to do outreach with the whole orchestra that’s yet another ball of wax. Taking an orchestra anywhere is very expensive. When you break it out from within the yearly budget you have to add up all the musician’s salaries, stage crew, hall/room issues, staff time/salaries, and that’s just the fixed costs. Add all that up and before you’re out the door of your hall you are already into five figures, sometimes way into five figures. There better be one hell of a payback to this outreach for you to be spending this money which you probably don’t have.
And marketing? Marketing is bloody expensive. Unless you have a quid pro quo arrangement with either your local paper or a passel of radio stations said marketing is going to eat into your budget something fierce. Mailers are similarly expensive, even with non-profit rates. All this requires staff time, which translates as money. Even then, when the SPCO sends me a flyer it usually goes straight into recycling. It’s not that I’m not interested – I just don’t have the time.
Make the musicians part of management – also self-evident. There are models of this already in existence. But if the musicians are part of management who are they going to complain about? The conductor, of course. That’s the easy target.
I’m being facetious (I think). But consider this – not everyone is cut out to be a musician. Not everyone is cut out to do marketing either, and when it comes to serving on a Board of Directors? Following and understanding the intricacies of a multi-million dollar budget is by no means easy. Most musicians I know, myself included, did not take a statistics class in music school. On the flip side, though, is that this really is critical for the success of many organizations. It is worth it to have musicians involved in those decision making forums of an organization. Gone (or very much going) are the days when musicians could afford to sit be and be artistes.
This is not to say that all the ideas expressed in the SOSMN blog aren’t possibilities. The problem with them is not that they are simple, but rather that they are simplistic. Once you start delving into those devilish details you will find that most administrations have tried many of these ideas, to a varying degree of success. But with the staff they have, the resources available, and the pressure of making this strange beast which is the modern orchestra actually work, it doesn’t surprise me that their track record is less than stellar. Herding a stage full of musicians onto the same page when they’re actually supposed to be listening to me is hard enough. Herding an entire organization in a different direction is not…. easy.
Well said! This is one of the most thoughtful posts I have seen on the complexities of orchestra administration. These are challenges, and can be worked out in a musician lead organization, but they are large hurdles that require serous planning and transparency.
Hey Bill,
I am sure you understand this, but I want to make clear to your readers that SOSMN did not write that blog, they just reposted it, like most things on the SOSMN Facebook Page.
The blog in question was written by Jim Brinton and appeared here:
http://www.considered-opinions.com/147/
Thanks for an excellent discussion of the topics adressed in that article.
Warm regards,
Dave Assemany for Save Our Symphony
Absolutely understood. In many ways the thread AFTER is more interesting than the original blog. It does behoove us to throw these ideas out and about, though. These things need to be discussed.
Bill, good stuff here! Thanks for posting this.
Great post, Bill. On the issue of ticket prices and subscribers, I know it’s more expensive to court the single ticket buyer. But how do you balance that with the increasing speed of our lives (and kids’ lives) and finding some kind of middle ground? Do you need to get some affinity from people in the 20s to 40s group so they will be interested in being a subscriber when they have free time? Price shock moving from a single concert (i.e. splurge) to a full subscription would be huge.
I’d love to see new ideas around subscribers and affinity. Yes, I know about the 4 concert flex-pass type of solution. Is there anything else? Ideas??
And 100% agree with you on a laser-focus on subscribers, but are there other groups that also need that laser?
oh god yes. This is the Great Balancing Act that every orchestra faces. I don’t have a miracle solution, but wishing for your single tickets to make up for lost subscribers I think is a losing formula. If anyone has said miracle solution PLEASE LET THE REST OF US KNOW!!!!!
I would just like to also add that I became a subscriber to the SPCO five years ago or so when they offered their lowest ticket prices at $11 a seat. I am a clerical worker at the U of M and do not have a lot of extra money. My appreciation for the affordable subscription was to also make a small to them but big to me annual donation. I know the musicians and some of their supporters argued that the lower ticket prices were a mistake, but the orchestra won my loyalty by making space for me to come to their concerts. Don’t assume that lower ticket packages won’t do the same for the Minnesota Orchestra. I am not a subscriber to the Minnesota Orchestra because haven’t been able to afford it.
Great to discover your blog posted by Performance Day on my Facebook. Bill Doggett, here: another Black male in Classical Performing Arts. Im on the West Coast. Your points are so on target. Hope to connect with you and others on making some of these recommendations a reality. MUCH of what you say, I was also saying when a Founding Board member of Los Angeles Opera’s African Americans division of the Opera League in the early to mid 1990 Visit my website: http://www.billdoggettproductions.com
Strong points all. So is there actually a positive vision of the future that’s _plausible_?
I am involved with the Atlanta Shakespeare Tavern – theatre, not music, but in its own way classical. We have an unusually young audience demographic, and the root is our volunteer organization, half of whom are between 11 and 25. Some come with families (that’s how my kids started), some with school groups (service fraternities in college, for instance), and some on their own. We’ve found that they become comfortable in the theatre, and come back as paying customers on dates, even while continuing to volunteer other evenings. We don’t have the extremely wealthy patrons, but donations from middle and lower income patrons kept us going through the recession.
catch’em when they’re young, Ann. it’s stil the best way.
Great thoughts, as always. One fundamental problem with lowering ticket prices, of course, is that running an orchestra, as you pointed out in so many ways, costs money. Lowering prices for seats that would otherwise go unsold is a no-brainer. Lowering them for seats that would otherwise sell for more is financially reckless. That said, I’d love to see orchestras do more events that attract a new kind of audience or create an unusual experience, but that probably needs to supplement, rather than supplant, their traditional presentations.
You are so right that one reason you don’t see a lot of under-50s at symphony concerts is that, well, those people are parents. I’ve been a high-frequency concertgoer all my adult life, but now I have four kids under age 10. I’d love to go – and for something really extraordinary I will make the effort. But by and large I don’t have time; kids have swim workouts, soccer practices, and I’m simply needed around the house.
Many of the economic problems of orchestras would likely be solved if orchestras could play 5-6 performances of any program, thereby amortizing the fixed costs of their preparation over more revenue-generating events. Assuming, of course, that the marginal revenue from one additional performance exceeds the marginal cost of staging it.
Thank you for writing this! As a staffer at a chamber music organization who has been very closely following the MN Orch situation, I am so glad that someone has taken the time to explain these things. Before I started working in “the biz” these ideas that are being tossed around would have made a lot more sense to me than they do now while I sit in meetings discussing why our renewal rate for 3 pack subscriptions is so much lower than full season and why did all the 30-somethings quit buying a young professional subscription (including free drinks, valet parking and an after-party) when they turned 41 and needed to buy “grown-up” subscriptions (ticket only). As you state, these are all very complicated issues and even organizations who have had some success at one or more areas listed above may not have good explanations as to why. Unless they conduct thorough and of course expensive surveys of concert attendees. Which of course is another can of worms.
People will pay for the right content. As you say, may be simple, but is far from easy. When I played in an orchestra in Texas we played a lot of modern pieces one season, but our season ticket subscriptions dropped quickly. They were exciting for us to play, but not what our 60 year old typical audience player wanted to hear. You joke about Miley Cyrus, but there are more pop culture acts that may work with an orchestra. I have heard some very good orchestral concerts with Brandi Carlile and the Seattle Symphony. Those concerts fill the room, but probably don’t attract many season ticket holders. There needs to be a balance of new exciting music and the classics. But far, far from easy.
As a parent of young children, I would love to be able to have season tickets for us to go to the symphony, but between schedules and the very high price it is impossible. Music lessons are much cheaper and probably in the long run better.
There are problems. And there are possibilities. Every problem has a solution if the desire is there to find it. It’s like a recent post I saw by a music teacher on Facebook: “If you don’t want to learn, there is nothing I or anyone else can do to help you; if you want to learn, nobody can stop you.” I have faith in the musicians of the orchestra to set the general overtone and direction of the orchestra for the future. What we have found in our music-based business is that unless you tie in to the higher power of the ideal you wish to attain, you will spin your wheels financially. Tying into the ideal permits one to tap the higher calling for inspirations that can lead one to solutions that otherwise would not be evident. The musicians have already proven that money is not their primary motivation (no paychecks for a year is a pretty good indication where their heart is). I would trust their motivation to set the direction and find a workable way to get the job done. I would not trust a money manager who views the performers as 2 steps higher than a herd of cattle. Practicality certainly needs to be addressed, but without a firm purpose or direction, it’s like a cigarette boat in the middle of the ocean without a compass.
I think you bring up a lot of important points about how complex any solution to fixing an orchestral budget really is. However, speaking as a (relatively) young person, I disagree that bringing in light fare to classical concerts is the way to attract younger audiences, and I think this is a mistake being made all over the classical world. My perspective is that young people who are at all interested in classical music tend to approach it the way they approach many things – with fanaticism, idealism, and a certain know-it-all arrogance . . . We tend to be more attracted to deeply committed performances, vibrant interpretors, original works, and authenticity (a la Taruskin).
Competing with Miley Cyrus is irrelevant – young people interested in classical music probably don’t want to see Miley Cyrus, or if they do, they tend to see that as a separate part of their lives. We are the people who dared to be different from the popular crowd, so trying to make classical music seem more mainstream is not going to win any points with the people most likely to become dedicated followers and subscribers.
What about the SPCO’s lovely tactic of reducing ticket prices for multiple concert offers? They do it in packages of three just like our Beloved Metropolitan Opera. But being operatic, they call these things TRIOs…..and no, I don’t think they are thinking chamber music!~ LOL
Another thing, why not use current communication styles like flash mobs, splitting up the orchestra into movable ensembles and spreading them around the city and notifiying people by phone twitters or text blasts about the location where they can find the musicians, spread across the metro area in places not expected? One of the worst problems is the idea that everyone should come only to Orchestra Hall to find music. Music needs to be OUT THERE. That is why using current modes of communcation instead of regular avenues would be NEAT and inventive and spontanious, generating interest outside the box. Good the musicians were at Lake Harriet to begin with….
Bill,
Thank you for this INSIDER’S look at the enormous challenges facing the classical music world today. Could I just add a slightly different perspective from the angle of concert hall ARCHITECTURE–peripheral to the core musical and financial issues, but part of the mix. A little history.
(I’ve studied/taught art history for some time, but SUNG in choruses since high school–and am taking a conducting class at Cornell as we speak).
—————————–
The “LA Phil” is one of the best examples of a “turn around” strategy–pitch to the younger audiences, who have grown up in a world where classical music barely registers. You will have to WIN new audiences over.
Hiring Gustavo Dudamel, a youngish, AUTHENTICALLY inspired and inspiring conductor, openness to experimentation, new music, new formats.
TIMING was obviously kind to the LA Phil–opportunities to hire new conductors don’t fall out of trees–can be messy, if not by natural attrition.
Also, LA’s grand new Frank Gehry “Disney”performing arts center has been a huge help in this uphill battle. Long delayed–it was likely the result of a well functioning “early warning system,” within the LA music community–rich in music and musicians (Stravinsky worked there for years), but poor in “housing” for the arts.
See Richard Meier’s similarly iconic Getty Art Museum, also a crowning and highly visible addition to LA’s diverse arts landscape.
LA has had other issues. The “TINSEL TOWN” culture of the movie/tv industry tends to OVERSHADOW everything else. It sucks all the air–and money–out of the Valley, soaks up the philanthropic resources that the “other” arts could tap into, in a more “normal,” balanced city. Building Lincoln Center in NY or Kennedy in DC, were much easier lifts, I’d guess.
On the other hand, Hollywood has made LA a very “can do” place. So, once getting the stars to align, the Getty museum and Disney concert hall finally did happen–huge projects.
Typically missed by the history-challenged media, the Phil’s Gehry building is modeled after the Berlin Philharmonic, with it’s early “one of a kind,” 360 degree surround seating and astonishing acoustics (like a huge chamber music hall, you can hear individual instruments and sections distinctly, as well as feel close to the players).
The Berlin hall was designed in the early 1960’s by Hans Scharoun, an avant garde Expressionist architect from the inter war years–1920’s/30’s.
The other evocation of this interior format was the Dane Jorn Utzon’s “Sydney Opera House” (which actually is a performing arts center, housing the national symphony, theatre and ballet).
Unlike the Berlin original’s dynamic, supple interior, Sydney is visually rather “stiff” looking–just as the exterior “sails” of the Sydney roof line, echoing the boats plying the Sydney harbor, feel stiff, un-yielding.
(Hard to make concrete/steel “bend,” without the massive computer aids Gehry has had available).
On acoustics, I don’t know, personally. I believe there were controversies about acoustical retrofits–just as the (in)famous ceiling “clouds” installed, after the fact at the NY Philharmonic (or was it the Met?)
The Sydney project became so embroiled in politics that Utzon eventually resigned, late in the construction phase.
And the very public fights go on. The opera house Trust that now governs the building has stubbornly refused to let the “endpins” (that accept the spikes on the bottom of cellos and basses) be drilled permanently into the stage–a “national monument,” un-changable, the Trust claims.
(PS: On LA as contemporary music center: when I was a sophomore music major, and member of the Pomona College Glee Club, I well remember singing the Bruckner E-minor Mass, at the OJAI FESTIVAL, with other regional choruses, under PIERRE BOULEZ, another avant garde luminary attracted by LA).
On the “Early warning system” in LA. As the movie capitol, it is a town obsessed with audience appeal, feeling the pulse, tracking—and shaping—the slightest ticks in user tastes and preferences. A talent less natural to soulful music folk, but worth borrowing a page from their play book maybe–with less draconian, cash driven myopia.
VERY interesting. The “Pops”/classical-light idea is attractive and kind of mainstream at this point. But your take on the CULTURE of young listeners is surprising–and very plausible.
We assume we know how and what younger people are thinking–it’s a very different world for the one a lot of us grew up in. We need to stop assuming and LISTEN hard, seek out real people. Excellent!
Thanks for the lesson, much appreciated.
In Montreal, I once cruised by PdA (innocently unaware of the program) and ended up with rush-seat A1 (front row, middle seat) for likely my favorite violinist RenaudC for a mere $17.
That kind of good fortune is no longer possible here with the new sold-out hall, ticket prices through the roof.
That`s great for the OSM and those able to attend. No problem here about an orchestra folding, Hallelujah.
But the metro trains are packed tight as sardines with gazillions of folks (a lot of 20somethings)
completely missing out on the whole culture of this so-called classical music world and that is certainly a shame.
So I guess different cities have different dilemmas.
OK, subscribers, subscribers, subscribers…
20something subscribers ? Is this possible ? i.e. the ones who don’t have kids yet ?