Tonight I was watching a documentary about the New York Times and the epic changes in the newspaper industry over the last decade or so, called "Page One."
I'm struck by the parallels with the challenges in the orchestra business, and particularly by the section discussing the demise of the Chicago Tribune, the LA Times and other papers under Sam Zell, who bought them under leveraged buyouts, saddled them with unmanageable debt, and ran them into bankruptcy (sound like any presidential candidate you can think of?).
Sam Zell had no experience in the newspaper or news reporting business, and he seemingly held nothing but contempt for journalism as a profession.
In the film they showed footage of what I think was a meeting between him and reporters at the Tribune, transcribed as follows:
Zell: My attitude on journalism is very simple. I want to make enough money so I can afford you. It's really that simple, okay? You need to, in effect, help me, by being a journalist that focuses on what our readers want.
Reporter: But what readers want are puppy dogs. We also need to inform the community.
Zell: I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I can't, you know...you're giving me the classic what I would call journalistic arrogance.
[At this point the film cuts away to commentary and then comes back. I'm not sure if there was any footage in between that was edited out.]
Zell: Hopefully we get to the point where our revenue is so significant that we can do puppies and Iraq, okay? Fuck you.
I can't help but draw a parallel to the lame, warhorse, give-them-what-they-want programming, marketing that panders to the lowest common denominator, and near wholesale adoption of a shallow, celebrity-driven conductor and soloist culture that, in my opinion, has made orchestral music essentially irrelevant in contemporary culture.
Yet another example of an executive shortsightedly trying to solve a financial crisis by putting out an inferior product. And making a lot of money in the process of destroying something that has immense social and cultural value.
