Muti's flight

Yes, excuse me, but actually I wanted to send a message and that monstrosity popped up, then I couldn't manage to fix it. I don't know if it's my computer's fault or technical problems with the forum.

Anyway, I wanted to ask Ettore how I should interpret the title: Muti's flight and the statement: it seems like "marginal" news to me.

I confess that I would have preferred a more explicit exposition of Ettore's thought in order to then be able, consequently, to respond and give my opinion.

danielescarpetti wrote:

Yes, excuse me, but actually I wanted to send a message and that outrage popped up, then I couldn't fix it anymore. I don't know if it's my computer's fault or technical problems with the forum.

Anyway, I wanted to ask Ettore how I should interpret the title: Muti's flight and the statement: it seems like "marginal" news to me.

I confess that I would have preferred a more explicit exposition of Ettore's thought in order to then be able to, consequently, respond and give my opinion.

I also had some problems, not when I quote, but when I reply without quoting.

But what do you think about the video?

and it doesn't seem like such marginal news to me, at least from the perspective of Italian news. Muti is one of the greatest living conductors, and the unions of a Theater where the lowest paid person earns 2000 euros a month have created a mafia-like situation that would be unacceptable in many other countries.

And what about Thallo on an international level? Given that Muti is indeed one of the greatest living conductors (in the world)

IlChitarrista55 wrote:

I also had some problems, not when I quote, but when I reply without quoting.

But what do you think about the video?

I have problems both when I quote and when I don't. For example, just now, I went crazy trying to quote you.

Regarding the video, I think I can agree, in general terms, with the director of Repubblica.

As for the matter regarding Muti and everything that follows, instead, I agree 100% with Claudio, and I continue not to understand - my own limitation, naturally - where Ettore is going with this, and I invite him to be even more explicit once again, if he wants and can!

Even if briefly mentioned, this is the second time it has happened (Scala talk, just to review).

It doesn't seem to me that a policy of stifling theaters depends on the orchestral musicians; at most, they provided a convenient excuse for Muti to remove the nuisance. In fact, it must be considered that with the current financial crisis, Muti is not one to save money. If 1+1=2, then to me it seems like a story already written.

Guys, it seems that an exception has occurred on this discussion, I am forced to delete it. If you still have things to say, you can create another one. I will delete it tomorrow so that all participants can take note of it.

TheSimon wrote:

Guys, it seems that an exception has occurred on this discussion, I am forced to delete it. If you still have things to say, you can create another one. I will delete it tomorrow so that all participants can take note of it.

I moved the messages here following the new topic recreated by Ettore (the other discussion was a mess), let's see if it works like this so we don't lose posts

I think that, beyond Muti's right or wrong - and anyway it is limiting and, above all, misleading, to reduce his behavior to his whims - the problem is something else: the ungovernability and the situation of collapse in which our lyric institutions and music in general are in Italy.

And regarding ungovernability, one will have to ask who is responsible, starting - not only naturally - with the trade unions which, precisely as such, should have a much broader and more far-sighted vision of the situation if they truly want to fulfill their task: safeguarding jobs and safeguarding musical life in this tormented country, and not closing themselves off in ideological or, even worse, corporatist motivations.

Tugging on a rope when it is completely frayed is equivalent to breaking it. And when it has broken... ciao!

The problem was the topic, consequently I think they shouldn't have problems now. In case, let me know and I will look deeper into it...

For me, it is also a matter of principle. If you are a starving person and the Pope passes by the street where you beg, perhaps you might not care at all about the Pope. But if you are someone who does good, well-paid work, fights for rights (legally), and yet in your class struggle you deny yourself one of the most beautiful opportunities of your life—specifically, working for years with Muti—then you should start to understand what truly matters.

I will begin my philippic and say that I do not like this era of 'grillismo'. Everything is monetized; Muti is not one of the greatest living conductors but someone who takes a lot of money; playing in the Orchestra of the Rome Opera is not a lifelong dream but just any job to nitpick at every time. Shall we tell things as they are? The Orchestra of the Rome Opera is a second-rate orchestra, the Rome Opera chorus is a second-rate chorus, the entire artistic and technical organization isn't worth a fingernail of what, I don't know, the MET's is worth. And the confirmation of this is that they themselves live not as artists but as workers; they experience their Theater not as a place of formation and expression but as an office. Let us repeat again that Muti's arrival did not force anyone to give anything up, it did not lead anyone to work 8 hours a day, to carry sacks of lime or to (OH MY GOD!) redo auditions or study more. The protests in the Theater are not made by precarious workers, they are made by those with permanent contracts, who are the only ones represented by unions.

And Muti's [arrival] is not an escape.

Perhaps Ettore wants to provoke, but I am not quite sure how much it has been understood that Muti IS one of the greatest living conductors. Perhaps if I repeat it enough it will be understood: Muti is one of the greatest living conductors, and he was also 10 years ago and 20 years ago; he is someone who made musical interpretation history, someone who, if he tells you to *go screw yourself, perhaps it is time for you to reflect on what you have done, because from people like that, one can and must learn.

thallo wrote:

I am starting my philippic and saying that I do not like this era of grillismo. Everything is monetized,

At the risk of sounding boring, I will say once again that I completely agree with Claudio.

However, I would like to pick up on this part of your speech to say that someone might retort that today we are in a time of renzismo and not grillismo. Someone, mind you, not me!

In reality, both grillismo and renzismo—and even before that, berlusconismo—are many faces of our beloved Italy, faces from which we cannot emerge because...

Personally, I continue to think that among the many jinxes in which we like to immerse ourselves, renzismo—conditional is absolutely mandatory—could be the beginning of a faint light in a tunnel that never ends. While waiting to ascertain whether it will be so or not, let us all start doing our duty and crying about ourselves a little less and thinking that anyway, the fault is always only others'.

Rome Opera: after Muti's departure, hypotheses of "outsourcing" the artistic masses.
That is to say: moving the relationships with the orchestra and choir outside the perimeter of management responsibilities.
You form a nice cooperative among yourselves. Every year I, the Theater, will make you a nice small contract under agreement for the season, and I will patrol a fixed amount to be paid to the cooperative. All-inclusive, not a cent more.
Then for the musicians' and choristers' salaries, for overtime, travel expenses, allowances, you deal with it yourselves, I don't want to know anything.
Do you want to hire them in Albania, in Romania, in China, where they cost less?
It's fine with me, as long as they play and don't strike.

I believe that if we get into discussions related to politics, we won't come out of it alive. Mentioning the economic issues underlying certain choices is almost obvious in the sense that we live in the era of the euro currency. The introduction of the euro gave us a strong currency which should be a positive factor, if it weren't for the fact that this has made us uncompetitive for exports and very competitive for imports; essentially, having a strong currency makes it profitable to buy from abroad cheaply, but you can't manage to sell. It is as if a warrior had a very massive and sharp sword, but the fact that it is massive makes it very heavy and difficult to maneuver; we are slow to move, and all it takes is the first idiot with a Swiss Army knife in hand to manage to slit our throat. From here, it is easy to say that if money is taken out of here, nothing ever remains for us and the debt increases, which leads to the fact that when hiring is necessary, people prefer to do it with non-EU citizens who, being used to the salaries of their own country, find that earning 700 euros here is a huge amount for them. Many non-EU citizens have come here to Italy to work like 'slaves' [censored] for 10 years, living like nomads in groups of 20 inside the same house to build up a nest egg, return to their country and buy buildings to then rent out apartments and live off the income...

This is a real problem for us Italians, but with this discussion I do not want to say that Claudio is wrong when he says that orchestral musicians should experience the theater as a place of training rather than as an office. I am only saying, however, that this should require some kind of mental serenity. Honestly, I would not be able to perform my job well if I had the thought in my head that everything could end next year. This also applies to those doing research at the university. After the Gelmini law, researchers all have annual renewable fixed-term contracts. How can one think about conducting research under these conditions? There are research projects that last more than a year; what do we do if we have started a research project and the contract is not renewed the following year?
The commitment must be mutual.

Then certainly things need to be corrected, this is the era of Renzismo... I don't want to offend anyone, but it seems to me that this premier, besides buying votes with 80 euros, has not yet done anything positive for this country. So far, I have only read and heard promises; the 80 euros were just an electoral maneuver that many fell for, especially since he gave 80 with one hand and took away 300 with the other (see the removal of IMU on the primary residence in favor of TASI - Tax on Public Services; I would be tempted to ask: "which services?"; anyway, calculated on the cadastral income of the house, just like IMU, but for 80% of the population it entails an increase in expenses in the order of 35-40%).

This politics made of tricksters who want to scam Italians has had its time. From the world power records of 20 years ago, we have moved to collecting all the negative records. We need to take a different path and make a radical change of direction; otherwise, the crash is just around the corner, and I will tell you that I am anxiously awaiting it.

let's not go off topic

It seems more interesting to me, rather, to try to understand what this outsourcing implies. There are many "regardlesss". The first is regardless of the fact that, in my opinion, it won't be possible to do it, because there are still many permanent contracts at the Opera di Roma and this would mean either waiting for their conclusion or outsourcing "parts" of the orchestra and the employees, with a consequent fierce union struggle, given the disparity in treatment; another regardless is the fact that this outsourcing already exists in many realities, not only for administrative roles, cleaning services, promotion etc. (which perform work just as much as the orchestral players), but also for choirs and orchestras: in fact, Aslico, the association for which I work as a choir artist, is a subject "other" than the theaters for which it operates, and the same orchestra that plays during the season of the Lombard lyric circuit is a sort of "subsidiary" of the Pomeriggi Musicali, an orchestra completely autonomous from Aslico and again from the circuit's theaters. From this, I don't see this scandal: these are contractual and artistic forms present in Italy and elsewhere, which have not resulted in the death of art.

Setting aside the "regardlesss", there are, however, consequences. Goffredo spoke of those economic-contractual ones, which are not as heavy as he said, given that in Italy regardless (again) of the company you work for, rather protective national contracts apply. Working for a theater like the Opera di Roma, then, would allow for de facto stability. The pessimistic perspective of an Albanian immigrant cooperative that begs in the subway by day and plays in the theater by night is folklore.

The first artistic consequence that comes to mind is that of common Artistic Direction. Every Orchestra has an Artistic Direction, which decides together with the administrative management how to manage and program concerts, rehearsals, travel etc. Despite the administrative entities being different (between orchestra and theater), the artistic direction in the case of outsourcing should effectively be common, since a Theater like the Opera di Roma has an entire season to program. The idea behind this choice is to make bargaining, dismissal, hiring freedoms more flexible, and indeed in this way there would be the possibility to dismiss more easily, to manage personnel more flexibly. But the personnel remains the same, and the Theater needs that personnel. It is possible that the first flute can organize their own tour without asking permission from the Theater Management, but certainly the Theater will need that first flute for the entire season. It would be different if the hypothetical "Associazione Orchestra Romana" were so large as to be able to deal with other things too, just as Pomeriggi Musicali does in Milan. In that case, the Opera Theater would only be one of the Orchestra's clients, and therefore there wouldn't be a single orchestral staff but multiple formations: one plays Traviata in the theater that evening, the other is in Tivoli performing a concert in an Auditorium. And, obviously, I cannot keep everyone on permanent contracts; I will call them according to my needs, based on how many concerts I have in that period. But the moment at least one of the clients is the Opera di Roma Theater, which is a mammoth structure, which needs to PROGRAM a high number of rehearsals in advance, which has a need for a stable staff for the whole year, then I don't think there will be major problems with precariousness

http://www.ansa.it/sito/notizie/cultura/musica/2014/10/02/opera-romacda-licenzia-orchestra-e-coro_4388b2a5-9e1e-4f81-80f6-2b90b3711801.html
Teatro dell'Opera di Roma licenzia coro e orchestra. Franceschini: "Passaggio doloroso ma necessario"

QUESTION: if Muti hadn't resigned, would it have turned out this way?
Now that they no longer have to pay Muti a contract that I imagine is costly, shouldn't the Theater's finances be better? How is it that NOW it turns out that the accounts don't add up, to the point of firing everyone or closing up shop? The thing has an unmistakable flavor of mass punishment, like the sergeant from Full Metal Jacket.

I find it significant that in an Opera House, all the artistic masses are laid off, while on the contrary, the stagehands, administrators, secretaries, managers.... i.e., the ruin of the Theaters (many of whom were placed in permanent roles by the Superintendent or the Artistic Director in charge!!) remain firmly in their positions.
I believed that a Theater lived thanks to those who practice art; evidently I was wrong!!
This is a NATIONAL DISGRACE that will see us, as always, all stunned and furious for a week, and then everyone will only look out for themselves as always... I would say instead it's time to stop being solidary only on the WEB! (I have read certain messages on Facebook) This is an extremely serious act for all of us musicians, and I believe that from tomorrow all theaters should stop to halt this outrage!
I hope that even the union, in its multiple forms and acronyms, is ashamed for having brought the state of music and musicians to this point!!

I totally disagree with Tiger and Dino