how much do orchestral musicians earn? - Part II

As I mentioned in the previous post on musicians' earnings, it's not easy to find out how much British orchestras pay. But from what little information is publically available, the conclusion must be that it's a lot less than the six-figure salaries offered in the US.

The majority of British musicians aren't even salaried as such at all - freelance arrangements prevail in many of the top UK orchestras. That means they are paid only for the concerts (and related rehearsals) they play in. Freelancers' pay may on the face of it appear a little higher, but they tend to do without certain benefits that salaried employees take for granted - pensions, sick pay and paid maternity leave amongst them.

A few British orchestras do put their musicians on the payroll. They include the BBC Orchestras, CBSO, ENO Orchestra, Hallé, Opera North Orchestra, RLPO, RSNO, Scottish Opera Orchestra, Ulster Orchestra and Welsh National Opera Orchestra. In these organisations, the majority of the musicians are salaried, and freelancers will be brought in as and when necessary to cover. 

The wage agreements of these salary-paying orchestras are not publically available, but a look at their annual financial statements gives a good idea of what pay levels are like.

The Halle Orchestra's accounts, for example, show that for the year to 31 March 2009, there were 107 employees, including 77 orchestral musicians, with a total salary bill of £3,231,000 - making an average of about £30,000 a year. The CBSO's accounts (which also include a detailed costs breakdown) show a similar picture, with an annual orchestral pay bill of about £3m.

For some other organisations it's harder to work out what's going on. Amongst the most secretive are the ENO, whose accounts for the year to 31 March 2008 (the most recent they have made available), show there were 391 employees including 82 music staff with a total pay bill of £10,847,000. That's it, no further details.

But for the majority of orchestras, freelance arrangements prevail. Many of these organisations subscribe to the pay agreement of the Association of British Orchestras (ABO). This provides for minimum basic rates, which individual orchestras may exceed if they wish. Names who have signed up include the LSO, LPO, RPO and Philharmonia, as well as more specialised ensembles such as the OAE, BCMG, London Sinfonietta, Britten Sinfonia and English Baroque Soloists.

The ABO freelance arrangement is that musicians get paid a flat rate for a concert plus rehearsal, with additional half-rate pay for extra rehearsals, and various allowances for expenses such as travel, subsistence, instrument porterage and so on.

The 2008/9 agreement imposes minimum rates varying between £81.45 (a tutti player with one of the smaller ensembles) to £149.20 (a Section Principal with one of the big London orchestras).

That's not per hour.

It covers a concert of up to 3 hours length, plus an associated rehearsal of up to 3 hours - basically a full day's work. Together with additional rehearsal pay and expense allowances, the total earned over a year would be broadly similar to the salaried arrangements already mentioned. And of course musicians of all types may in some cases be able to earn extra income by teaching, recording or moonlighting in other ensembles.

With British orchestras struggling to fill halls and keep ticket prices down to a level audiences can afford, it's hard to see how they could realistically pay more. But it must be hard for British musicians not to look enviously upon the comparatively astronomical pay of their American counterparts.

Comments

[A.Non]

This much is very true. In economic terms I guess that this shows that there is too much supply and too little demand. Is it possible that fewer orchestras could result in higher salaries? I think it could... But who is willing to start the cuts, and how best to do it?

When the UK has the deficit we have, the continued subsidy of large number of musicians surely cannot survive, especially not where there is a significant overlap in artistic planning and audience base. I'm not saying that this is necessarily a good thing - diversity of approach of ensembles, and the different sounds they make (etc etc) is surely desirable - but should the tax-payer really be supporting these to the extent they do at a time like this?

[Simon]

the tax payer support an awful lot worse!

[Jack]

Here you see, they do a lot for their money! Staatskjapelle Berlin is writing a Blog during the Tournee. And they earn no money for that! http://www.staatskapelle.wordpress.com

[violinhunter]

Well, well - compared to the pay musicians of old used to earn - prior to 1970 - these amounts are indeed astronomical. Any musician can easily live on half of what these pay scales show. The unions are, of course, to blame. I predict that in four or five years' time, they will have killed the golden egg goose. Look at the automakers. hehehe

[A.Non]

I thought I would come back and just and some hard figures to this.

Salaried tutti players in the UK, outside London, earn £24k - £35k.
The BBCSO pays rather better, presumably because it's in London, - £35.5k - just over £38k. Give or take the exchange rate as was, £38k isn't a million miles from the Cinncinati pay cited above., though obviously it's still lower.

Salaried section principals, meanwhile, are looking at £32.5k - £45.5k; though in London the BBCSO and ROH pay £47k - just over £52k

It's more difficult to analyse freelance pay because of the different ways it is calculated - rates per session, for rehearsal & concert, with media right, vanilla... etc.
But broadly, let's say for a rehearsal and a concert, a tutti play is looking at about £100 (£85 - £130), which tends to be - or often is - plus travel, porterage for larger instruments, etc..
Section Principals, on the same basis, are looking at £115 - £180.

I haven't been able to get any decent detail on the major London orchestras - only ENO, ROH & the two BBC bands, all of which pay somewhat better than the orchestras out of town.

Hope that's helpful.

[A.Non]

Incidentally - and this is a slight hit in the dark, since with the right statistics you can attempt to demonstrate anything - I just came across median household income figures for various countries, though not quite up-to-date (from 2005).

Applying those here, we see that:

USA median h/h $3,000
so let's take an orchestral salary at $84k, that says that the annual orchestral salary is 28x the median household income.

UK median h/h $2,300
x28, = $64k. Divide by 1.8, gives us £35k, which is what the better paying orchestras outside London pay their rank-n-file players.

In other words, comparing the two countries relative to their own income profiles suggests that UK salaries aren't quite as out-of-whack as one might think on first glance.

There's a lot more analysis one could do here, and it needs a number of countries and a variety of different factors to be addressed (it could also be interesting to compare data with orchestras that are largely publicly funded versus those mainly funded by the public or private donors); and we've hardly started when it comes to contracts including some media rights or additional payments for those... but the above is just one different perspective.