Given the surge of audience interest in historically informed Baroque and Classical era music performance in the last 30 years, and the rise of high-quality early-music groups to satisfy that interest, a strange conundrum faces Chicago.
Inspired by the active European early-music movement and fueled by the recording industry, a host of scholar-performers from Boston to Berkeley has been devotedly changing the way we hear the rich repertoire that extends from Henry Purcell to J.S. Bach.
So, one might ask: Why hasn’t Chicago — which prides itself on its world-class symphony orchestra and world-class opera — become a center of world-class Baroque performance to rival other large North American cities?
Among the innovative groups that have captured the ears and imagination of audiences, especially younger ones, are Boston Baroque, Berkeley’s Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Toronto’s Tafelmusik ensemble, Cleveland’s Apollo’s Fire, the Seattle Baroque Orchestra and the fledgling New York Collegium.
It’s not that Chicago is without worthwhile early-music activity or qualified, capable musicians. The demise of the excellent, innovative period-instruments orchestra, The City Musick, in 1991, followed shortly by the collapse of a smaller group, Basically Bach, has given the 29-year-old Music of the Baroque a monopoly on local performances of the big Baroque and Classical choral and instrumental repertory, from Bach to Mozart.
Music of the Baroque remains the largest professional orchestra and chorus of its kind in the Midwest. Every other local ensemble that specializes in music written before 1750 has been obliged to operate in its long shadow. Obviously this has been good for MOB. But the situation doesn’t make for a particularly diverse or vital early-music scene — especially since MOB has fallen into ossified, predictable routine.
The suspicion also persists that the group, by virtue of its clout with foundations and other funding sources, has soaked up at least a portion of the funding that by rights should be going to smaller, more innovative early-music groups in the area such as the Chicago Baroque Ensemble, the Newberry Consort and His Majestie’s Clerkes. But they lack MOB’s reputation and community clout and are thus ill-equipped to rise to the next artistic echelon.
“One of the struggles we have with funders is when we tell them we are a Baroque performance group and they tell us, `Music of the Baroque already has that area covered. What are you doing there?’ It’s too fine a distinction for some people in this town,” says Jerry Fuller, executive director of the Chicago Baroque Ensemble.
Why, then, is MOB out of step with the kind of feisty, adventuresome, stylistically aware performances heard in other cities?
To begin with, MOB, which was founded in a Hyde Park church in 1972, has never had a concert conducted by anyone but Thomas Wikman. And the music director apparently has not solicited artistic input from anyone. If he has investigated the use of period instruments or has explored the historically informed avenues of interpretation made possible by those instruments, he has yet to bring that knowledge to bear on his performances.
Bolstered by the proven strength of its chorus and orchestra (drawn mainly from the ranks of the Chicago Symphony and Lyric Opera orchestras), MOB continues to command the loyal support of a mostly middle-aged public, many of whom have been subscribers since the group began. Big individual donors such as Sidney L. Port as well as major arts philanthropies such as Chicago Community Trust remain solidly behind the group. For the last eight years Community Trust has given MOB annual grants from $25,000 to $40,000 for general operating support.
MOB also has survived on the loyalty of its singers and instrumentalists. MOB musicians are thorough professionals who can give Wikman anything he wants. And even if his conducting seldom lifts the ensemble to heights of inspiration, for them the perks of playing under his baton are considerable. Although specific salaries vary and are a closely guarded secret, it’s well known that MOB pays its orchestra musicians well above the going rates for Chicago freelance players. But that may be part of the problem. The more a group pays its musicians, the greater their fidelity to that group, and the less inclined they are, generally speaking, to push for a change from the status quo.
So when did the hardening of the artistic arteries set in?
Some would say MOB began a slow decline after the death of Lucille Ollendorff, its dynamic first general manager and fundraiser extraordinaire, in 1987. But the group managed to coast along until last season, when steadily rising production costs and a chronically low ratio of earned to contributed income (MOB derives only about 30 percent of its budget from earned income, whereas the industry norm is between 50 and 60 percent) caused cracks in the foundation.
The first sign of difficulty was MOB’s cancellation of four announced performances last January of Monteverdi’s opera “Orfeo” — an expensive project the group had scheduled hard on the heels of two other costly programs.
The cancellation signaled a cash-flow emergency last spring that left the organization with a six-figure deficit, reported former executive director Rhonda Kess in April, two months after she was fired.
An experienced professional musician with an impressive background in administration, fundraising and performance, Kess spent only seven months at her post. But her own progressive nature probably doomed her from the start.
Recognizing the need for change at MOB, board chairman Elbert O. (Bert) Hand asked Kess to submit suggestions for needed improvements. She says she recommended the group bring in guest conductors; reduce the number of its performances; cut back on the number of churches in which it performs; and give more performances in more cost-effective venues such as Orchestra Hall. Kess maintains her recommendations would have saved MOB more than $200,000. (Her successor, Karen Fishman, says the board has since reduced the deficit to $13,000.)
Yet, soon after she turned in her report, Kess found herself out the door. Ironically, almost every one of her reported recommendations was adopted, in principle, for next season: MOB will have its first guest conductor, the Pittsburgh Symphony Chorus’ Robert Page; will give five fewer performances in three fewer churches than in 1998-99; and will return to Orchestra Hall for one program.
Kess remains perplexed about her dismissal. “Maybe I was perceived as a threat to Tom Wikman,” she says.
Hand insists the music director had nothing to do with her ouster, that it was strictly a board decision. “Rhonda didn’t have bad ideas at all (but) she was more ambitious about how fast we should go with these (changes) than the majority of the board. It’s a question of aggressiveness and pace,” he says.
But observers in the arts community believe Kess merely told MOB what it did not wish to hear. “No musical organization can function for nearly three decades with only one point of view,” says a prominent local arts CEO who did not wish to be identified.
Wikman says he would have welcomed artistic input from within the organization but that none was ever offered. “There were many years where no one wanted to become involved. It was a hands-off board,” he says. “Now they are more involved, and there’s more discussion about what to do.”
Although board members refuse to cite figures, Wikman is reported to draw an annual salary of $93,000 — for what many feel is essentially a part-time job. MOB pays more than top dollar in other areas as well. The music director brings in harpsichordist Michael Bahmann from out of state despite the fact there are several continuo players just as good — also less expensive — in Chicago. On average, a CSO player who “jobs” with Music of the Baroque can expect to take home anywhere from $3,000 to $4,000 a season, good money for a local musician. And a handful of key MOB orchestra players, including the concertmaster, principal second violin and cello, and two trumpeters, draw an estimated three or four times that amount.
A voice teacher, organist and musical scholar, Wikman achieves his finest results with the MOB Chorus, a number of whose members study voice with him. The music director has given audiences some admirable performances, notably in the Monteverdi opera cycle he led from 1993 to 1996. But these have been outnumbered by dry, metronomic readings infused with little or no inspiration. And the situation, alas, seems to be getting no better fast.
“Tom has gotten lazy and wings it a lot from rehearsal to performance,” reports a string player who performs regularly with MOB. “He used to be better about giving us phrasings and articulations. Now he doesn’t mark the parts thoroughly, doesn’t meet deadlines and waits too late to make interpretive decisions.”
When pressed for a response, Wikman insists he has always enjoyed a smooth working relationship with his players. “I consider it an utter joy to work with such a wonderful band of musicians,” he says.
“Inside any organization, people are going to have different opinions and want something done differently,” he adds. “Every conductor does some things in performance he doesn’t do in rehearsal. I always feel I’m trying to work at a consistent vision (of the score). I don’t have any doubt in my mind about what I’m trying to get out of the piece.”
Undaunted by the past season’s fiscal and administrative problems, Music of the Baroque is entering its 29th season in decent financial shape on a budget of $1.35 million. Board chairman Hand says he expects MOB next year will post a budget surplus. Seven programs have been announced, including Bach’s Magnificat and Purcell’s “Dido and Aeneas,” plus a performance of the Mozart Requiem at Orchestra Hall. There will be two “name” soloists, singers Susanne Mentzer and Elizabeth Futral.
And the board, according to Hand, will be involving itself more actively in MOB’s artistic as well as financial destiny.
“We will change things over time (but) we’re not going to do everything at once,” he says. On the horizon will be an increase in the number of guest conductors and perhaps guest ensembles from outside Chicago. “Over the next two or three years you will see MOB becoming a very different organization in terms of what we do and where we perform,” he adds.
As for Wikman’s future with the group, Hand says, “There is not a faction on this board that wants to get Tom out of MOB.” But, he adds, “If Tom or any other member of this organization becomes an impediment to its growing and changing, that would call for another look at what we are doing.”
Barring a major loss of funding or serious audience attrition, MOB can probably continue indefinitely in much the same musical groove. But that will hardly lift the organization out of artistic mediocrity, nor will it do anything to redeem Chicago’s reputation as a city that jeopardized its chance to become an innovative, nationally respected center of early-music performance.
