How much money does a music conductor make

Douglas Sheldon said in a recent interview. To summarize the tried-and-true tale: Costs are up, while ticket sales and donations are. Yet despite these troubles, the amount orchestras pay their conductors is confuctor. McManus said in a telephone interview after releasing the most up-to-date data on his blog, Adaptistration. At the top end, the numbers are well over the average. The numbers, drawn from tax filings, may over- or underestimate actual compensation because of the inclusion or exclusion of severance or deferred compensation payments, bonuses, and expenses and other perks. But he was outpaced for the No. Some of them are, indeed, a little bizarre.

Recording and Writing Music …

Great article in yesterday’s Chicago Tribune, on the almost football-player- level of salaries that the conductors and administrators of the big American orchestras receive. There is still a ridiculous iniquity in the way classical musicians are paid. That’s vastly more than any orchestral player in a comparable and comparably good ensemble in Britain could hope to earn, but it points up the proportional lack of player power in classical music: reversing the footballers’ paradigm for wild over-remuneration, it’s the conductors, AKA the managers, who receive exponentially more cash than their players. Precise figures for what British orchestras pay their maestros aren’t in the public domain; anecdotal evidence suggests it’s less than in the States, but the scale of conductors and soloists receiving many times more than rank-and-file orchestral players still holds. As John von Rhein suggests in his piece, this situation can’t go on forever in recession-hit America, where arts organisations, and especially its orchestral behemoths, are more vulnerable now than they have been for a generation. But the monstrous discrepancy between conductors’ and soloists’ salaries and those of the rank-and-file orchestral musicians remains. My favourite quote in von Rhein’s article is from CAMI, the only conductors’ agent who responded to his request for a comment that maestros are paid too much, who said the question should rather be asked of the orchestras, «as they are the ones paying the fees». It’s not exactly in agents’ interests to change the fee structures of classical music. It’s too easy only to blame those unseen fixers of the musical world, the agents, however: the system is clearly rotten. Perhaps, as von Rhein says, it’s a «quaint souvenir» of the Bernstein or Karajan decades, when money from recording contracts was the oil that kept the international classical music machine moving, producing ever higher fees for its star conductors. And maybe now is the time to change all that, and to create a more level playing field where musical responsibility rather than celebrity would be the baseline of how musicians are paid. In this country, I’d start by paying orchestral musicians more with the revenue that would be recouped from paying the stars of the podium less. Topics Classical music Tom Service on classical music. Reuse this content. Order by newest oldest recommendations. Show 25 25 50 All. Threads collapsed expanded unthreaded.

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Posted by StringOvation Team on Jan 10, Like any worthwhile pursuit, if you aspire to become a conductor there are certain steps that must be taken to achieve that goal. Many music students dream of leading a group of highly trained musicians using their own unique interpretations, but realizing that aim requires discipline. Since there are a number of marketable skills required for becoming a professional conductor, you need to plan wisely. These career path steps can help you outline what you need to learn, and how to arrange it. To be able to inspire the best performances from a group of musicians, you need the ability to communicate with players on their own level and understand their language. To become a conductor, you must have a love of music and its possibilities. Like musicians who are able to channel their feelings into their playing, an aspiring conductor needs to love music so much that they can effectively communicate their ideas to the group. Fortunately, there are a variety of music majors and minors to choose from, including conducting, in a number of universities. In addition, there are other aspects involved in a conducting career. Because you will be working with people, you need to know how to effectively communicate and inspire. Necessary skills include:. Although an education is essential, like most jobs, experience also ranks very high as a marketable feature. Productive ideas include:. Be open to all sorts of opportunities. You can also get your musical friends together and create small ensembles for practice. Informal gatherings offer great practice for everyone, especially those who want to become professional musicians. Aspiring to become a skilled conductor requires education, diligence, and fortitude. Students who plan to pursue this career can also get a head start on their journey by speaking with their music teacher or guidance counselor about current options, ideas, and the best schools to attend. Music Careers.

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Upload your resume Sign in. Find jobs Company reviews Find salaries. Upload your resume. Sign in. Orchestra Conductor Salaries in the United States Salary estimated from 26, employees, users, and past and present job advertisements on Indeed in the past 36 months. Last updated: January 15, Add a Salary. Most Reported.

How much is a conductor worth?

Copyright — ownership of songs and albums as creative works — is a riotous knot of rules and processes in the music industrywith the players much more numerous and entangled than the ordinary fan might think. For music listeners, a song is a song is a song. But for the music business, every individual song is split into two separate copyrights: composition lyrics, melody and sound recording literally, the audio recording of the song.

Sound recording copyrights are owned by recording artists and their record labels. Those parties may have nothing to do with the people who write the lyrics and melody of the song and thus own the composition copyright.

For the majority of times when somebody listens to a song, both types of copyright kick in, generating two sets of royalties that are paid to the respective parties.

Sometimes labels work with agents that can license bigger catalogs all at once, saving time and trouble but wedging in an extra fee. The specific percentage payouts within these deals depends on the type of service and the negotiating power of all the names involved. Putting music in film and television and commercials, a. A fee is paid upfront, and royalties are also paid once the particular film or television show has been distributed and broadcast.

The process is further different for radio services, though, which typically use blanket, buffet-style licenses that determine payment rates on mass scale. That difference — which the music industry largely considers an unfair loophole — means that whenever a song is played over the airwaves, it only makes money for its writers, not artists.

While album sales dwindle and streams may only pay out fractions of a cent at a time, live shows — be it tours, festivals or one-off concerts — are commanding some of the highest ticket prices. Another way musicians find side money is from YouTube monetization, wherein YouTube videos share in the profit from the ads that come tagged onto. Selling non-music products like perfumes, paraphernalia and clothing lines is an easy money-making strategy that artists have been taking advantage of for decades — but in the digital era, musicians can also get creative with their methods, expanding well beyond traditional merch tents at concerts and posters on a website.

More groups are releasing dedicated apps or subscription packages for their music or selling bespoke products like artist-curated festivals, email subscriptions and limited music releases. Pitbull has his own cruise. And yet, the average modern artist is still strapped for cash. By recent research estimates, U. Another reason: the sheer number of brokers, middlemen and other players in the music industry, as detailed.

Good news: The music industry has now accepted streaming as its revenue-leader and is poised to adapt around that, with many analysts and experts expecting that the business will streamline itself — with rewrites of law, new royalties negotiations, mergers, acquisitions and consolidations — into something leaner and, finally, more lucrative for musicians.

Bad news: No one knows when that will be. The buzziest word in music this year is the one that used to be the most utterly boring. Recording and Writing Music … For music listeners, a song is a song is a song.

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What Does a Conductor Actually Do?

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Most people have no idea what these maestros do outside the handful of concerts they lead each year. So it’s no surprise that the general population has little clue as to how much these conductors make each year, beyond the vague perception that it’s «a lot» of money. And it certainly can be. Feel free to take a moment or two to pick your jaw off the floor. Whether it’s the sheer amount of money or the wide margin in compensation for the conductors in Texas’ two major cities, the numbers can be startling. Every year, Chicago-based arts consultant Drew McManus raises the cone of silence on conductors’ salaries in the U. His annual findings, which come from IRS forms, are always keenly studied by people in the music business. His recent report, released in June, sent minor shock waves through the classical music scene by showing the wide salary gaps between conductors in major cities, and that large sum Dallas paid its maestro, Jaap van Zweden. Top salaries paid to conductors during the season, followed by the compensation awarded the Houston Symphony’s conductor, according how much money does a music conductor make adaptistration. According to the Dallas Symphony, the generous bonus «was funded entirely by a restricted gift from one individual given exclusively for this one-time occurrence.