Orchestras expand recording options

By Anastasia Tsioulcas

NEW YORK (Billboard) - Not long ago, American orchestras considered the notion of creating new recordings an almost impossible dream.

Among the hurdles: longstanding union regulations that made the process untenably expensive in the United States, a market flooded with mid-priced catalog reissues and budget recordings that made new full-priced titles less appealing to consumers, changed financial expectations at major labels (demanding that classical recordings earn their keep rather than be prestige money-losing projects) and the sales woes of the broader recording industry.

But several world-renowned American orchestras have figured out how to start recording again -- many adopting a do-it-yourself mind-set that centers on digital retail. Already familiar to indie rock acts, the approach was entirely new terrain to orchestras that in decades past had enjoyed lavish contracts.

One major force that has shifted the current is a set of new agreements between the musicians and the management of many American and Canadian orchestras. In August 2006, more than two dozen orchestras signed a groundbreaking agreement with the American Federation of Musicians (AFM) that has made recording costs far more tolerable. Among the signatories are the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO) and the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra (ISO).

NEW MODEL

Under the terms of the agreement announced in 2006, live performances can now be recorded. (Past AFM agreements covered studio recording sessions and were structured as deals between the union and traditional record companies; this relationship has not changed.)

As a result, there is a new financial model in place for signatories of the 2006 agreements. Musicians participate in a revenue-sharing plan with reduced upfront payments, while retaining the power to veto recordings on a project-by-project basis. Furthermore, ownership of such recordings is retained by the orchestras themselves, but can be licensed out under short-term contracts to third parties, including traditional record companies. The 2006 agreement also explicitly covers digital sales.

Another agreement between management and the AFM, made in 2000, stipulated the creation of "local Internet oversight committees" that include management and musicians to deal with digital streaming and downloading opportunities.