I am currently a dynamic harpist-about-Europe. I'm all too familiar with the extras that touring can involve; excellent initiatives, like playing to sick children. But the main reason we musicians do it is pure, crispy wonga. British orchestras receive much less public funding than their German rivals. Musical Brits, therefore — saving the orchestra money on sick pay, holiday and pensions — often freelance. No play, no pay: they cannot afford, as Clark writes, "to down tools."
Being freelance has made British musicians the Polish plumbers of music. We are on time, hard working, good at what we do, and with an endless supply of similarly-named friends whom we organise to cover if we cannot work. Of course we are easy to work with. If we don't work, we don't eat. But that isn't the only reason.
Not getting paid if you are sick or perform badly is an effective motivation technique. It helps one to keep fit, and be good at one's job, whether you are an individual or a hard jobbing harpist. This means that we Brits also have better institutions. The LSO isn't any cheaper than the Munich Philharmonic fo a punter, but it is less hassle on tour. Not for us the way an American orchestra sends an advance party to check conditions. Certainly the LSO would have little use for their contracts, which can run to thirty pages; a British contract, generally runs to two. The Philharmonia - a Britsh outfit managed by David Whelton, who said in the FT that "the thing about London orchestras is that the harder they work, the better they play" - didn't get a hotel at all on a tour to Scotland a few years ago. The musicians got a Per Diem instead and were told to organise their own accommodation. Many decided to couch surf, and pocket the difference.
But all of this hassle free fly-by-nightism has its downsides. The well organised Germans have over 200 employed orchestras - I suppose, about 30,000 jobs, in contrast to Britain's 1000 (there are also about 1000 graduating from music college every year, who want those jobs). When you have a job, you are allowed to be sick - you simply ring in, say "ich habe kranke", and go on watching Germany's Got Talent. In Britain, a show recently forced me have a flu jab to keep me healthy for the 10-week, 2 x 3-hour shows a day-with-no-days-off Christmas run. Harpists are very important, i like to think. But they aren't allowed to get sick either.
So, yes, British musicians are free market heroes. Yippedee-doo-dah. Reader, at this point in music journalism there usually follows some pious moaning about the artistic price of freedom. I was going to leave it out, because I accept that the world doesn't owe musicians a living. But given that David Whelton in the FT article said "the harder they work, the better they play", here goes.
What is this? Colditz? British musicians play unbelievably well under the worst conditions in the world, but if you go and hear the Berlin Staatsoper, where they are not knackered, you will hear the difference. I simply don't understand Clark's assertion that in our touring orchestras
"repertoire and personality act as a palette-cleansing antidote to the week-by-week offerings of local ensembles in the host country."Orchestras tend to offer more conservative programmes abroad than at home, safeguarding ticket sales. The Philharmonia are currently touring Japan with Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven and Sibelius - wonderful music, but hardly cutting edge. The LSO are also in Japan with Rach 3 - you know, the one from the film - and Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Overture - that's the one from the World Cup. Its daring stuff. Meanwhile, the Munich Philharmonic are performing Des Canyons aux Etoiles for the first time ever at home, as part of a big Messiaen series.
But what does this have to do with my work as a jobbing freelance harpist, schlepping the length of Europe to be ignored as posh wedding background muzak? Freelance conditions are great for employers and tour promoters. In the salaried havens of lower Bavaria, our theatre haemorrhages money on freelance deputies for "sick" musicians. You can tell the sick quite easily - they are the ones you see later that day cheerfully going round the garden centre. One colleague managed to argue there was no suitable candidate for his paternity leave cover, and is now being paid extra to play instead of himself. But this sort of thing could be easily stopped: you don't have to turn everyone out onto the snowy freelance moor. Yes, Britain's freelancing creates a "can-do" culture, which is good; "must-do" is another matter, and I'm not sure - were the FT to ask the musicians, as well as their managers - what side of the line many tours fall.
The sort of hard work Whelton describes is done by young, fit, hungry musicians, who fly to Lisbon, rehearse, play the concert and fly home the same day (a so-called "hit-and-run", in the biz) fuelled by adrenaline, alcohol, caffeine and illicit sex. Eventually they burn out and leave, or try and get an opera house job where there is no more touring.
Whether it is a manager's job to care is debatable - there will always be a fresh supply of young players for the next tour. Still, people become how they are treated, and this rubs off on the music. In the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, some British musicians walk after one project because they can't believe that the musicians are prepared to go half an hour over time at rehearsal for the sake of the music. They are worked so hard, that they won't go an inch further than they absolutely have to. In the long term, that's not something over which to rub your hands in glee. But at the moment, British orchestras have no other choice.
The British harpist Helen Right lives in Munich.
