{"id":32916,"date":"2023-09-20T13:40:55","date_gmt":"2023-09-20T11:40:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/?p=188412"},"modified":"2023-09-20T14:39:57","modified_gmt":"2023-09-20T12:39:57","slug":"the-curse-of-bullying-in-music-how-it-needs-to-stop","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/rss_feed\/the-curse-of-bullying-in-music-how-it-needs-to-stop\/","title":{"rendered":"The curse of bullying in music: how it needs to stop"},"content":{"rendered":"

There is nothing civilised about bullying, says Richard Morrison <\/p>

By Richard Morrison\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Wednesday, 20 September 2023 at 11:40 AM<\/p>

\n\n

S<\/span>everal weeks of (one hopes) calming reflection have passed since that moment in France when <\/span>Sir John Eliot Gardiner<\/a><\/span> came offstage after conducting Berlioz<\/a>\u2019s The Trojans<\/i> and punched bass soloist William Thomas<\/a>. Gardiner, who is 80, has publicly apologised and withdrawn from engagements. <\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

His agent tells us that he has sought counselling for his mental health. Thomas, 29, also withdrew from the final performances in The Trojans<\/i> tour (including the BBC Prom), telling colleagues that the media pressure had become too much.<\/span><\/p>\n

So is that the end of the matter? If I write \u2018I hope not\u2019 I might be accused of spinning out a juicy story for low journalistic reasons. That\u2019s not true. Some aspects of this cautionary tale \u2013 for instance, Gardiner\u2019s sometimes abrasive behaviour and his high-handed treatment of the musicians in his ensembles \u2013 have been dissected in the press and (more viciously) via social media over the past few weeks. There\u2019s no point in continuing that. If and when Gardiner returns to conducting it will be up to individual musicians to decide, all things considered, whether or not they want to work with him. <\/span><\/p>\n

However, the incident has raised much more general concerns about the way the classical music business works, or ought to work. First, conductors with wealth (or access to wealthy friends) have always, in effect, bought themselves orchestras. <\/span><\/p>\n

Thomas Beecham<\/a> <\/strong>virtually bankrolled the Royal Opera House and several London orchestras for decades. Richard Hickox owed his early success to the terrific players he recruited for the modestly named Richard Hickox Orchestra (I don\u2019t deny that, in later life, he delivered many fine performances). <\/span><\/p>\n

There are young conductors and opera directors today who are equally privileged and equally adept at using their access to wealth to buy themselves interesting projects that get noticed in the press. Gardiner is not unique in having generous patrons. Indeed, you could argue that schmoozing is an essential part of the job of running any arts organisation, particularly when public subsidy is scarce.<\/span><\/p>\n

That need not be a problem if the conductor is also a decent, genial, fair-minded human being. The problem comes when the power to hire and fire colleagues, almost on a whim, is used as a weapon that enables abusive behaviour. That happens in all sorts of workplaces. <\/span><\/p>\n

I have seen it often enough in the newsrooms of even quite civilised broadsheets over the past 40 years. But the checks and balances put in place by other industries over my lifetime don\u2019t seem so apparent in music. Arrogant and offensive behaviour from a conductor is still tolerated, even (in some quarters) regarded as necessary in the pursuit of the highest standards.<\/span><\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t. It has always been possible to inspire wonderful music making without recourse to terrorism. Think of the monumental achievements of Mariss Jansons, Colin Davis, Bernard Haitink<\/a><\/strong>, Charles Mackerras, Claudio Abbado \u2013 people who were genuinely mourned by orchestral musicians when they died. Yes, they had exacting standards, but they also had a surpassing humanity that shone through their dealing with colleagues.<\/span><\/p>\n

And I think their attitude, rather than that of the machismo monsters, is the one that is prevailing among younger conductors today. Just thinking back to this summer\u2019s BBC Proms season, I witnessed brilliant results achieved by the likes of Dalia Stasevska, Nicholas Collon, Gemma New and Dinis Sousa (the conductor who replaced Gardiner for The Trojans<\/i>) without the slightest whiff of authoritarianism or egomania.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018You can\u2019t hold votes on what tempo the music should go,\u2019 Daniel Barenboim once rasped at me, when I plucked up the courage to ask him about allegations that he bullied colleagues. \u2018Someone has to take charge.\u2019 That\u2019s obviously true. And I don\u2019t deny that if you want an orchestra to achieve world-class standards in a hugely competitive environment, you have to make intense and unflagging demands. But those demands cannot include inflicting psychological (let alone physical) damage on your colleagues.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not just a question of behaving decently as a matter of course. It\u2019s also about respecting the very basis on which professional music is made, and for which we expect music-lovers, donors, sponsors and governments to pay \u2013 that it is one of the highest expressions of human civilisation.<\/span><\/p>\n

There is nothing civilised about bullying. <\/span>\n<\/span>Richard Morrison is chief music critic and a columnist of\u2004The Times<\/i><\/span><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n

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