Orchestras Canada/Orchestres Canada

Archives: Resources

How to Produce a Virtual Ensemble Project

Donovan Seidle of the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra takes you through the process of creating a physically distant or virtual ensemble. Watch the full Facebook Live video here, or read this post in blog format below.

I use a 2010 MacPro for editing and producing. I’ve found it a great operating system for my creativity, and love its workflow. However, this type of work can be done on either a Mac or PC, and many of the tools I use work on either operating system. My list of tools is not exhaustive, and you’re free to explore the many options out there – there are a ton of great tools, and free ones too! We’ll go through this workflow on both Mac and PC. I’m not a video editor: I’m approaching this more as an audio guy, so if there are people on your team, or yourself that have tips and tricks that are better than these, please use them!

Our goal is to create synchronized music videos from many participants using current online technology. For ensemble work, there isn’t a solid solution to practice or perform together online that works. This is because of timing latency (the time it takes for something to transmit from one network location to another over the internet). There’s also trouble with audio dropouts, or unintended noise reduction. Some of these can be dealt with in the settings of Zoom or WebEx, but the quality of the audio experience for an audience is lacking – and we want to produce something better than that.

An ensemble has to be synchronized – in a recording session this happens with a conductor and a click track: we won’t have the luxury of being able to tune to one another, and adjust our tempo and rhythmic timing to one another – so a click track is a sure way forward. In order to do this, we need tools. Whatever platform you’re doing this on, here’s what we need:

Audio Converter Application: A way to convert audio to whatever format we want. Switch, $25 – Mac & PC
Video Converter Application: To downsample and standardize the many videos we will be receiving – we have little control over the devices being used to record. Uniconverter, $70 – Mac & PC
Multi-track Audio Editor (Digital Audio Workstation): To change timing, mix together, and tweak our final mix using all of the audio from our participants. Logic Pro X, free trial – Mac. Reaper, free – Mac. Cuckos Reaper or Cakewalk, free – PC.
Audio Editor: If needed Audacity, free – Mac & PC.
Video Editor: To compile all our videos into a mosaic, and make them all start at the same time. Final Cut Pro, free trial – Mac. Davinci Resolve, free – Mac. Filmora, subscription- Mac & PC. Sony Vegas Pro, $70 – PC. Adobe Premiere Pro, subscription – PC.

Define your project goals

Clearly define your project goals. Start small, and once you get the hang of it, you’re ready to expand. Try a test project first, which you can do on your own! Some guiding questions:

  • Is this an audio-only project, or with video?
  • How many performers do you need? Think about the final layout and “look” of your mosaic. Will it be an unbroken shot from start to finish, or will you have featured performers?
  • How long is the piece?
  • Are there tempo changes?
  • Will the participants record sections of music, or the whole thing all at once?

You can approach your project differently depending on your answers. Make sure you answer all these questions – they will inform you of what you need.

Synchronizing players

In a performance context, we are all synchronized on stage with a conductor, our ears, and our brains; which navigate the sometimes tricky dissonance between what we see, and what we hear. For a “recording session” like this, a well-defined beat that goes WITH the click, is really helpful. We don’t have the benefit of being able to push and pull our timing against our colleagues as we play – but we have a precise click that will keep us all in line as we separately record our music.

Ideally, we want some natural “push and pull” of the tempo; not just a steady metronome (which is also an option, and great for pop material).

The simplest solution

The simplest solution that allows us to collaborate with other musicians is an app called Acapella. You can record a video/audio track, and then record over the top of this up to 8 more times as we listen. By listening to ourselves carefully, we can stay on track, and harmonize and arrange.

Pros and cons: This cool tool provides us with a simple click, and our own recordings as a guide track. But after we record something, we can’t adjust timing or the mix; and the small number of screens isn’t a workable solution for the orchestras we love to work with, nor is listening to a single line of music suitable for synchronizing a whole symphony. We’re going to have to create something more flexible and precise.

You’re probably thinking “why can’t I just have a conductor on the screen, waving the all-powerful baton?” The success of that is dependent on consistency between your players: a baton largely gives subjective information: how precise is your beat? What happens when the music gets faster or slower, more rhythmic? A conductor is not meant to be a metronome: and there’s a lot more happening in an ensemble than paying attention to the beat. Your players are responding to each other, and the information dissonance between what they see, and what they hear, and navigating that difference in the moment. In this medium, they’re absolutely unable to respond to another player, unless there’s a guide track, and objective tempo information like a CLICK. A conductor is certainly helpful for conveying emotional information and direction in this context

Simple Click

Our next sync method begins with something steady: a metronome. This is the simplest click track we can have. For a steady click, you can even just record your metronome into your recording device.

But if we want to make sure our music has tempo or meter changes, we have to design that in.

Designed Click Track Grid

Our next sync method is a designed click track grid. This is the approach that most audio productions and movie scoring composers use.

This method is precise, it mirrors the scores that we have (in our heads or in our hands, as closely as we design into the grid, at least). I often use this method for my writing. It is as precise as a metronome and follows the score as closely as I’ve designed my grid.

Adaptive Click

We can also have the music “follow” an existing guide track. Let’s create that music guide, and do a technique called Beat Mapping, or Reclocking in order to match the grid of our project to the ever moving fractional tempo changes of all those individual beats.

This is the most musical solution. This music can come from anywhere – you could play it in, you could conduct as you hummed the part (which could be muted after you place your click in), it could be a pre-existing recording that you like…. Anything.

We have to make sure video and audio will be synchronized the whole way through the project. I find a visual and aural snap or clap to be very useful when lining up video and audio. We’ll do this in this next video. I’ll be using this final video as a little project, and apply the next steps to it, moving forward.

Your Guide Video

Include a greeting, a sync point (clap together on a count), and a few beats before the music starts. You could also include in your email to participants: a guide video link, sheet music, participant video submission link, recording instructions.

Receiving Submissions

Sending out the video: Guides like this can be created and sent out to your participants; you can host the guide on YouTube, your website, or send it to your players as a video file via email. Receiving large video files can be tricky. I like to use Dropbox, but Google Drive and WeTransfer work well for this too.

Processing Submissions

Once we receive submissions from our performers, the EASIEST way to proceed is just to bring them into our video editor, align them, and set up our mosaic. To solve issues of balance, it’s usually best to do some audio editing at this stage, and to make sure that all of our videos are in the same format.

Our first step is to make all the videos the same format. I like to work with Quicktime videos smaller than 720p, especially if we’re making a mosaic.

Math Moment: If we want our videos to have a 16:9 aspect ratio, this means something like 1920 by 1080 (1080p), or 1280 by 720 (720p). 720p or 1080p refers to the RESOLUTION of the video: how many pixels are in every frame. Less pixels means a smaller file size and less resolution. If you enlarge a tiny video too much, it looks pixelated and strange. Think about your final product, and decide whether you need full resolution video (for close-ups), or if small is fine for everyone.

Audio Processing

I like to edit the audio – sometimes the mix or balance isn’t right, because of recording volume. Sometimes we need some studio magic to make it sound great. First the simple steps:

There are likely more things to tweak. We can start to edit timing, and if we really want, get into pitch correction, and advanced stereo imaging.
We have our video mosaic already, so let’s bring in our completed audio, line it up, with the click point, and then create a fade in and fade out.

At this point, you have your video. You can host it on your website, send it out to your friends, family and social media platforms (as a link to a YouTube video, or uploading the file itself).

Review

  • Set your goals – know what you want to creatre
  • Create your guide (click, guide video/audio track, sync point clap)
  • Email participants (include how you want to receive submissions)
  • Receive & process submissions (convert, trim, separate audio, create video, process audio, assemble and render)
  • Deliver / host final product

Quick Tutorials

Fundraising and Marketing in a Time of Crisis

On April 17th, Orchestras Canada hosted a panel discussion with senior members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s staff team: Jeff Alexander (President & CEO), Dale Hedding (VP Development) and Ryan Lewis (VP Marketing & Sales). We recommend listening to the recording of the event, as it’s packed full of useful fundraising and marketing approaches, for all times, but particularly for during the current crisis. We picked out five (plus one bonus) tips from the discussion to share.

A recording of this session is available here.

 

1. “Never say no for the donor”

Dale spoke about how to approach fundraising for arts organizations at a time when there is such a strong need for support in the health sector. He spoke of the strong advocates that are working to support the sick, hungry and unemployed, and says that we need to be these advocates for our organizations. “If we can’t get people fired up and excited about what we do, who else will?” says Dale. We believe that the arts matter now more than ever, so we shouldn’t say “no” on a donor’s behalf. There are donors out there who particularly love to step up and be a hero during a crisis – it’s important to engage them and communicate clearly how their support will sustain the organization.

2. Tailor your communications to different stakeholder groups

Ryan talked about how important it is to ensure frequent communication with different stakeholders. This includes orchestra musicians, your board of directors, donors and volunteers, among others. Communications will need to be tailored to meet the needs of these different groups, and the platforms through which you engage them. The CSO is using tools like Zoom and Microsoft Teams for ‘live’ internal communication, and have been keeping in touch with patrons through email, regular mail, phone calls, and social media.

3. Marketers are fundraisers, fundraisers are marketers

Now more than ever a siloed approach from development and marketing departments is detrimental to an organization’s goals. It is important to ensure frequent cross-department/staff communication and collaboration on projects and messaging. Both fundraisers and marketers need to contribute to getting the right message in the right patron’s hands at the right time. “We don’t think about people as ticket buyers versus donors. They are our patrons, and we all have to manage that relationship and work together,” says Ryan.

4. Check in with your public and stay in touch with your audience on all channels

As the situation evolves quickly, so does people’s bandwidth for engaging with their local arts organizations. Dale spoke about frequently “taking the temperature” of their patrons. Donors are far more willing to re-engage now than they were at the beginning of the crisis in early March. With people’s perceptions, moods and personal resources being impacted at different rates, it’s important to stay in touch and to listen to what your audience is telling you. Use your social media and other points of contact with the public to inform future fundraising and sales approaches.

5. Get buy-in from your musicians on digital content

Ryan talked about the digital content working group they’ve formed, which is doing great work in having a diverse array of perspectives heard in producing digital content. At the CSO this group is includes musicians, marketing/PR staff and the technical team producing the work. They sent an invitation to their musicians to submit ideas and content to the group, with the caveat that not all content would be posted everywhere. They also sent tips to their musicians about best practices on filming themselves at home.

Bonus: Your public wants more of you

We often worry about inundating our audiences with information, taking up too much space in their inboxes or social media feeds. Dale and Ryan talked about how their audiences are engaging with the CSO at a higher rate than ever before, and they want more! With many people at home all day, the CSO team is finding a substantial increase in their email open and click rates and social media metrics. They’re hearing back from people that “they’ve seen every cat video, every virtual concert, and every Q & A video. And they want more.” It can be hard to push through an overcrowded online space right now, but it seems that people are still very much valuing the connections they find with their local orchestra.

A Letter to the Ontario Ministry of Heritage, Sport, Tourism and Culture Industries

Sent by email to the Honourable Lisa Macleod, Minister of Heritage, Sport, Tourism, and Culture Industries.

Dear Minister Macleod:

I am writing to thank you most sincerely for your advocacy on behalf of your Ministry’s many and varied stakeholders: as you’ve emphasized in your town hall meetings, Ontario’s heritage, sport, tourism, and culture industries are the proverbial canaries in the coal mine, feeling the impact of the public health measures required by COVID-19 both early and deeply. Thank you for that acknowledgment.

I’d also like to introduce my organization and the organizations and artists on whose behalf we work. I am executive director of Orchestras Canada/Orchestres Canada, the national association for Canadian orchestras. We have 130 member orchestras across Canada, and an astonishing sixty-nine of them are based here in Ontario. The diversity of Ontario’s orchestras (ranging from internationally-renowned ensembles that engage skilled professionals to perform at home in Ontario and on the world stage, volunteer-driven groups performing for neighbours and friends, our vibrant youth orchestras, seniors’ groups, big-city and small-town orchestras alike, from Thunder Bay to Ottawa, from Timmins to Windsor) is unique in Canada.

Each one of these charitable, not-for-profit groups is a source of pride to its community, and the 1366 live concerts that they performed last year – in venues ranging from concert halls to prisons, schools to parks – reached over 860,000 Ontarians. Ontario orchestras paid almost $42 million in artist fees in 2018-19; as well, they engage administrators, fundraisers, marketing personnel, and production crews as well as an army of volunteers to ensure that concerts happen, and that the public is well served.

In normal times, Ontario’s orchestras benefit from healthy and diverse revenue streams: our 2018-19 data confirms that orchestras earned 38.3% of their annual revenues (through ticket sales and sold services); raised 42.9% of their annual revenues (through charitable donations, sponsorships, and special fundraising events); with government funding (municipal, federal, and provincial) making up the final 18.7% (including 2% from provincial sources, principally the Ontario Arts Council). Ontario orchestras’ revenues in 2018-19 was almost $76.5 million; expenses (75% of which involved payments directly to people) totaled $74.3 million.

The measures necessary to combat the spread of COVID-19, in combination with the impact of turbulence in the stock market, have combined to create a perfect storm for our province’s orchestras: we’ve effectively lost access to over 80% of our revenues and while the full impact will likely be felt across two fiscal years (at a minimum), it is – and will be – significant.

Absent these revenues, orchestras with some cash reserves or borrowing capacity may be able to compensate contracted artists and administrators in the short term, but profoundly compromise their ability to re-open the doors with engaging programming when public gatherings are safe again; orchestras without cash reserves simply cannot pay their skilled artists and administrators, risking future access to these skilled professionals and delaying (perhaps permanently) their re-launch.

We’ve been following federal announcements about COVID-19 relief measures, and OC is encouraging our members to participate as appropriate.  We’ve also been following the province’s work, and we have some additional thoughts on the role that the Province of Ontario, through your Ministry and others, might play in softening the impact of COVID-19 and ensure that our orchestras are ready to welcome Ontarians – indeed, the world! – back to arts venues across the province when the time is right.

In brief, we ask that you:

  1. Ensure that the Ontario Arts Council can expedite grant payments to the organizations and artists that have been awarded grants, including multi-year commitments. If the OAC currently receives its allocation from the province quarterly, consider providing the OAC with at least 50% of its annual allocation now, so that grants can be released quickly. We also urge you to consider supplementary funding for the arts through the OAC.
  2. Help broker relationships between the intrepid Ontario arts organizations (including orchestras) that have developed wonderful, curriculum-linked on-line educational resources and the Ministry of Education, so that existing on-line education materials can be refreshed and made available to Ontario learners.
  3. Include representatives from the not for profit arts sector in your round table consultations on immediate mitigation measures and recovery-oriented initiatives, whether industry-specific or regional. While we have much in common with artists and companies on the commercial side of the sector, and with the other stakeholders served by your Ministry, our needs and contributions are distinct – and we’d value the dialogue with you and with colleagues across the province.

Again, Minister Macleod, Ontario’s orchestras value the work that you, your team, and the Government of Ontario are doing, and we look forward to continued and productive exchange. Many thanks.

Sincerely,

Katherine Carleton, C.M.
Executive Director
Orchestras Canada/Orchestres Canada

A Letter to Ministers from Orchestras Canada

We encourage you to download the PDF of this letter and to share it with your MP.

A template for a ‘cover letter’ email is also available for your use here:

Sent by email to: The Honourable Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Canadian Heritage; The Honourable Bill Morneau, Minister of Finance; The Honourable Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development; The Honourable Diane LeBouthillier, Minister of National Revenue; The Honourable Chrystia Freeland, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs; The Honourable Jean-Yves Duclos, President, Treasury Board.

Dear Ministers,

We write on behalf of 130 member orchestras – including 70 professional and semi-professional ensembles – across the country, the musicians they engage, and the communities they serve. We request your help in securing urgently needed assistance for artists, arts workers, and arts organizations grappling with the impact of COVID-19 and the necessary measures in place to control its spread.

In 2018-19, Canadian orchestras reached almost 2.8 million Canadians through live performances in concert halls and community venues, and millions of others through streaming and recordings. From St. John’s to Victoria, from Prince George to Charlottetown (and many places in between), Canadians benefit from orchestras’ activities, whether through public concerts, youth orchestra programs, seniors’ programs, community music schools, concerts in and for schools, newcomer welcoming, social prescribing and support to music therapy programs, and sheer, enriching pleasure.

The Financial Impact of COVID-19 on Orchestras

Mandated closures and the economic effects of COVID-19 mean that orchestras are looking at losing a minimum of 3 to 4 months of non-governmental revenue in the short term; followed by several challenging seasons of rebuilding attendance, donations, and ticket sales.

Our high-level estimate of the short-term revenue loss is this: there are over 70 orchestras in Canada, and collectively we are looking at losing between $38 million and $50 million in non-governmental revenues this season. This represents between 17% and 23% of our total annual revenue for the year.

We are currently working to survey our members to determine the impact in more detail, and will share those results with you as soon as we can.

We already know that this is creating significant challenges for employees and for liquidity. There have already been major layoffs announced at the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra and the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, and we anticipate many more announcements in the coming weeks.

We have identified the following actions to help orchestras address the immediate challenges of COVID-19 and the economic challenges it has brought.

Urgent Short-Term Measures

1. Access to working capital

Orchestras echo Imagine Canada’s request that the Government of Canada consider the needs of charities and not-for-profits in designing support and recovery programs, including enhanced access to working capital loans. The Federal Government can take immediate action to help orchestras by doing the following:

  • Accelerate payment schedules for all grants from government departments and arms-length funders for the 2020/21 fiscal year to help relieve cash flow pressures. This is an action that other levels of government, including the provinces of Ontario and Quebec, have already started to work on.
  • Remove the exclusion of organizations that further a charitable purpose under the Canada Small Business Financing Act. This will allow many orchestras across Canada to benefit from the leadership and support of Canada’s banks during this crisis.

2. Help us pay our people – to sustain us through the crisis and help us recover afterwards

Orchestras need access to immediate funding to ensure that they can honour their commitments to guest artists, staff, and musicians (both musicians with annual contracts, and freelance musicians contracted for individual concerts) through to the end of the 2019-20 season.

We recognize that, in common with many other industries, orchestras will commence (and, in fact, already have commenced) laying off people. We applaud the creation of the Small Business Wage Subsidy Program; as well as the Emergency Care Benefit and Emergency Support Benefit to support workers who would not normally be eligible for Employment Insurance. These will be an essential lifeline for many of the musicians and staff that we engage.

We want to work with you to ensure that our artists are eligible to participate based on the true extent of their work week, including permitting musicians to include practice and preparation time as hours worked for eligibility purposes. A typical collective agreement for a professional orchestra caps musicians’ onsite work week at eight 2.5-hour services per week; but the expectation is that musicians will have invested at least as much time in practice and preparation to maintain and sharpen their skills, and ensure that they are in top playing condition for all rehearsals and performances. Not unlike our elite athletes, musicians are continually “training” for their work.

While the Small Business Wage Subsidy, Employment Insurance and the Emergency Support Benefit—as announced—are of great help, orchestras are also in need of additional support, including enhancements to the Small Business Wage Subsidy and one-time funding to offset losses to enable them to continue paying essential staff and musicians throughout this crisis, for three reasons:

  • Music plays an essential role in bringing community together, and offering comfort and healing. We are excited about using digital platforms to sustain and extend Canadians’ opportunities to engage with music, and want to compensate musicians fairly for their work in this period of great uncertainty.
  • When larger community gatherings and travel become safe again, orchestras must be well-positioned to bring our communities back together. If orchestras file for bankruptcy or lay-off core staff and musicians for prolonged periods, they will face challenges in executing the marketing, programming, and fundraising plans that will make a quick recovery possible. Earned revenue (principally through ticket sales) made up 35.8% of Canadian orchestras’ income in 2018-19; it’s vital that orchestras are well-positioned to re-engage that revenue stream when public performances are again possible.
  • Contributed income through donations, sponsorships, and special events made up 40.2% of orchestras’ revenue in 2018-19. Maintaining relationships with community partners, donors, sponsors, and funders through this time of disruption is key to a quick recovery.

3. Help Canadians support musicians and orchestras by making early 2020 donations eligible for use in 2019 tax credits

Allowing 2020 donations (up to a certain date) to be credited to the 2019 tax year will help musicians, orchestras, and Canadians. Since charitable tax credits are offered by the Federal Government and Provinces, we see this as a relatively easy opportunity to coordinate assistance with Provinces.

  • It helps orchestras keep operating and paying people. In our financial modelling to date, donated revenue is the source of the single greatest uncertainty. Orchestras are charities; for many of us, contributed funds are our largest single source of revenue.
  • It helps reduce revenue losses from cancelled concerts and events by making it easier for our audiences to feel like they can support us by donating back the value of cancelled tickets.
  • It helps individuals at this crucial point by increasing their tax refund or reducing their tax payable.
  • It helps raise donations for artist support funds, such as the Actors’ Fund of Canada, Fondation des Artistes, and Unison Benevolent Fund.
Longer-Term Recovery Measures

We encourage the Federal government to start thinking now about the time after COVID-19, once social distancing can be eased or is no longer required to manage the health impacts of this crisis. The arts and culture sector has a major role to play in community resilience and celebration; forethought now will help ensure a stronger, more complete recovery later. Such measures could include:

Recovery and Resilience

Help people regain confidence with participating in large community activities again through:

  • Direct investments in marketing and promotion initiatives to rebuild audiences and revitalize relationships with our communities and with cultural tourists.
  • Direct investments in artistic programming designed to engage with community, restore social cohesion,and connect people through the arts.
Long-term financial measures:
  • A time-limited matching funding initiative, that enables arts organizations that are registered charities to get matching funds from the government for gifts to operating costs. In some cases, the matching funds could be directed to endowments to ensure short-term and long-term sustainability at the same time.

We are happy to contribute our ideas, and hope that we can work with you over the coming months to ensure strong plans are in place to deal with the long-term economic effects of this crisis. We are orchestras, and bringing people together is what we do. We look forward to continuing this work, for and with Canadians, in the near future.

We wish you well in your deliberations. Thank you. Sincerely,

Tanya Derksen
President of the Board of Directors
Orchestras Canada

Katherine Carleton, CM
Executive Director
Orchestras Canada

Advocacy Leave-Behind Document

As part of our advocacy work, we’ve prepared a leave-behind document, useful for meetings with federal and provincial members of parliament, or indeed for any meeting where you’re hoping to demonstrate the value of orchestras to a decision-maker. This document also highlights some key facts about orchestras in Canada, and summarizes our four most recent recommendations to the federal Standing Committee on Finance.

Holiday Repertoire by Canadian Composers

As part of our commitment to promoting Canadian content, we have added a Canadian Holiday Repertoire Library to our website and are inviting you to submit works appropriate for the holiday period, written by Canadian composers. We hope that this collection will grow and make it as easy as possible for music directors and artistic decision-makers to program Canadian content on their holiday concerts. Thank you to the Canadian Music Centre for consulting during the early development of this initiative, and for their ongoing support.

Some tips on using this library:

  • Export the entire library by using the Print (PDF), Excel or Copy buttons at the top of the table.
  • Select which columns are displayed by using the Columns button and toggling them on and off.
  • Filter what kinds of pieces are displayed by using the Duration, Ensemble or Suitability options at the top of the page.
  • Contact us if you have additional questions about how to use this library

Letter Template: MP Congratulations

With the 2019 federal election behind us, and the new cabinet recently announced, now is a good time to reach out to your Member of Parliament to make them aware of the important work that your orchestra is doing in their riding. In consultation with out government relations advisor, Éric Dubeau, we’ve prepared a template letter to send to MPs in your area, congratulating them on their election or re-election.

We encourage you to send letters to all MPs in your city/region, not just the one where your orchestra is located: match your correspondence to your audience data. If you don’t know who your MP is, or how to contact them, you can find their name and contact details here. We also encourage you to tailor this template letter as appropriate, making it specific to your orchestra, your region, and the party affiliation of the MPs you’re writing to.

  1. Sending this letter by email is possible, but a physical letter means that you can include a season brochure and other relevant materials.
  2. If you’re sending by post, be sure to use the constituency address, not the Parliament Hill address.

Analysis of the major Federal parties’ electoral platforms

As part of Orchestras Canada’s ongoing advocacy work on behalf of Canadian orchestras, we asked our government affairs consultant, Éric Dubeau, to prepare an analysis of the major Federal parties’ electoral platforms, with a specific focus on arts and culture commitments.

You can find the analysis here. (Updated October 17th)

Here in Peterborough-Kawartha, Orchestras Canada will be participating in an all-candidates meeting on arts and culture on October 9, and Katherine will be asking the candidates to talk about the Canada Council for the Arts.  We’d love to know what you’re hearing from your candidates – feel free to update Katherine by phone (705.243.6640) or email ([email protected]) if you have insights to share.

How to Get the Board You Need

Finding the right skill set for a board of directors is difficult. Yet, orchestras can rely on their boards for a variety of aspects, from fundraising to strategic planning and organizational direction. This guidebook was originally commissioned by one of OC’s predecessors, Orchestras Ontario in 1996, and revised in 2007. While much has changed in the intervening years, many of the challenges of building and sustaining an effective board remain.

This book focuses on the management of the nominating process: the composition, procedures and tasks of a nominating committee, the identification of new prospective board members, and their recruitment, orientation, development, recognition, and evaluation. In addition, it reviews the obligations of board members, the issue of board size, the role of honorary and advisory boards, and the desire for cultural diversity in board selection.

Arts Data You Can Use

From OC’s National Conference 2019: 

Aimé Dontigny and Alexis Andrew (Canada Council for the Arts) present a report on the Canada Council’s recent research relevant to orchestras. Highlights include a presentation of the Council’s recent analysis of Canadian orchestra trends; an introduction to the Council’s work on the qualitative impact of the arts; and an overview of the Council’s pilot survey of the demographic composition of Canadian artistic institutions’ employees and boards.

Slide deck available here:

Recording available here.

The Arts Facts using CADAC Data: 47 Symphony Orchestras research report is available on the Canada Council for the Arts website.