Among several orchestras with recently signed musician contracts is the Kansas City Symphony, where over the four years of the new contract musicians will receive a 19.7 wage increase, along with improved healthcare and long-term disability insurance. The contract was ratified more than a year before the current contract’s expiration in June 2017. At the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, musicians and management negotiated a one-year contract extension in June that includes a 1.33 percent pay increase effective September 12, and a 2.63 percent increase beginning May 1, 2017. The Buffalo Philharmonic has a new contract with musicians that goes through 2022 and includes a wage increase of 12.6 percent over the six years. The Delaware Symphony Orchestra has a new musicians’ contract through August 2019, with annual pay increases of 5 percent. The Grand Rapids Symphony announced a new collective bargaining agreement through August 2020 that includes pay increases, restores retirement-plan contributions, and makes no changes to health insurance. The musicians of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra have a new contract that includes a 9.3 percent pay increase and boosts the number of musicians from 74 to 76. The contract runs through 2019-20 and was signed fourteen months before the current contract’s expiration. The Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra musicians have ratified a collective bargaining agreement that includes a rehearsal schedule of one evening rehearsal per day instead of two rehearsals; financial terms were not disclosed. Musicians and management of the Nashville Symphony announced a new contract that provides a 4.5 percent base salary increase in the 2016-17 season and two increases totaling 5.3 percent in 2017-18. Under a three-year contract extension at the Oregon Symphony retroactive to September 2015, musicians will receive cost-of-living pay increases, following a pay freeze in 2014-15; musicians continue to receive full family healthcare coverage and pension contributions of 5 percent per year. The San Diego Symphony’s new contract for musicians includes an annual wage increase from $70,000 to $80,000 through the end of the contract in June 2021.
At press time, contract negotiations between musicians and management of the Fort Worth Symphony had come to a halt, and musicians went on strike on September 8. Contract talks had been underway for more than a year. At the Philadelphia Orchestra, the musicians’ one-year contract expired on September 12, and management and musicians were in ongoing talks while performances continued. At the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, contract talks were underway at press time, with an agreement to continue performances past the September 18 contract expiration.
