Klemp, you talka too muich
Posted on March 12, 2010 at 1:21 am by Robert Levine
in General
Tags: Conductors
That was the punch line of what is likely an apocryphal story about an interaction between the great German conductor Otto Klemperer and an Italian principal oboe. Sadly, Klemp is not alone.
It must be hard to be a conductor, and I don’t mean that sarcastically. But one of the hardest things – judging by how few conductors have mastered it – is the art of not saying too much. No doubt the tradition (or myth) of the omniscient maestro, teaching the ignorant and faceless mass of musicians in front of him about the greatness of the art and getting them to play far beyond their innate musicality, is the source of much of the problem. Teaching involves a lot of talking, after all.
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Depreciation of Musical Instruments
Posted on March 11, 2010 at 12:41 pm by Bill Hunt
in Taxes
Tags: Depreciation, Taxes
Original question:Linda Ayres, March 6, 2010
Dear Mr. Hunt,
I’m an amateur musician. I don’t really earn any money playing the violin, but I play in a community orchestra that plays four or five concerts a year. We are very serious and we sound pretty good. I have the funds to purchase a better violin. Would I be able to depreciate the instrument on my taxes? I also know that old string instruments generally appreciate in value. Am I able to depreciate the violin even if it appreciates? Thanks for your help.
Lynda Ayres
Linda
Because you do not play your instrument as an income generating activity, your performing with the community orchestra would be considered a personal activity or a hobby rather than a business activity. As such, you would not be able to claim any expenses related to playing in the community orchestra, including depreciation on the violin. However, if the organization is listed with the IRS as a qualified not for profit organization, then you could deduct mileage to and from rehearsals and concerts as a charitable donation. Please note that persons engaged in a hobby that does generate some income can deduct expenses for that hobby up to the amount of income.
If you do find yourself in a situation where you are playing your violin professionally and earning income from this activity, then you could depreciate the instrument, but please read my article on polyphonic.org for more information, especially regarding older string instruments.
Thank you for your question and good luck with your next concert!
Bill Hunt
Musician Tax Questions
Posted on March 11, 2010 at 12:27 pm by Bill Hunt
in Taxes
Tags: Taxes
Original Question: Adam Franklin, Posted March 7, 2010 at 4:37 PM
Hi,
My wife works full time for an orchestra and receives all the benefits of such – predictable schedule, a contract for the year, insurance, etc. She receives a W-2 from them every January. She is for all intents an employee.
However, she also subbed for another much larger orchestra in another state this past year for about 12 weeks. These were anywhere from 1 to 3 week engagements. When she worked there, she was responsible for her expenses of travel, lodging, food. This added up to about 2500 miles round trip, a couple of flights, and around 70 days of meals. She received a W-2 from this group, even though she really didn’t enjoy any of the benefits of being an actual employee – she had no guarantees of work, no contract beyond 3 weeks, and definitely no benefits package. She did have taxes taken out and I believe pension contributions under the groups’ CBA.
What I am wondering is if she can treat this work and its expenses as any kind of self-employment and take above line deductions rather than fall under the unreimbursed employee business expense category, which creates a much more complicated situation – we would have to itemize her travel and costs for every ensemble rather than just the one she subbed with and a festival.
Does the Vienna Phil discriminate?
Posted on March 10, 2010 at 2:10 am by Robert Levine
in General
Tags: discrimination, Hiring, Vienna Philharmonic
The Vienna Philharmonic is touring the UK, and The Independent has re-visited the question of whether the orchestra discriminates on the basis of gender or national origin:
No commentsBernstein called it “that unbelievable orchestra, which plays like one hundred angel-fingers growing out of my hands”. Yet once Stravinsky immolates into silence, pause, for before you is a bald fact: an orchestra almost exclusively male and white. No other internationally ranked orchestra has so few women and non-whites: respectively three percent and zero per cent. The belief system surrounding classical music seems to reach its most conservative apotheosis in Vienna. The Philharmonic’s maleness and whiteness seems to remain as inviolable a part of its identity as the liquid legato of its Vienna horn. (more…)
I Get By with a Little Help from My Friends
Posted on March 5, 2010 at 11:35 am by Ramon Ricker
in General
The article that follows my comments is from The Minnesota Daily, the newspaper of the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis/St. Paul. It’s the first in a series profiling drug use on the UMinn. campus, and they start with music students.
Since the readers of Polyphonic.org are familiar with the orchestra world, it will be no surprise to you to be reminded that some musicians use beta blockers to calm their nerves in performance. It is well known that there is stress related directly to performance and playing an instrument. (more…)
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He has a dream
Posted on March 4, 2010 at 5:12 pm by Robert Levine
in General
Tags: Infrastructure
The General Director of the San Francisco Opera has a vision for the future of the company, and it’s…a multi-storied annex?
No commentsDavid Gockley has a dream, and it’s to transform a parking lot behind the Veterans Building into a multi-storied annex for the San Francisco Opera.
Of course, like any dream, there is a reality check. In this case, it’s about $60 million. (more…)
It’s an ecosystem, Maestro
Posted on March 4, 2010 at 9:35 am by Robert Levine
in General
Tags: Conductors
Riccardo Muti, who last week taught us (and the Met Opera orchestra) about Verdi, this week is teaching us about the value of some American orchestras:
No commentsThe Riccardo Muti era at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra officially began Thursday at Symphony Center, as the CSO’s 10th music director announced plans for his first season. He did so with a combination of relaxed good humor and expressions of serious concern for the role symphony orchestras, and classical music in general, can play in today’s troubled world….
“Symphony orchestras are the windows of a part of our great Western culture,” he said earlier when asked if he believes U.S. orchestras face extinction amid the serious economic woes of the great recession. “The big orchestras such as Philadelphia, Cleveland and Chicago cannot close their doors, because if that happens it will be not only a scandal but also a disaster for society. (more…)
Nice little pension plan you got there…
Posted on March 3, 2010 at 9:41 am by Robert Levine
in General
Tags: money
It’d be a a shame if something happened to it. Oh wait… something just did:
No commentsThe Pension Protection Act of 2006 requires the funding “zone status” for defined benefit multiemployer plans like the American Federation of Musicians and Employers’ Pension Fund (the “Plan”) to be certified each year by the plan’s actuary. The actuary for this Plan has advised the Plan’s Board of Trustees (the “Board”) that it expects to certify the Plan to be in “critical status” (also known as the “red zone”) for the Plan Year beginning April 1, 2010. (more…)
Resistance is apparently futile
Posted on February 28, 2010 at 10:06 pm by Robert Levine
in General
This article on composer/programmer David Cope and the compositional software he’s created is absolutely amazing:
It was here, half a dozen years ago, that Cope put Emmy to sleep. She was just a software program, a jumble of code he’d originally dubbed Experiments in Musical Intelligence (EMI, hence “Emmy”). Still — though Cope struggles not to anthropomorphize her — he speaks of Emmy wistfully, as if she were a deceased child.
Emmy was once the world’s most advanced artificially intelligent composer, and because he’d managed to breathe a sort of life into her, he became a modern-day musical Dr. Frankenstein. She produced thousands of scores in the style of classical heavyweights, scores so impressive that classical music scholars failed to identify them as computer-created. Cope attracted praise from musicians and computer scientists, but his creation raised troubling questions: If a machine could write a Mozart sonata every bit as good as the originals, then what was so special about Mozart? And was there really any soul behind the great works, or were Beethoven and his ilk just clever mathematical manipulators of notes?
Cope’s answers — not much, and yes — made some people very angry. He was so often criticized for these views that colleagues nicknamed him “The Tin Man,” after the Wizard of Oz character without a heart. For a time, such condemnation fueled his creativity, but eventually, after years of hemming and hawing, Cope dragged Emmy into the trash folder.
This month, he is scheduled to unveil the results of a successor effort that’s already generating the controversy and high expectations that Emmy once drew. Dubbed “Emily Howell,” the daughter program aims to do what many said Emmy couldn’t: create original, modern music. Its compositions are innovative, unique and — according to some in the small community of listeners who’ve heard them performed live — superb.
Regardless of whether or not you believe that these programs are capable – or could ever be capable – of producing works that really are “superb,” the issues raised by the article go to the heart of the nature of musical creativity.
New Article: Selling Bartok’s Blackbeard’s Castle
Posted on February 26, 2010 at 5:13 am by Ann Drinan
in General
We’ve published another article — about an amazing marketing success with a program that should have been hard to sell. Now, of course, our own Robert Levine, with Ilana Setapen, was featured on the first half playing the Mozart Symphonie Concertante, so that must have done it right there!
But seriously (no offense meant, Robert…), Bluebeard’s Castle is truly a hard sell. (more…)
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