Volume 21 Issue 3 - November 2015

The idea was to appeal to new audiences
and audiences aged under
35, not by changing the music
we play but by changing how
we were presenting it, giving it a
different surround. So by putting
music in other genres before and
after it, and having the classical
music presented from the stage, by
changing the lighting, by having
people bring drinks in, encouraging
social media, photography,
that kind of thing. And it’s been a
huge success. From a one-off event
it’s now a real part of what the
orchestra does, usually between
four and ten events a year – four
William Norris
large-scale and chamber events,
say, plus chamber events in pubs as
part of the London season.
Is there also a strategy at OAE of using, say, orchestra section leads
for chamber concerts, for outreach into schools, for example? They
do a lot of education work. In fact it’s quite interesting because the
education work is led by Cherry [Forbes] who used to play in the
orchestra as well, so she had a dual role, something like Charlotte
[Nediger] at Tafelmusik, bridging the orchestra/office’s two different
worlds. But they do a huge amount of work in schools with children
of all ages, and all sorts of public education. One of the real successes
of recent years has been what they call OAE Tots, concerts for children
under under five years old. Its amazing the kind of rapt attention you
can get from children under five if you’ve got the right material.
Brought by grandparents? Grandparents or parents, yeah, or ...
The grandparent/grandchild dynamic particularly interests me –
bypassing the generation between. If you can set it up so you take
away the stress for the adults in question of worrying that the children
have to behave in a particular way.
Yes. And it’s amazing because we’re still using core bits of the
baroque repertoire but we might put words to them or actions to them
that engage children and at the end there’s a good chance for the children
to come right up close to the instruments.
I want to go back for a second to something you said earlier about
OAE as a player-driven ensemble. It put me in mind of the Vienna
Philharmonic which is a player-run association – I don’t think it’s
even incorporated. But they decide which conductors to invite, as
guests, to lead them. In their case, though, they are also all employees
of the Vienna State Opera Orchestra on negotiated leave. So there
isn’t the worry of “who’s going to pay the bills?” So in the case of
OAE, who does pay the bills? That’s interesting because the other
unique thing about OAE is that it was founded with no government
money, no public money; it was all individual donors. Obviously in
the U.K. there are lots of ensembles funded at arms length by the
Arts Council, and now the OAE does get money from the government,
but it was a difficult decision to take at the time because they
prided themselves on their independence and not being answerable to
a government body. Even so, it’s still a very small part of it, less than
ten percent. The rest is individual donors, ticket income; but also lots
of it – it’s a different model to here – lots of the income comes from
touring; touring in Europe is a major part of an orchestra’s income.
And recordings? Less so these days because, sadly, now recordings
are more things you invest in.
In terms of arts council funding, a lot of what happens around here
is that, until you are well established, you’re compelled to undertake
new projects to apply for funding, so new funds entail taking on new
work that overextends the same little band of workers. Yes, that’s a
familiar problem. In a way OAE has been quite lucky. In terms of core
funding from the arts council we’ve been able able to demonstrate
the quality of what we do, and that’s been fine. Certainly if you want
to go to trusts and foundations, they want something new, so when
the Night Shift was started ... I wouldn’t say it was easy but certainly
it was slightly easier to find money, and now that it’s a core part of
what the orchestra does
it’s less easy to find
money for something
that is just continuing,
although actually what
made that project
successful was keeping
at it and developing it,
refining it, and building
that brand with the
right audience.
How does the fact
that the orchestra
performs exclusively
on period instruments
affect how the
orchestra can collaborate
with other musicians,
in something like
Night Shift, for example?
They can’t really, in fact. So what usually happens is the OAE
orchestral bit of the evening is usually a stand-alone thing and the
music, say, in the bar happens separately to that so we don’t have
problems with things like pitch. Having said that, we have done
collaborations, say with London Sinfonietta, which is contemporary
music; we’ve recently had a new commission written for both orchestras
which actually used the difference in pitch as something within
the composition. So we have done collaborations like that, and that’s
something I would be interested to do here as well I think.
One of the interesting things about Tafelmusik, in the same way as
a symphony orchestra in town does, is that it helps stabilize the life
of the core players. So they are able engage in all kinds of interesting
other musical stuff at times the orchestra isn’t playing. Does OAE
have enough critical mass to enable its players to do the same kind of
thing? I think it’s slightly different. It does a degree – I mean there are
100 concerts a year - but membership is more fluid than Tafelmusik
is; that’s also just how the European music scene is – everyone has
portfolio careers, and plays in other orchestras in London, or teaches,
or even plays with other orchestras outside London or even Europe, a
lot of the time, so it’s a slightly different environment. But one of the
great things, or possibly unique, about Tafelmusik in terms of period
instrument orchestras is to have such a stable core of musicians. It’s
really unusual and I think a great bonus.
And of course it develops into a two-way street; for example,
[Tafelmusik violinists] Aisslinn Nosky and Julia Wedman came to
Tafelmusik from I Furiosi; I think I was there the first time that
Jeanne Lamon and Christina Mahler came to hear I Furiosi on their
home turf, and things went from there, evidently to mutual advantage.
In London I guess it’s just that there are so many ensembles
there is no one ensemble which is that binding element, because
there’re just too many. But it’s interesting what a musician was saying
to me earlier about Tafelmusik and that having that stability is that
it encourages risk in a way because the musicians are secure in their
position and there’s not the feeling with each job that you’re being
assessed and might not get booked again. You have that security that
allows you to try things out which you might not have the opportunity
to do otherwise.
And does OAE also have an associated choir? Yes we do – the Choir
of the Enlightenment, you’ll be surprised to hear it’s called! A fantastic
choir and they do seven projects a year with the orchestra. It’s on
somewhat more of a loose basis than the choir here which is much
more part of the core of what the orchestra is all about.
I also wanted to ask you a bit about audiences. Tafelmusik has
always had a hardcore band of purists in its Birkenstock brigade,
I guess you could once have called them – you know, people who
emphatically draw “thus far but no further” lines in terms of musical
taste. “Early Mozart is fine,” for example. Has OAE gone through a
similar kind of challenge in terms of audience horizons? I guess I
would have had to be with them ten years before I arrived to know
that; interestingly, these days it’s actually the earlier boundary that
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