Monthly Archives: June 2008

Jun 12 2008

Long Way Round

I want to buy a motorcycle.

No, it’s not a mid-life crisis. We recently watched the ten episodes of Long Way Round on DVD, and I’ve got the adventure bug. For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been dreaming about picking up a nice BWM R1150GS, getting a few maps together, and setting off on the open road.

If you haven’t seen the series, you really should check it out. For 16 weeks in 2004, Ewan McGregor and his friend Charley Boorman travelled 30,000 km from London to New York by motorcycle. It’s a buddy picture, a travelogue, and an homage to big, powerful machines.

The highlight of the series is episodes 5 through 7, as Ewan and Charley drive through Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and Russia to the Siberian coast. The scenery is beautiful, and their interaction with the locals they meet en route is very honest and compelling. As the roads become practically impassable, I really felt their sense of frustration and accomplishment.

In fact, if the series has a shortcoming, it’s that the emotional climax comes three episodes too early. After they’ve traversed the rugged Road of Bones and finally arrive in Magadan, it feels like the natural conclusion of an epic journey. The next couple of hours, which follows them down the paved highways of Alaska, Canada, and the U.S., almost feels like an afterthought (although seeing Ewan get hit by a young idiot driver in Calgary was pretty funny).

What really struck me was the obvious friendship that exists between Ewan and Charley. They’re very likable guys, and really seemed to support each other through the trip. We’re so conditioned to viewing celebrities in sterile settings that it almost seems ridiculous to watch a famous actor like Ewan sleeping in a hut in Mongolia or straining to push his bike out of a muddy rut.

Their trip made me envious on a couple of levels. First, it’s been a while since I’ve had a real adventure. You know, one of those life-altering experiences in which practically every second is seared into your memory. I suppose it’s natural that at a certain point domestic responsibilities take priority over more engaging pursuits, but I recognize the need for some degree of risk. The orchestra’s Asia Tour was going to fill that void, but I managed to dodge that bullet.

Second, watching the bromance between Ewan and Charley was a reminder of something that’s been missing in my life for a while. While I had a number of really close guy friends in school that I could count on for some testosterone-fueled mischief and mayhem, those opportunities have dwindled over the past decade.

The obvious solution to both issues is getting a motorcycle. There’s the instant bonding between bikers, as exhibited in rallies, clubs, and the donning of gang colours. There’s also the element of risk and adventure, with road trips, rain-slicked roads and cigarette smuggling. In the meantime, I’m going to rent The Wild One and Easy Rider and live vicariously through Brando, Fonda, and Hopper.

Jun 6 2008

The Broadway Movical

B and I will be travelling to Long Island in July for a wedding, and we’re hoping to spend a day in Manhattan before heading home. It’s been suggested that we see a Broadway musical, so I began looking at a list of shows that will be running.

I was immediately struck by the number of shows that have been adapted from Hollywood movies. I know there’s been a fair amount of sharing between the two genres for decades, but the trend really seems to have exploded in the past few years. I guess with the incredible cost of mounting Broadway shows, producers are looking to minimize financial risk by avoiding artistic risks.

Some of the adaptations make perfect sense. I can see how movies like Beauty and the Beast, Mary Poppins, Billy Elliot, and Hairspray could make the transition from screen to stage pretty easily. However, some of the other shows strike me as pathetic cash grabs. Do we really need Legally Blonde: The Musical? Does Shrek The Musical really advance the art form?

I understand musical versions of The Wedding Singer and Weekend at Bernie’s are also under development. Seriously, Weekend at Bernie’s? I guess they couldn’t get the rights to Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.

Notably absent from the list of movie adaptations is the greatest musical written in the past decade. Of course I’m referring to South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut. No other work in recent memory can match its combination of crude humour, memorable songs, and political satire. I can’t believe it hasn’t hit Broadway yet – perhaps the Great White Way isn’t ready for a show highlighted by Saddam sleeping with Satan.

We actually went to see an honest-to-God original musical the other night. A touring production of The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee pulled into town, and staff were offered comps on account of its dismal sales. Although it lacks a signature song, it was a funny, fast-paced show that made for an enjoyable night out. Given the poor sales, however, one has to wonder how many more original musicals will be coming through in the future.

Jun 5 2008

i deal coffee

I’d like to publicly apologize to i deal coffee. Since this little coffee shop opened on Dalhousie nearly three years ago, I have made a number of derogatory comments to my wife about the place. “It’ll never last.” “Who’s going to go to that shack when there’s a Starbucks and Bridgehead just up the street?” “Good luck surviving at this end of Dalhousie.” That kind of thing.

In recent months, though, I’ve grown tired of the inconsistent coffee at most of my regular haunts. Paying $4.00 for a bad latté at Starbucks started to seem foolish, and I was willing to forgive Tim’s for its watery brew until Roll Up The Rim To Win season came to an end.

So, a couple of weeks ago, I stopped by i deal coffee on the way to work and fell in love with the little place. It’s the antithesis of the shiny, modern coffee conglomerate. The furnishings are spartan – just a few booths, an old Ms. Pac-Man game in the corner, a large bean roaster, and a grinder. The vibe is funky and relaxed, with cool music streaming from a laptop.

The coffee is great. The beans are roasted and ground on site, so the coffee is really fresh. A large coffee, in a plain Styrofoam cup with absolutely no advertising, is just $1.50. The scones come from the local bakery instead of being trucked in from the pastry factory in Toronto. It’s a little oasis in a busy part of town.

So why didn’t I try i deal earlier? I blame it on a lack of character on my part. I fell for the marketing hype – “Starbucks is a lifestyle, not just a cup of coffee.” I gave hundreds of dollars to a big corporation and didn’t give a cent to the little independent place I passed every day on the way to work. For shame, for shame.

As it turns out, i deal coffee has developed a great reputation. It originally started in Toronto with a shop in Kensington Market, and coffee geeks sing its praises on on-line forums. With four shops, it looks like there are a lot of people who are turning away from the usual suspects in search of something tastier and more socially responsible. I’m just sorry it took me three years to get there.

Jun 3 2008

Orchestra Salaries Part 2

There’s a moment in every musician’s life when you realize it’s possible to get paid doing something you love more than anything else. I can still remember the thrill of getting a cheque for $30 for my first MPTF concert when I was a teenager. I felt so mature getting paid to play Oktoberfest gigs in my uncle’s polka band. I couldn’t believe my luck when I found out the Kingston Symphony was going to pay me for rehearsals as well as concerts. What a great way to make money.

As one gets older and starts considering a career in music, the reality becomes a bit more grim. In this country, only a handful of orchestras pay what I consider a decent salary. For the most part, musicians are severely underpaid, especially when you consider the amount of training, skill, and commitment required.

The NAC Orchestra currently enjoys the highest minimum annual salary in Canada. A base musician earns $79,000 for a 46-week season, although a lot of musicians make more than that due to overscale payments, electronic media fees, and extra fees for doubling. The orchestras in Toronto and Montreal used to be in the same range, but their salaries have fallen back a bit in recent years. For the sake of comparison, the Boston Symphony has the highest minimum annual salary this season in the U.S. at almost $123,000.

The majority of orchestra musicians in this country aren’t so fortunate. Most professional orchestras in Canada pay minimum salaries between $25,000 and the low $40′s. With fees that low, it’s basically a necessity to pick up teaching jobs and other playing engagements to make ends meet.

A couple of months ago, I came across a job posting for Principal Percussion of the Victoria Symphony. If I was still pursuing an orchestral career, that’s a job I would be very interested in. Rather than a weekly fee, the position provides a guaranteed number of services. Total guaranteed fee? Just over $21,000 a year. Median price of a single-family home in Victoria? $545,000. Sigh.

The starting salary for my first admin position ten years ago, with my complete lack of experience, was $35,000. While not a huge sum, I do find it odd that I was making more than professional musicians with years of experience in some pretty decent orchestras. No wonder part of me felt like I was selling out.

This post made me think of something Michael Hovnanian wrote on his blog a while ago. He described his evolution from beginner to sophisticated professional as follows:
1) wanting to hear myself play
2) wanting others to hear me play
3) wanting to be paid to play
4) wanting to be paid not to play

At the other end of the salary spectrum, Drew McManus continued his 2008 Orchestra Compensation Report today with a post on Music Director salaries. Click here to find out which maestro earned $2,189,455 in 2005-2006.

Jun 2 2008

Orchestra Salaries

Drew McManus at Adaptistration.com is publishing his annual Orchestra Compensation Report this week. Over the next few days, Drew will be posting salaries for Executive Directors, Music Directors, Concertmasters, and core musicians from a large number of U.S. orchestras.

In the U.S., non-profit organizations like symphony orchestras file tax forms that are made available to the public. By using guidestar.org, it’s possible to look up your favourite orchestra and get information on the highest-paid employees – usually the Music Director, Concertmaster, and Executive Director / CEO. Fortunately for us lazy folks, Drew does all the leg work by gathering up this information and publishing it in a number of handy charts.

Even after ten years in the business, I’m still astounded by the amounts of money that are involved in the big (and not-so-big) U.S. orchestras. For example, the average salary of the top ten Executive Directors in 2005-2006 was almost $529,000. Sure, it’s an incredibly demanding job to run a major orchestra, but that still seems like a lot of money to pay someone running a non-profit.

There are some surprises on the list. For example, the ED of the Colorado Symphony received $282,000 while his counterpart at the Dallas Symphony earned a more modest $265,000, despite the fact that the Dallas Symphony’s operating budget is more than twice as big. Even a mid-size orchestra like the Fort Worth Symphony pays its top executive a salary in excess of $270,000.

The picture is quite different in Canada. Although you can’t find salary information for employees of Canadian orchestras, I can assure you the salaries aren’t in the same league. Don’t get me wrong – it’s possible to earn a very decent living running an orchestra in this country, but you’re certainly not going to get rich doing it.

I sometimes find the wage gap between base musicians and the top executives a little disturbing. When I was talking to a headhunter for an orchestra in Southern Ontario last year, one of the concerns I had was the job paid about five times more than the base salary for musicians. That’s a pretty huge gap, and part of me wondered whether I’d feel any guilt about the obvious discrepancy. (Dear potential future employer who has found this post: I no longer bear any such concerns).

If you think it’s only the suits who are making a lot of money in U.S. orchestras, don’t worry. In the next few days, Drew will post salary details for Music Directors and Concertmasters. Let the griping begin…